Wednesday

Solid Brass And Bronze Shelf Brackets

Apart from being sturdy and durable, solid brass and bronze shelf brackets make a good choice to adding décor and elegance to any shelving arrangement. For many generations shelves have continued to be used not only or the purpose of storage of items, but also for the element of decor associated with them. Perhaps this was one of the earliest accessories discovered and designed by mankind to facilitate storage and display.

A shelf is the simplest weigh carrying structure that one could imagine. Its design may vary from being the simplest to the most decorative. Different materials like wood, stone and metal have been employed for making of shelves, bur the advantage of using solid brass is that it can be cast to get a number of intricate designs and aptly finished to suit any decorative style.



Inclusion of solid brass shelving into any space brings its special aura. Brass is one such material that can be exploited to usher in novel and exciting designs to otherwise bare and simple shelves. Apart from that, this metal can bear heavy weights without any fear of getting damaged in the process. Of course, they need to be fixed up properly to bear heavy weights.

The vast variety of solid bronze and brass shelving being produced these days in simple and intricate designs makes it very convenient to choose a design and style that goes well with almost any design of interiors. The choice is so wide that you can easily introduce them to have new theme in your home or add to the décor of your existing style and arrangement.

You need to follow a few simple steps and precautions while installing new shelves or replacing the old ones. You should not overlook the weight of the objects to be displayed in the shelves, and if need be, you should provide more than two brackets. Remember that it’s not the weight of the objects alone, brass is a heavier metal, and the bracket has to support its own weight also.

To ensure a uniform distribution of weight, the brackets should appear in the middle of the shelf. Further, you may be required to replace your existing or worn out doorknobs and cabinet knobs to have a uniformity of design with the newly acquired shelving. And, finally look for an appropriate lighting arrangement to highlight your shelving. You can surely get many ideas if you browse thru some design or home décor magazines. Else, engage an interior designer for getting the desired effect in your room.

It’s not much of an effort to locate the kind of solid brass shelving that you may have in mind. You may shop online or visit a store. Be on the look out for solid brass, bronze or iron shelving for durability and sturdiness. You can create a beautiful theme by choosing different styles and shapes of solid brass in such a manner that they jell with each other. You may view and buy solid brass shelf brackets online from Look In The Attic & Company; they are pleased to offer you free ideas and help on designing of such shelves.

Saturday

Metal Shelf Brackets - Use Them For Decoration

The very mention of metallic shelf brackets is very discouraging to most of the people, who imagine these to be just factory produced crude looking uneven pieces of angle iron that are often used to support shelving in manufacturing plants or garages. There is no doubt that such type of brackets continue to find wide application in and out of manufacturing industries but what is not so well known is the fact that there is large and beautifully styled collection of decorative brackets in different metals for being used a number of applications other than just supporting of shelves.

There is a vast variety of decorative brackets available in different metals like aluminum and steel and their respective alloys. We get sturdy cast iron brackets, forged iron brackets in unique designs and beautifully detailed aluminum brackets. Further, these metals can be treated to get different colors.

Materials Used In Decorative Metal Brackets

Aluminum Brackets:

Aluminum metal comes in silver white color. It is a good conductor of heat and electricity. Its alloys are extensively been used to replace a steel in a lot of applications involving hard, light weight and corrosion resistance parts. Some of the alloys have high tensile strength and durability and give the same technical feature as iron at one third of the weight of the latter. Strong and durable Aluminum bracket are prepared by casting from No 319 Alloy of aluminum

metal shelf brackets

Cast Iron Brackets:

Cast iron is characteristically brittle and hard. It can not be given a shape by rolling, pressing or hammering as is the case with wrought iron. Though hard and brittle by nature, it is capable of withstanding high compression loads. It derives its name from the fact that it needs to be melted and put to a cast to give it any desired shape. This feature makes it most suitable for mass production of items at low prices. From one mold you can make hundreds of copies.

Tole Iron Brackets:

Tole is made from iron by rolling it in thin sheets. This is then cut to different shapes and designs like leaves or flowers that can be welded to forged brackets.

Wrought/Forged Iron Brackets:

Forging is a process wherein a piece of heated iron is hammered down on an anvil to bring it to a desired shape. Designs are made from rods of wrought iron that are heated and bent to get desired effects.

wrought iron brackets

Ideas for Using Decorative Metal Brackets

Their availability in sizes varying from 4” to 24” makes corner brackets enables one to use them for a wide application, be it for supporting shelves and counters to framing windows and doorways. The beautiful designs them come in, is prompting for any one to give shape to his or her creativity.

Corner Brackets

Corner brackets present a very distinctive way of highlighting an ordinary looking doorway or a window. You just need to fix a pair of elaborate brackets at the corners of an opening to add decorative value to a doorway or an entrance. You could also use them in conjunction with posts to beautifully highlight your front or screened-in porch. You get these decorative brackets in a range of styles and are designed to give a rustic or traditional look. Whatever be you style, you are sure to come across some that meet with your discerning taste.

Counter Support Brackets

Beautifully designed and styled brackets in cast or wrought iron are available to go with any décor. Should you have any creative ideas, feel free to design something unique of your own! Primarily not meant or designed to support counter overhangs, their shape and strength is prompting for being used as replacements to wooden brackets or corbels. Quite many people, including some kitchen designers, have very successfully exploited them to bring in a feeling of freshness to their homes or kitchens.

Hanging Brackets

Decorative hanging brackets offer enormous possibilities of being used around the house, particularly in open spaces like your lawn or kitchen garden. Here’s your chance to demonstrate your creativity by putting them to use for supporting a plant or a bird feeder or even for hanging a candle holder.

Mailbox Brackets

One may explore the possibility of combining intricately detailed designs of aluminum and iron brackets to create an ornamental support for a mailbox.

Mantle Brackets

In stead of using the conventional wooden brackets, experience the thrill of using attractive cast or wrought iron bracket over the fireplace.

Monday

Floating Storage Shelves Tips - How To Build Them

It will not be wrong to say that most house owners use the garage as a storing, or more appropriately, a dumping place for all the unwanted items at any part of the year. Any item that is infrequently put to use is sent to the garage. The list of such items too long and varies from sporting equipment to old dated electronic devices. As a consequence, over a period of time a garage loses its main purpose of parking a car.

Perhaps to some extent this practice can’t be helped out, as everybody wants to have a neat and organized home. But, why people fail to extend the same idea to management of space in the garage is a difficult question to answer. May be there is no arrangement for a proper storage of items. Ever thought of having some kind of shelving over there? It could surely simply things and facilitates better organization of space and objects. It will be an interesting DIY project too. As a result you will be left with a lot of extra space even after you have properly placed your tools and hardware.

Basically there are two types of garage shelving: the pre-fabricated kind and the custom built type. As can be expected a pre-fabricated product will be cheaper. This kind of shelving is conveniently available in various sizes and designs at any local handyman or a lumberyard. To further facilitate your project, building plans for shelves are offered by most of the home improvement stores.

Plywood or lumber is most often used for making of garage shelving that is kept in place by using shelf brackets. In such cases the brackets are attached to the studs by means of long screws. These may be further strengthened by bracing the studs. There is an option of using floor supported shelves also.

Material

Though plastic shelves can be used to a good extent, using pre-fabricated steel shelves make a better choice in the long run. One, because they have more life and two because plastic shelves are designed for light duty and are not well suited for heavier objects that you will eventually store on those. The drawback of steel shelving is that you can’t cut it to different sizes and have to go for standard sizes. So make sure to have a right assessment of the sizes needed if you wart them to fit perfectly.

Adjustability

Do not neglect this feature of adjustability when you decide to go for pre-fabricated shelves. For a better utilization shelves should be adjustable and the pins needed for the adjustment should have a locking arrangement to ensure that those are not misplaced or lost.

Safety

Take all the necessary measure to ensure that the shelving remains attached to the walls and it can’t trip. Otherwise it will be quite a risky and dangerous affair when you have them loaded with heavy objects.

Hooks

You can adopt another space saving measure to make still better use of shelving by having hooks into the ceiling joists. That’s a smart idea for hanging of bicycles, canoes and other miscellaneous tools.

Getting rid of clutter

Any amount of shelving will prove to be insufficient if you do not develop the habit of periodically spending some time in the garage and get rid of unwanted and discarded clutter.

Friday

Floating Glass Shelf Brackets

Glass shelving most often finds an application in the bathrooms but that should not prevent one from trying it at other places in the house. Try to picture glass shelves, in a corner of the kitchen at your eye level, with glass containers filled with colorful beans and other such kitchen-ingredients. You may also have one with family photos in a corner of one of your favorite rooms to get that feeling of warmth. The best feature of glass shelving is that it doesn't occupy any floor-area and gives an uncluttered look. Their contents almost seem to give the impression of floating in air, thus imparting a clean and beautiful look to the area around.

Well, the primary function of the bracket is to support the shelving. But, glass being such a transparent material is unable to hide anything, not even the brackets that support it. That's why it is good to have supporting systems that add to the beauty of glass. This continues to prompt designers to design brackets to enhance the grace of shelving. As such, it is not desirable to use brackets designed for glass shelves for supporting another kind of shelving.

Glass shelf brackets generally tend to be lightweight and delicate and in certain cases intentionally kept shorter than other types of brackets. It is understandable that a large bracket may dominate the glass shelf and thus present an uneven look to the shelving. Larger brackets are required when there is more of weight, be it of the shelving or of its contents. Glass shelves purported for display are not expected to be so heavy to call for larger brackets. It's only if you are going to use the shelving for storing of items that add to weight and necessitate a bigger bracket.

glass shelf brackets

The nominal-sized glass shelf brackets are rails or clips. Such brackets hardly stick out of the wall, are often made of chrome, thus giving a glass like shine and naturally blend with the shelf that they support. These are first mounted on the wall, and subsequently the shelves are fitted onto them. No screws are driven thru the glass to keep the shelf fixed. In stead, they are provided with specially designed headless-screws that push down and grip the shelf in place. Their size is governed by the weight and thickness of glass that they are designed for. Rails and clips are recommended for glass shelves for keeping very light items and can't be used for display of heavier items.



There are many pages devoted on the subject of shelves of different design and materials, shelving accessories, brackets and much more at The Home Shelving Guide. The kind of information that is gathered there surely needs a visit by you.

If you have plans of keeping heavier items on these glass shelves and fear that this might cause sag, you should use only standard glass brackets. These brackets are designed to have more width than the width of the shelf. As such, the end that is not fixed into the wall will project out from the shelf but it ensures that all the base of the bracket is firmly supported. Thus you won't have to worry about sagging or depression of any kind.

These brackets have a raised foot on the end or an extended lip that firmly keeps the glass shelf in place. As we know that glass slides easily on the metal it is important to have a suitably designed bracket that prevents the shelf from gliding away.

There are a very large variety of brackets available for glass shelves. Depending upon your budget you may a choose one that goes well with the rest of décor, keeping in mind the kind of support your glass shelf might need.

Sunday

Decorative Shelf Brackets - It's Time For A New Look

Decorative shelf brackets often fail to get the kind of attention they deserve from the viewer, though even the shelf edging tends to draw the attention of the viewer.

Did it ever occur to you that rather than changing the old shelving, you could enthuse a new life to them by just choosing ornamental shelf brackets?

Brackets are available in a wide variety of materials. You may have them in metals like wrought iron or chrome, not to mention those gracious ones in natural wood. They are pretty-looking accessories that go to highlight the system they support and an appropriate selection goes to add to the charm of the room.

Shelf bracket is supposed to jell with the surroundings. Modern chrome brackets would look better in a bathroom, while a cast iron Victorian bracket should go to enhance the looks of a foyer or formal dining room.

If you search on the web, you'll be amazed at the variety of decorative shelf brackets. There is a wide variation of pricing too that may vary from less than a dollar to a couple of hundred dollars. To avoid confusion and to simply your purchase you should decide before hand the required quantity and a style to match your budget. You should not ignore the only technical criterion: that is the weight your bracket is going to hold. You should be more careful of this technicality while purchasing decorative brackets.

Size is of utmost importance. Primarily the bracket should offer proper support to the shelf. Make sure that the bracket you buy is neither to big nor too small for the shelves. If they're too big then they'll project out but if they're too short the shelves would remain unstable and may fall down. The bracket should not be protruding out by more than an inch from the outer edge of the shelf.



To learn more about shelves and brackets, have a look at The Home Shelving Guide. It offers a lot of info on the subject and has definite recommendations on shelving. You may get prompted to venture into making your own shelving!

With a bit of imagination and some inclination, you can avoid spending money on buying expensive brackets. Instead, make use of some of the unused items lying at home. Else, make a trip to a flea market to buy some items that could be turned to expensive-looking brackets. Some of the items that come to mind are old hockey sticks, baseball bats or discarded toys of your children. The only factor that you need to keep in mind is that they should provide a firm support to the shelves, the intended ultimate purpose.

You may craft brackets from so many materials to match the theme of a room. Why not try glued-together kitchen paraphernalia for an eye-catching set of brackets in the kitchen? Or you may stick together old videocassettes to a thin metal bracket and convert those to a shelf next to the TV. It's fine if you don't want to go thru the hassles of putting together such odd items. You surely could buy inexpensive brackets and beautify them.

Try sticking CDs onto brackets for an arresting stereo shelf or decorate the plain shelf brackets in a little girl's room by making use of girlish items like ribbons, bows or some parts of a worn out doll. The limit is endless if you possess the inclination and have sometime at hands!

Friday

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Wednesday

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Monday

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