How We Made Our DIY Kitchen Island Look Custom-built

Okay, so you’ve stacked a few cabinets together and are wondering how to make your DIY kitchen island look more, uhh, professional? We got you.

Look guys, we’ve been doing this DIY thing for a little while now and I feel like every time we finish a project, we say it’s our favorite one. But this DIY kitchen island is actually our favorite.

Our weirdly enormous kitchen (this isn’t a humble brag, it’s disproportionately large for our small house) was just waiting for an island and who are we to deny it? So, we stacked three unfinished kitchen cabinets side-by-side and secured them to our tile floor (we did a tutorial on that last week if you’re wondering how this wizardry works, too).

But then it was just three cabinets on the ground which is not really a high-end look, so here’s how we built around the island to add some much-needed support for the butcher block counter and a cute little bookshelf for our cookbooks.

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Tools & Materials

Add the inner support

So we knew from the get-go that the bookcase would be the countertop support on the right side, but we needed to figure out a solution for the left side so it A) didn’t look lopsided, and B) had the same amount of support on both sides.

We grabbed a few scrap 2x4s and made two big rectangles using pocket holes (but you could easily just use screws if you’d like).

I won’t give dimensions because it’ll be specific to your counter and cabinet situation, but we knew we wanted the support inset from the outer edge of the countertop by a few inches, so we just measured from the back side of the cabinet to where the countertop would end on the stool side and subtracted the gap we wanted for the overall width of our rectangles. Then the height was easy, of course, because it just had to be the same height as the cabinets.

We duplicated our first 2×4 rectangle and put them side-by-side, which is honestly just personal preference because we wanted the support to match roughly how thick the bookcase would be on the other side.

We attached the 2×4 rectangles to the cabinets by adding a few screws from the inside of the cabinet into the rectangle.

Build your bookcase

We used a 1×8 for this. We had two one piece that was the whole height of the base cabinet for one side, and another piece that was the height of the base cabinet minus the height of the baseboard (ours was a 1×6 ripped down to 4.5″ tall). We had two shelves, and set the bottom one to align with that shorter side piece, using a level to make sure it was straight on the other side before nailing in place from the outside of the side 1x8s. We added another shelf roughly in the middle of the opening.

Finally, add a piece of ¼” plywood to the back of the bookcase with a nail gun and wood glue.

Attach the bookcase to the outer cabinet

Now you’ve got a whole bookcase. Grab a piece of scrap wood you can cut for supports (we used three pieces of 2×4 cut to about 4.5”), and hold the bookcase in its place, making sure it’s aligned with the front of the cabinet.

Slide your supports underneath (this will probably be a tight fit so you might need to wedge it or even use a mallet to tap it into place) and nail through the back of the bookcase into the cabinet in a couple of places.

Add a plywood wrap

The bookcase is looking pretty fancy, but the rest is just kind of cobbled together. Using the same ¼” plywood you used for the back of the bookcase, cut a piece to cover the whole back of the cabinets where the stools will go, a piece for the inside edge of the 2×4 support rectangles, a piece for the front of the 2×4 supports, and one more piece for the outside of the island on the 2×4 support side. Nail all those pieces into place with your nail gun.

Add baseboards

We ran a baseboard of 1×6 ripped down to 4.5” (ripped meaning we ran it through the table saw longways so instead of 5.5” tall it was 4.5” tall) along the whole outer edge of the island, beveling the edges so they looked more seamless in each edge.

Add trim

I’m going to be honest with you here: my plywood pieces were terrible. I cut the plywood using a jigsaw on our kitchen table and let me tell ya, that plywood was thin and wobbly and so were my cuts.

But not to worry: trim is your best friend. I would eat a makeshift cheese platter and sip wine with trim, then listen to its boring boy problems. I truly love it that much.

Anyway, we used a basic square trim and made so many cuts to go over all the edges, frame out the front and side pieces, the inside piece where the stools go and a couple of decorative details on the stool part. We just used our nail gun to line everything up and keep it in place.

Caulk and wood fill

We wood filled each hole (which was a lot because we got wild with that nail gun) and caulked all the seams (which were also a lot because we used so much trim) but this step is so worth it for that really profesh finish.

After the caulk had dried a while and the wood filler turned white, we used a sanding block to flatten the nail holes out, and then wiped the whole thing down so there wasn’t any dust.

So there you have it, you’ve got a fresh AF DIY kitchen island that probably looks like you paid thousands. Oh, wait…. Right. It’s not painted and doesn’t have a countertop. Well, we’ll be detailing the process of using our brand new paint sprayer next week. Spoiler: We love it and it’s a total DIY game-changer if you’re looking for a new toy.