Moving from a 3,200 square foot home to a 1,400 square foot house made storage a top priority. A few weeks ago we added two major storage upgrades that have already changed how we live in the new space. We bought simple IKEA Bestå cabinets and, after assembly and installation, gained the equivalent of eight large cabinets’ worth of storage. That felt huge since our kitchen only has seven cabinets. Delivery was straightforward (there was roughly a four-week wait), and the installation left us ridiculously pleased with the new breathing room.
The change is dramatic. It’s almost like we added a closet—only in the form of three large cabinets placed around the house. Let’s start upstairs in our family room. Before, a small console table and fabric baskets held board games, but digging through baskets to find a specific game was inconvenient. Open shelves that display games front-facing are much more user-friendly.
We replaced that small console with a nearly eight-foot-long glossy white console made by joining two IKEA Bestå cabinets. Now every game is easy to see and grab, and all of our photo albums, yearbooks, and keepsakes have a tidy home in the family room instead of being scattered around the house.
Although we’ve shopped at IKEA for nearly twenty years, this was our first time using anything from the Bestå line, which is designed for media storage. Their standard sizes fit our spaces almost perfectly, both in the family room and in the bedroom, which made planning and installation much easier.
We ordered four 47″ cabinet boxes—two for the family room and two for the bedroom. Each cabinet has two compartments and can be customized with shelves, doors, legs, and a countertop. To create the long console, we joined two cabinets together using the hardware and instructions included by IKEA.
We added the manufacturer’s recommended legs to give the unit a furniture look rather than a built-in feel. IKEA provides a connecting bracket that allows a single leg to support the middle of two joined cabinets, which keeps the center from feeling bulky with redundant legs. We also installed discreet metal support legs underneath to prevent any sagging over time.
If you prefer a floating look, Bestå boxes can be mounted to the wall using suspension rails for a fauxdenza style. For now we kept the legs and secured each box to the wall to prevent tipping.
We chose legs because we wanted the piece to read as freestanding furniture. The right side of the wall has raised paneling that would look awkward if we tried to build the cabinets into it, so the freestanding option felt cleaner. We may eventually add a countertop to hide the seam between the two cabinets, though it hasn’t bothered us so far.
We’re considering swapping the stock doors for custom fronts from a vendor that makes panels for Bestå, perhaps in a wood grain or a color. For now we really like the glossy white IKEA doors and are in no rush to change them.
The TV needs a slight repositioning to center over the console, so that’s a small task on our to-do list. From the side the alignment reads fine, but from straight ahead the TV is just a touch off.
One cabinet door holds all of our board games, while the other three compartments store puzzles, photo albums, extra books, and sentimental items that had been scattered around the house. Everything is now consolidated and much easier to access.
In the bedroom we replaced a white printer/filing cabinet that had been acting as a catchall with matching 47″ Bestå cabinets placed symmetrically on either side of the fireplace. The paired cabinets look more polished and symmetrical, and they added a significant amount of storage for decor and gear.
These cabinets hold camera gear, a podcast mic, a tripod, spare frames, and decorative items that aren’t currently in use but will be rotated or moved into a guest studio when we set that up. One side functions as a decor stash with vases, sconces, pots, and extra accents.
Eventually we plan to “hack” these bedroom cabinets to look built-in: adding filler pieces, a continuous countertop, new hardware, and a matching baseboard so they integrate with the room. That project is on hold until we make progress building a closet wall—once that side wall exists, the cabinet will have a natural termination point and the fireplace will be centered on the wall span.
For now the clean, simple look is a huge functional upgrade. We delight in small organization wins, and adding thoughtful storage has made the home feel calmer and more practical.
We’ll share the closet and custom door-front plans when we get to them. In the meantime, these Bestå cabinets have been one of the simplest, most impactful updates we’ve made since moving in—big storage gains with a minimal footprint and a polished result.
We’re excited to continue updating this house and will report back when we begin the closet build and the cabinet tweaks. For now, we’re enjoying the extra organization and the calm that comes from having a place for everything.
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