Make An Ikea Pax Wardrobe Look Built-In, step by step

Since our bedroom used to be a living space, it came with absolutely zero closet space. This was obviously a big downgrade from the fancy walk-in closet in our last house. BUT ALAS! Watch how we built in some floor-to-ceiling Ikea Pax wardrobes to create simply as much storage as our last closet AND make them look like they’ve been there all along…

For comparison, our last home’s walk-in closet was an 8′ x 6′ room. Each side had one 29″ wardrobe in the middle flanked by two 19″ wardrobes on each side. That is 67″ of linear closet space along each wall, for a total of 134 inches.

In this home, we used the exact same Pax systems across a single wall in our bedroom. The configuration here is three 39″ wardrobes plus one 19″ wardrobe on the end, for a total of 136″ linear inches. Yep, so that 2″ more than our last set-up (if we are splitting hairs).

It is wild to us that our last house had a dedicated 48 square foot room to accommodate this amount of storage, and in our smaller closet-less room we simply ran the wardrobes along a wall, and still managed to work in ! Talk about living large, even while downsizing. It is fairly remarkable.

So this post is to show you how we crammed all of that storage into our smaller bedroom (along with the biggest bed we have ever had). Plus, we will detail exactly how we make them look fully built-in.

Why Use Ikea Pax Closets?

Ikea Pax wardrobes are budget-friendly closet solution that offers a lot of customization and organization options. We fell in love with them 15 years ago when we first used them to add clothing storage AND create a cozy sleeping nook in our first house. There are dozens of configuration options, interior fittings, door styles, and more so you can tailor your Pax to your needs. That is why we have used them again and again, including for our “fanciest” closet makeover in our last house.

You can check out that closet reveal post for all the details (how much it cost, before & afters, how we organized it, and even a video tour). You can also see how we organized our current closets for maximum storage.

That post also includes a drawer-by-drawer video tour if you are curious!

Why Add Another Closet Now?

When we originally brought in the Pax wardrobes to our current bedroom in 2021, we left space on one end for a doorway that we were planning to move there eventually (right now it is simply around the corner of that wall below). But we tabled that change, meaning we could turn that blank wall into more storage.

We briefly tried a dresser and mirror in that space, but ultimately adding one more Pax closet made the wall look more complete.

We considered using some especially thick filler pieces on each end to make the closets fully flush to the door wall, but ultimately chose we liked it better this way without bulky end pieces flanking the closets.

I will share some more pictures of how the space fits together at the end of this post, but let us dive into the building process.

Making An Ikea Pax Closet Look Built-In

Pax wardrobes are in fact one of the easier Ikea pieces to hack if your goal is to make them look more like a custom built-in closet. The main trick is to use trim or molding for that fully floor-to-ceiling look.

The Pax system comes in either 79″ or 93″ heights, so if you’ve got 8ft ceilings (96″) like us, all you have to do is fill that 3-ish inch gap. You may need to do some gap filling on the sides too if you also want it to go wall-to-wall (which we did here). That process is fairly much the same one we are sharing in this post.

We in fact captured the whole process – from unboxing to painting! – on a timelapse video that you can watch below. We have also got a more detailed step-by-step walkthrough after the video as well.

Building-In A Pax Wardrobe: Timelapse Video

We condensed this process down to simply 5 minutes, but in real time it stretched over the course of about 4 afternoons. The first 2 were more labor intensive with assembling and building in the closet, while the second 2 were mostly simply waiting for caulk and paint to dry. So it is certainly something you could mostly complete in a weekend.

Note: You can also view this video on YouTube.

Tools & Materials Needed

In addition to your Pax wardrobe pieces themselves (wardrobe box, doors, hinges, interior fittings, etc) you will also want to have the following items available:

• Miter saw
• Nail gun
• Power drill/driver
• Clamps
• Measuring tape
• 1×3″ scrap wood
• 1×2″ or 1×3″ primed trim boards (depending on your ceiling height)
• Quarter round molding
• Caulk & caulk gun
• Paint & painting supplies
• Stepstool or small ladder
• Table saw or circular saw (optional, we did not need either)

I am going to skip over the actual wardrobe assembly and installation parts, since Ikea covers that fairly well in their instructions. You can watch them in the timelapse above if you’d like to see them in action. and we brought in some notes to the video for you, like how I brought in an outlet hole. Below we are going to start at the stage where you’ve already got your Pax in place and secured to the wall.

Step 1: Make Your Plan

Like I said, the main trick to making it look built in is simply filling the gap between the top of the Pax to the ceiling. Nearly like you are creating some crown molding around your closets.

The challenge is that the Ikea doors go all the way to the top of the box, leaving no exposed surface to nail your molding into. So before you add your trim, you’ve gotta add a “backer piece” that it can attach to. Here is a little overhead view of how we solved this. What you see me nailing in the photo above is the piece that is labeled “trim” in the photo below:

The “backer piece” is simply some spare 1×3 I had laying around, but it can truly be anything. It will attach flat against the top of the closet (nailed in from underneath). Then whatever you use as your visible trim can be nailed into the 1″ side of the backer. I promise this will make more sense as we go.

Step 2: Align & Attach Your Backer Piece

First, we used the miter saw to cut our 1×3″ backer pieces – one for each side – to size. Next came the tricky part: getting the placement of the backer simply right.

Assuming, like us, you want the trim to be flush with your closet doors – resist your instinct to install this piece flush with the front edge of the wardrobe box. That would only work if your trim were exactly as thick as your closet door. Since it is not, we have consistently had to mock something up to get our placement simply right. That is where this puppy comes in handy.

What I have done here is taped a couple of pieces of scrap trim (aka, the same 1×2″ that I will be using as my final molding) to the front of my backer piece. That way I could hold up my backer piece and double-check that my final trim would end up exactly where I hoped it. In this case, it would be flush with my existing trim (since we were adding this last wardrobe to an existing one here) as well as flush with my doors.

With the backer firmly held in place with my hand, I secured it with a couple of nails using my nail gun. You can also see this part in action during the timelapse video above.

Here is another view of that process, as repeated on the other end of the closet. You can see how the scrap piece of trim helped us ensure the backer piece got attached in precisely the right spot. Because on this side, I hoped the trim to be exactly flush with the side of the Pax box.

You can also see above that we had already attached the trim on the front of the closet. Notice how much it hangs over the wardrobe box? But as you will see below, it is perfectly flush with the door when it is closed.

Step 3: Cut & Attach Your Trim

Once your backer piece is nailed into place, you can cut and nail in your trim (aka: the molding that will in fact be visible and give your closet a built-in look). Since we have an exposed corner, we chose to miter cut ours on an angle for the most polished look.

Then we nailed the trim pieces into the backer, as you can see below. Do not worry about the nail holes. You can fill them later with caulk or wood filler.

Step 4: Adding Quarter Round To Finish It Off

As you can see above, our 1×2″ molding was not tall sufficient to fill the gap to the ceiling entirely (and a 1×3″ was too big). But luckily a piece of quarter round was sufficient to close the gap. Depending on your ceiling, you may have to get creative with what molding or combination of trim works best. You also can consistently use a table or circular saw to rip a larger piece of wood to size.

In the photo above we have in fact already completed the last step, which is…

Step 5: Caulk & Paint

Once everything is built, use paintable caulk to fill any nail holes, gaps, or seams – like where your moldings meet the wall, the ceiling, and each other. From there you can paint your trim to match. I will admit we have yet to find a paint that perfectly matches Ikea’s white (especially since distinct Ikea products are distinct whites). But we have found that our wall & ceiling color – Sherwin-Williams Pure White – is a fairly close match. We have simply been using it because, if nothing else, at least it is a ideal match to the adjacent surface in our room.

The Wrapped up Built-In Closet

We wrapped up this project a month or two ago, and it is been so strong having the “bonus” storage. Not to mention that the wall does not feel in limbo anymore.

We are also working on a closet organization post because we know people like to see specific interior components of the Pax wardrobes and how we have chosen to store stuff in ours. Perhaps Sherry will do the whole video tour deal.

The biggest takeaway from this many-years-long closet evolution is that wild realization that we did not in fact end up giving up a whole lot when we moved to a house that is half the size of our last one. Back when we chose to downsize, we assumed that we’d constantly be cutting corners and sacrificing space, so the fact that our current bedroom has simply as much closet space as our last house (which had a 48 square-foot walk-in closet!) – it simply shocks us. And to now be luxuriating in the largest bed we have ever owned… we simply did not see that coming.

We also laugh about how, in our old walk-in closet, we seriously contemplated sacrificing some wall space to add a window for some natural light in there. And now, even though our current closet is a little less traditional (wardrobes along the wall of the bedroom versus having an actual closet), we have sunlight in spades!

Now that you’ve seen how we brought in to our built-in closets, we will be back with a whole-shebang tour of how we have organized them inside (that has been a bit of a moving target as we continue to optimize it, but it is on our to-do list!). In the meantime, feel free to check out the other side of the room and the other Ikea storage we customized and our last house’s closet, which was full of go-to Pax components!

Other Ikea Customization Projects

Wanna see some other Ikea hacks? Here are a few of our go-to customizations:

• A wood-wrapped Expedit bookcase
• Painting Ikea kitchen cabinets a custom color
• Making built-in cabinets with a window seat
• Adding brass & marble to a Vittsjo shelf
• Building a Malm dresser into a nook
• Creating a sleeping nook with Pax wardrobes
• Turning Fjell dressers into floor-to-ceiling bookcases

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