Homemade Bulletin Boards

 I have been experimenting with making a bulletin boards for the Things off and on for some time. The first ones I made were out of canvas picture frames. They were ok, but a number of the accents fell off quickly.  This latest incarnation involves plywood and a staple gun. Thankfully there were no trips to the hospital, most people know I am a bit of a klutz.

Supplies needed
2' by 4' by 1" plywood
1 1/2 yards of fabric
2 yards of battening
Spool (?) of ribbon
2 squares of cork board
1' by 6" metal sheet (not aluminium)
2 D rings
Cut tacks

4 screws

a staple gun

Glue Gun

Take the plywood and lay the battening out on it leaving about 1/2" all the way around, double up the battening on one side. Staple gun everything down well.  Don't worry about the back we clean that up later.  After the battening lay the fabric flat, good side on the floor and lay the plywood down on top battened side down. Staple gun the fabric on to the back, the most even way to staple the fabric is to staple the fabric in the middle of each side first and then staple the corners.  I did the corners like a package to make sure that no extra fabric showed on the corners.  Then you can staple all the in between places.

I then drilled holes in the metal, I made the mistake of getting sheet metal, bad idea it was aluminum and hence not magnetic.  We are trying to decide now if we are just going to paint the metal with magnetic paint or actually get metal that is magnetic.  I would recommend if you're an idiot like me to take a magnet to the home improvement store. 

Back to the work at hand, screw the metal to the board through the fabric. After this step you start getting to play with the tacks.  These were great, black and sharp and looked nice. Use the tacks to attach the cork at the corners.  I laid our the ribbon the way I wanted it to look and wove it together in any area that they overlapped.  I used the tacks on all the ribbons ends, hanging the ribbon over the ends, or ending it in on the cork edges when I could.  Tack the ends of the ribbon and where it overlaps or every 3 or 4 inches put another tack.  The tacks when hammered in well will allow papers to stay up pretty easily. On the back of the board there was quite a bit of clean up.  A lot of the tacks went through the back and there was fabric hanging out. I used a glue gun to hold down the fabric in places and used it to cover the tacks that went through.

These were not terribly cheap to make and I didn't pay a whole lot of attention to the cost. Thing Ones was a lot cheaper since her fabric was a lot cheaper. I also ended up buying more supply wise than you would really need since I wasn't sure what it would take.  I only made on trip to the fabric store, but 4 to Lowe's and ended up buying A LOT of different nails and screws that I wasn't sure what would work. 

I love these and I think they turned out fabulous so decided to share. I would LOVE to see if anyone else makes one what they might look like.