Hackers Help: Adding mirrors to EXPEDIT for home gym

I am moving to a new place and there is a spare room that I would like to use as a gym/office combo. Ideally, I would like each portion of the room to feel separate, with the majority of the space devoted to the home gym.

I am planning to use a 4×4 EXPEDIT that I already have as a room divider and would like the office portion to be sort of tucked away behind the EXPEDIT. My desk is always messy and is mostly for storage, so I prefer it to be a little hidden.

For the gym side, I would like to have some mirrors and was thinking about trying to add them to the EXPEDIT, but I’m not sure how to do this or if it would look bad. Would the mirrors make it too heavy to be freestanding?

I was thinking I could buy inserts and affix mirrors to the back of each insert (and the cubby side could be used for the office), but I’m not sure if the smaller mirrors would look bad or be too hard to use as a gym mirror (mostly just to check form).

The other option would be to buy larger mirrors and affix them to the frame. Has anyone done either? Which would look better? Any other ideas or suggestions for this? Thank you in advance for any ideas you may have!

~ by Jill F.

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Hi Jill

Congrats on the move to a new place. A home gym/ office combo sounds great.

To add mirrors to the EXPEDIT, I would suggest cutting a thin piece of plywood or MDF the size of your 4×4 EXPEDIT. Your local hardware store may cut it for you if you give them the size. If one piece is too large to fit into your car, cut it into 2 pieces.

Before you affix the board, you can choose to paint it in your favourite color or stick on pretty wallpaper (like so) so the back of the cubbies looks good, facing your office.

Then attach the wood onto the EXPEDIT with glue and screws. Make sure to drill onto the solid parts of the EXPEDIT (usually all the corners) and not the honeycomb. Then, stick the mirrors (eg. IKEA LOTS) onto the plywood. IKEA LOTS mirrors are not very heavy, so I believe the EXPEDIT can still function freestanding.

Hope that helps.

Let us know how it goes.

Happy hacking,
Jules

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