AKURUM Cat Litter Box + EXPEDIT Office Storage

Materials:
Ikea Items:
2 AKRUM Wall Top-of-Refrigerator Cabinets, 30″ x 24″ x 24″;
4 HARLIG Doors and INTEGRAL Hinges;
1 EXPEDIT Shelving Unit 59″ x 59″;
11 EXPEDIT Insert Doors (7 gray; 4 white);
2 EXPEDIT 2-drawer Inserts (gray);
KVISSEL Letter Tray; KASSET and
FLYT Magazine Files.

Other:
¾” Melamine particle board;
120V/USB 2.1 amp receptacle and related wiring;
2 22″ soft close drawer slides;
Drawer base (poplar and Melamine MDF);
Air return grill

Description: Our new condo has a hallway “tech niche” space that we decided to use for a cat litter box area for our two cats and office storage. The litter box hack was inspired by several we looked at on Ikeahackers. What we did is pretty apparent from the photos, but here’s the gist of it:

We placed the two AKURUM cabinets beside each other, spaced apart (to the width of the niche) and constructed a filler strip (which is screwed in) for the space between the cabinets. We extended the wall receptacle to a new 120V/USB combination receptacle with the box mounted in the strip.


In the right hand cabinet we cut a door for the cats to use, and built and installed a sliding drawer base to make cleaning the litter box easier. Likewise cut a hole in the other door and installed the grill for ventilation. The left hand cabinet is used for litter storage and miscellany.

The EXPEDIT unit sits on top of the cabinets and is pinned to the wall at the top in the usual manner. (I stood on each of the cabinets before doing any of this to make sure they could handle the weight).

We use insert doors and drawers to hold/disguise most of the office materials inside. Three magazine files will fit behind one of the doors. The letter tray will also fit into this space, but you have to put it in before installing the hinges and door.

Possible addition: a counter-top of some sort on top of the base cabinets, under the storage unit.

~ Doug Fuson, Evanston, IL