Your Shelf Bracket Resource

Glass shelves have unique designs for installation, which gives an impression of their floating in air, as the supporting gear is not visible. That surely gives added looks to the decorative items you may decide to contain in them.

Though most often they are installed in bathrooms for obvious reasons of remaining unaffected by the moisture and humidity associated there, you could certainly consider them for other rooms too. Imagine having colorful beans or candied fruit in glass jars kept over glass shelves in your kitchen! That’s spontaneous way of adding color to your kitchen. They can be fixed up in a corner or conveniently and usefully be fixed in the space above the door. Similarly, you could have an attractive addition in the den by keeping your family pictures in some of the glass shelves.

In case of glass shelving, using appropriate supports is very important to get an enhanced effect. Glass shelves need specifically designed brackets that go to compliment their looks. One should be careful to avoid using such brackets for supporting other kinds of shelving, unless recommended by the manufacturer.

What distinguishes glass brackets from others is their weight, delicate nature and in certain cases intentional small size. It’ s difficult to appreciate a delicate glass shelf supported on a large metal bracket, which would be out of place as it tries to dominate the shelving itself. Moreover, it is not a very practical approach to use, or rather waste so much of heavy metal for housing so lightweight and delicate an item made of glass. Remember, glass shelving is mostly for the purpose of display rather than storage.

In its smallest form a glass shelf bracket is made of rails or clips. These brackets hardly project out from the wall. Quite many are made of chrome because of its shine that complements shining glass and thus easily blend with the shelf. The brackets are first fixed on the wall and then shelves are fixed on to them. The screws that pass thru the glass shelves have a slightly different design in the sense that they have a blunt end that pushes down to hold the shelf in place. Depending on the thickness and hence the weight of the glass, they are available with different specifications. Rails and clips are suited for lighter glass shelves with not so heavier display items and are not fit be used for displaying such decorations that weigh heavy.

However, if you are keen to use glass shelves for displaying heavier items and are concerned about their sagging, you should be using standard glass brackets. These bracket have the traditional design and project out of the wall to fully support the shelf. Their design is slightly different than the normal wooden shelves and are generally longer than the width of the shelf. They would either have a raised foot on the end or an extended lip that keeps the glass shelf in place. As glass can very easily slide over the metal, such an arrangement is necessarily needed.

There is too large a variety of glass shelves available. Keeping in mind your budget, present décor and above all, the supports needed for them you can chose suitably.

There are countless styles, sizes, and uses for metal shelf brackets together with variations of:

* Decorative metal shelf brackets
* L-Brackets that can bear 25 to 750 lbs.
* Folding L-Brackets
* Cantilever Support Brackets, some of which can hold as much as1, 000 lbs.
* Utility Shelf Brackets
* Metal Shelf Brackets for closets (shelf and rod supports in one)
* Wall Mounted Shelving Systems (with metal shelf brackets and wall standards)

You’ll get metal shelf brackets from home supply stores and even online. The only factor that you need to bear in mind while buying a decorative metal shelf bracket of your choice is its strong and sturdy design.

For any other kind of shelf bracket you should assess how you intend using the shelves, and the weight they’ll be supporting to decide the best metal shelf bracket for the purpose.

As far as weight is concerned, you have to get that information from the manufacturer’s specifications and follow those. Generally, it would involve securing the bracket into wall thru a stud.

USING DECORATIVE METAL SHELF BRACKETS IN YOUR KITCHEN

Using decorative metal shelf brackets in your kitchen is a wonderful idea. It is inexpensive and easy also. You may have them to support wooden shelves too. In case you have open space along the walls, you can have metal shelf brackets and shelves. That’s an easy way to have additional open space for storage.

Having open shelves in your kitchen or any other room is not only helpful, but has decorative appeal also. Further, their cost is negligible compared to complete cabinets.

DECORATIVE METAL SHELF BRACKETS CAN HELP YOU REMODEL OR EVEN SELL YOUR HOUSE

If you are on tight budget that doesn’t allow replacing your present old and outdated cabinets in the kitchen you may try this to update and add value to your house:

* Remove the old cabinets.
* If needed, repair the wall and paint it fresh
* Put in new base cabinets and countertop
* Mount a few upper cabinets
* Using metal shelf brackets fix decorative shelving in the rest of the open area along the walls.
* This kind of remodeling saves money.
* In case you want to sell your house, you’ll find this of help.
* Your kitchen suddenly begins to look larger and more open, that’s especially helpful for small kitchens.

L-BRACKETS AND FOLDING L-BRACKETS

Not all, but some of the L shaped brackets can hold up to 1, 000 lbs. per pair! Check with the manufacturer or refer to the package that usually gives a fairly good idea if it will suffice to hold the item you may have in mind. And, bear in mind that proper installation is vital to enable them holding the specified weight.

Usually, a larger bracket will hold more weight and will cost more.

Folding L-Brackets offer flexibility and are ideal for limited areas. You may even fold your cabinet whenever required. You get them in quite a few brands and can hold up to 750 lbs or more per pair. Knape and Vogt’s folding L-bracket can be folded or adjusted to angles varying from 70 to 90 degrees. They are available in depths of 12” or 16” in white or zinc color.

Apart from the foldable L- brackets, you also get folding brackets, which are not so expensive. However, they may not fold as flat as L-brackets and wouldn’t generally hold as much weight as the L design.

WHAT ARE CANTILEVER METAL SHELF BRACKETS, AND WHAT CAN THEY BE USED FOR?

Cantilever support brackets are of great help in your garage and shop. We put them to good use along the back wall of our woodworking shop. The entire wall of 14 feet had cantilever brackets with shelving that conveniently stocked the whole of our face frame material. Just for your information, face frames are lengths of wooden boards cut for being used for making face frames of kitchen cabinets.

You may also use them to support computer workstations, ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) stations, and for storing heavier tools and other paraphernalia. A cantilever metal shelf bracket is ideally installed with the support of a back wall.

In our woodworking shop we often used this type of metal shelf brackets for computer workstations. Such an arrangement offers the advantage of a large available area without any visible support, thus offering more area for free movement of legs of the workers. Undoubtedly, cantilever metal shelf brackets are superb under such circumstances, but they may prove to be the most expensive of any other kind of metal shelf brackets.

BUILDING YOUR OWN COMPUTER WORK STATION

Making you own computer workstation is a very easy and cheap DIY project. Just buy the needed number of cantilever metal shelf brackets and top up with a laminate countertop, and that ‘s all, it’s ready! You can have a laminate counter top from any local supply store or make one of your own or even select some from the surplus ones from a local supply store in the neighborhood. Rest assured, having square ends at your computer workstation is no problem. You may like to add end-splashes to the countertops. That will help avoiding the “raw’ countertop edges from being visible.

UTILITY SHELF BRACKETS

This category of metal shelf bracket is available in a wide range of sizes. They are very practical and find wide applications in places like closets, laundry storage rooms, rooms, garages and shops. By and large they are quite economical, like Stanley Utility Shelf Bracket for instance, that has a baked enamel gray color.

SHELF AND ROD SUPPORTS FOR YOUR CLOSETS

Of course you can use these versatile shelf and rod supports in your closet, but think beyond that and you’ll find them useful on the free wall space of your laundry room. You might have them right under a small upper cabinet of the laundry room. You may use them for drying of clothes or those needing ironing or just for keeping your dress for next day to office. They are multipurpose and convenient.

METAL SHELF BRACKETS AND STANDARDS

Well they may not be the prettiest, but metal and solid brass shelf brackets and standards offer maximum flexibility for adjusting the height of shelves. You may not have them in your living room, but they go well in your garage. At times they may answer specific requirement in the kitchen or cabinet of the bathroom.

If you can spare time and effort and have the tools you can make them better looking. You may cut a wooden board and put a dado in it to fit the wall standard you have. Finally paint or stain it to match color of the scene.

The size and weight support of such shelves varies, making it important to assess your requirements while buying from this category of metal shelf brackets and standards.