DIY Coat Rack: An Easy Wall-Mounted Idea With Hooks

You’ll love this idea for a DIY coat rack! It is so easy to make one yourself to hang on the wall by your front door or entry way using this step-by-step tutorial.

Keep Your entryway Tidy and Organized

Learn how to make a coat rack by your front door using this easy DIY tutorial. This idea involves a wall-mounted board with large decorative coat hooks.

Having a coat rack makes it clear and easy for guests to see where they should hang up their jackets, purses and tote bags when they arrive for a visit. Plus it looks like beautiful rustic home decor or a farmhouse style accent for your entryway when it’s not in use too!

Disclosure: We want to give a big thanks to Hickory Hardware and HomeRight for sending us complimentary products to use for this DIY coat rack project. No other compensation was provided. This blog post also contains affiliate links for products or services we think you’ll like. This means if you make a purchase from one of these links, we’ll make a small commission at no additional cost to you so we can keep the great ideas for the home coming your way. All opinions expressed are our own, derived from our personal experience.

Entertaining solution for coats

We love to entertain family and friends throughout the year. In fact this past year, I hosted a weekly women’s Bible study in our home. My friends and I would meet downstairs while the kids played upstairs with a baby sitter in the playroom.

With six women and nearly that many kids here week after week, it quickly became apparent that we had a big problem in the entryway by our front door.

While there is a very large closet for coats just inside our front door, no one ever uses it. I mean EVER. As a general rule, I’ve come to realize that people just do not open other people’s closets in their homes.

I’d noticed this issue before, but it became more obvious to me once we had the weekly group meeting here. As I’m welcoming folks or trying to keep Scruffy our dog from jumping up on them, I’m often not able to take and hang coats for everyone as they arrive. If I don’t take their coats, I’ve found no one opens the closet door to hang them up themselves. Instead, coats and jackets get draped over furniture, tossed on the floor or hung over the railing to our downstairs.

It’s a friendly and familiar group so no one minds the clutter of coats and jackets everywhere, but I just knew there had to be a more elegant and welcoming solution. One of my friends has a beautiful decorative coat rack just inside her door for guests, so I thought that idea could work great in our home too. Fortunately, there is a large empty wall right across the entryway from the coat closet.

I decided we should create a long horizontal DIY coat rack to take up most of that wall space so there would be plenty of room for coats, sweaters, diaper bags, purses and whatever else people bring over when they visit.

A simple and decorative idea

I also wanted a coat rack that was simple to make, yet decorative so it would look pretty on the wall even when no one is here. Above the coat rack, I could hang framed 8 x 10″ school photos of our boys as well as a seasonal wreath that I could change whenever I update our fireplace mantel that’s just across the room.

How to Make a DIY Coat Rack

It is really easy to make a DIY Coat Rack like we did. You just need a long board, some paint, gorgeous decorative hooks and a few simple tools.

What You Need:

• 1 long rough cut board (our coat rack is 64″ x 5 1/2″ x 1″)
• Router
• HomeRight Spray Shelter
• Spray Paint (We used Rust Oleum American Accents Ultra Cover 2X Spray Paint in Satin Heirloom White.)
• 7 of P2155-10B – Bungalow Double Coat Hooks from Hickory Hardware in Oil Rubbed Bronze Finish
• Drill/Impact Driver
• Measuring Tape
• Stud Finder
• Level
• Pencil

Instructions

Just follow these simple instructions. This entire project should only take you a few short hours from start to finish.

1. Prepare the board

We happened to have a long board in our garage that was leftover from another project. One side was rough cut and the other was smooth. We decided the rough cut side would give the coat rack a little style and a bit of a rustic appearance on the wall in our entryway.

The board was already 64 inches long so we didn’t need it cut it down further to fit our space. Kent just ran a router along the edge to make it smoother.

2. Paint the board

You should always use spray paint in a large well-ventilated area. Ideally, we would have done this step outdoors, but it was a little too cold here in Michigan the day we wanted to do this coat rack project.

Fortunately HomeRight sent us an awesome Spray Shelter that we could set up in our garage with the door cracked open several inches.

The Spray Shelter pops up easily like a three-sided tent. While it’s larger than you might need for just a 64-inch board, I can see how the Spray Shelter would be incredibly helpful for large dressers, chairs, furniture and other spray paint projects. It folds up small and comes with its own bag to easily store it away until our next project comes up.

We sprayed the board with several coats of spray paint, allowing time for the board to dry between each coat.

3. Choose where you will install it

This step takes a measuring tape, a pencil, and a trusty dog to supervise you. Kent measured to find and mark the center of the wall with a small pencil mark. 

He also measured up from the baseboard and floor in a few places to mark the height for the coat rack. He then used the level to make sure it would, in fact, be level.

4. choose the spacing for the decorative hooks

This part can get a little tricky. We had 7 of the Bungalow Double Coat Hooks from Hickory Hardware and wanted them to be evenly spaced apart.

Starting from the center and then working our way out seemed obvious enough. However, we also wanted to hide the screws that would attach the board to the wall behind the decorative hooks.

We used a stud finder as well to make sure one or more of the screws that goes into the wall would hit a 2×4″ stud. That was an absolute necessity to give the coat rack the strength and stability to hold heavy coats and bags. Once we had all that figured out, we laid out the coat hooks and marked where they should go with a pencil.

5. Attach the board to the wall

Kent used his impact driver to secure the board to the wall in the entryway using two screws. As mentioned in the previous step, we made sure at least one of those screws went into a wall stud. You can see our pencil markings for where we want the decorative hooks to go.

6. Install the decorative hooks

Next, he used the same impact driver to attach each of the decorative hooks over the pencil marks. We measured from the bottom of each hook to the edge of the coat rack board to make sure it was centered vertically on the board.

The Bungalow Double Coat Hooks came with their own screws to easily attach them to the coat rack.

7. Hang any additional home decorations

We centered a nail above the coat rack where I can hang a seasonal wreath. Then on either side of the wreath, we hung framed school photos of our boys.

8. Step back and enjoy Your DIY Coat Rack

We love how great the new coat rack looks in our entryway. You will love it too!

The main floor of our home is an open concept, so you can easily see the coat rack, wreath and photos from anywhere in our living room, dining room or kitchen.

The oil rubbed bronze coat hooks go wonderfully well with all the other oil rubbed bronze knobs, light fixtures and accents we have throughout our home.

What I love the most about the new coat rack though is how quickly people gravitate towards it to hang up their jackets, bags and purses when they arrive. It’s the first thing they do or comment on after they take off their shoes at the front door.

What else should we add to our entryway to make our home more inviting for guest? Please comment below and share. We’re always looking for new ideas.

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While you’re here, be sure to check out other home decor ideas on Ideas for the Home by Kenarry® –

• 22 Insanely Creative DIY Home Organization Hacks
• Coat Hooks, Hat Racks and Organization for the Mudroom
• How to Stencil Faux Tile Around Your Fireplace

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Updated November 2019.