How to Build Simple Floating Shelves with Plywood and Veneer

Build cutting guides for perfect cuts

Family Handyman

It’s hard to get nice, straight cuts without something to help guide your circular saw. That’s where a cutting guide comes in. We used a self-squaring crosscut guide for short cuts and a longer guide for “rip” cuts. The guide shown here is just a narrow piece of 3/4-in. plywood attached on top of a wider piece of 1/4-in. plywood, with a squaring fence on the bottom. The base of the saw rides against the guide’s “fence.”

Cut the parts

• Using a 60-tooth blade in your circular saw and a cutting guide, cut all the parts to size. A 4 x 8-ft. sheet of plywood will yield enough parts for two shelves.

Glue and nail the frame together

• With all eight parts cut to size, it’s fairly easy to assemble the shelf with glue and nails. Start by laying the front rail on end on top of your worktable (an old hollow-core door or plywood scrap on sawhorses works great), plus a couple of short support blocks cut from a 2×4. These blocks will support the top panel while you glue and nail it onto the front rail. Carefully align the top and front pieces and use an 18-gauge pneumatic brad nailer to drive 1-in. brads.
• Now, stand the side rails on end and glue and nail them to the top panel.
• Flip the whole thing over and install the fillers with glue and brads. The fillers should be evenly spaced, but don’t be too fussy because they’ll be hidden once you install the bottom panel.
• Nail through the front rail into each of the fillers.
• Then, flip the whole thing over again and nail through the top panel into each of the fillers.
• Now, flip the whole works over one more time and nail through the bottom panel into the fillers.

Tip: It helps to draw pencil lines on the top and bottom panels first so you’ll know where to drive the nails for the fillers after you cover them with the top and bottom panels.

Sand the front and sides flush

• Using a random orbit sander and 100-grit sandpaper, sand the front and sides of the shelf so that the rails and panels are flush with each other. This will give you a flat, smooth surface on which to apply the veneer.
  • If those edges aren’t perfectly smooth and flush with the faces of the front and side rails, the veneer won’t stick properly.

Cut the veneer to size

• Lay out the roll, veneer side down, and draw a straight line using a marker and straightedge at 3 in. wide along the entire length of the roll. This will give you 1/4 in. of overhang when you apply the veneer to the front and sides of the shelf.
• Cut along the line with a pair of scissors and then cut the strip of veneer into three pieces for the front and two sides, leaving them long enough so there’s 1/4 in. of overhang on each end.
• Apply the veneer to the sides first, being careful to keep the veneer aligned with the shelf. Don’t peel and stick more than a few inches at a time, and rub a block of wood over the veneer to press it on. Cutting the pieces slightly oversize helps in case you don’t get it on perfectly straight.

Stick on the veneer

• Peel off the back and stick on the veneer, leaving a little bit of overhang on all four edges. Press the veneer on firmly with a block of wood.

Trim the veneer flush

Using half of a handheld edge-banding trimmer, trim the veneer flush with the edges of the shelf. You can also use a router with a flush-trimming bit.

Drill holes for screws

Drill countersink pilot holes in the top of the shelf for some No. 8 wood screws. Drill them 3/4 in. from the “wall” edge and space them about 12 in. apart.

Cut the cleat to size

Cut a wall cleat out of a straight 2×4, and make it 1-1/2 in. x 1-3/8 in. x 70-3/4 in. Use your circular saw and the same cutting guide you used to cut the plywood pieces to width (set another 2×4 under the guide to keep it from tipping).

Rip the cleat to width and then crosscut it to length. The narrow part of the cleat should slip into the hollow opening in the shelf with just a bit of wiggle room.

Screw the cleat to the wall

• Using an electronic stud finder and painter’s tape, find and mark the stud locations on the wall.
• Transfer the stud locations to the wall cleat and predrill holes in the cleat slightly smaller than the diameter of the shanks of the lag screws.
• Hold the cleat to the wall and drill pilot holes in the wall using the cleat as a drilling guide.
• Drive 4-in. lag screws through the cleat and into the wall. Start by driving a lag screw on one end of the cleat, check for level, then screw down the other end before driving the middle screws.

Scribe for a tight fit

• Hold the shelf over the cleat and firmly against the wall and drag a pencil along the wall to trace a scribe line onto the shelf.
  • Scribing and sanding allow shelves to fit perfectly against wall contours, but you can skip these steps if you don’t mind a few gaps.

Sand to the scribe line

• Using a belt sander clamped to a sacrificial worktable, sand up to the scribe line on the shelf.

Fill nail holes

• Push “stainable” wood filler into the nail holes, leaving it slightly proud of the plywood in case of shrinkage.

Sand and stain the shelf

• Sand all the sides of the shelf using 100- and 150-grit sandpaper.
• Remove all dust after sanding with the 100-grit to prevent loose granules from scratching the plywood’s surface.

Attach the shelf to the cleat

• Hold the shelf against the wall and drive 1-5/8-in. wood screws through the shelf’s pilot holes and into the wall cleat.

Hide the screw heads

• Hide the screw heads with wood putty that matches the color of your stain. Use “non-hardening” putty so you can dig it out if you decide to remove the shelf someday.