Homemade wardrobe doors

Joy Geach asks:
What I need is advice on built-in wardrobes. We are rapidly running out of money but we certainly need somewhere to put the few remaining clothes that aren't totally ruined by builders' dust. The interiors won't be a problem but what is the best place for doors? Ideally, we would like floor-to ceiling but all the ones I've seen are very expensive.


Mark reckons:
Why not make your own wardrobe doors? I did just this and, twelve years on, the doors are still fine. What I did was to build them up from 18mm MDF panels, cut to size by the builders merchant. On the front, glue some 18mm edge strips: this gives you a fielded door panel effect, which you can further embellish by routing off the sharp edges, plus it gives you a 36mm hinge edge necessary to hang them. You could go for two 18mm panels stuck together but that's a very heavy door indeed. Once painted, you would have no idea that these were DIY doors.

You can then design doors to fit whatever space you want to cover up. We split the space so that the main wardrobe doors are 1750mm high and there are 600mm high-level matching doors over, useful for suitcases and hiding Xmas pressies. If you wanted floor2ceiling, then that would be no problem. Just build the frames, and make up doors to fit. But, be warned, they are heavy, though they work perfectly well hung off a pair of 75mm brass butt hinges.