You may have a hard time believing my story about this vertical coat rack. I was really surprised I was even able to find the photos in the collage below. I have trouble keeping up with “time”. When looking for the pictures I was thinking I took them around 2012. FIVE years ago. But NO! When I found them, I see they date back to November 2009! Only a few months after I started blogging.
You can see the progression of me trying to beat up this new board to make it look old. I even stained it. THAT, I didn’t remember. As things go around here, the board got shuffled, but mostly hung out in the back yard. For the last couple of years it has been in the storage carport where I keep my reclaimed lumber.
Here’s a screen capture of the date of the file. November 29, 2009. Unbelievable. What’s even more miraculous is that I was able to find the pictures. I’ve had them in a file called Rustic Coat Rack all these years.
This is how the board looked when I drug it out last week. You can tell by looking at the bottom edge that it has spent some time resting on the ground. 
I was staining some other projects, so I used the same Jacobean stain on the vertical coat rack board. Not shown: Wipe-on Poly in semi-gloss.
You can see the stain and semi-gloss poly really brought out the hammer and screw marks.
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I marked the holes and pre-drilled the holes for the coat hook using my Kreg Multi-mark . It’s great for getting everything even.
I changed how I installed the last couple of coat hooks. I marked one hole, pre-drilled, and secured the screw. I aligned the hook to make sure it was straight, then drilled the second hole and secured the screw.
I use these ball hooks from D. Lawless in a lot of my coat rack projects.
I staggered the hooks from left and right to allow hanging of towels, jackets, hats, etc.
A vertical coat rack is perfect for tight spaces to hang towels in the bathroom where there isn’t room for a horizontal towel rack.
The vertical coat rack would also be great in a tight space by the door.
As you know, I’ve been wanting to do this project since 2009! Why? Because the Romano’s had one hanging by their front door on the show Everybody Loves Raymond.
I didn’t hang it low, but someone who has kids could make it longer, hang it lower and the kiddos would be able to hang up their own coats.
Have you ever seen a vertical coat rack? Do you have a place where one of these would work for you?
gail
I think one would absolutely awesome inside the closet on the sidewall for hats, mittens, scarves; I live in Maine where these are staples! I firmly believe in making it simple for kids to hang up their own stuff!
Super idea Kathy! Thanks for your input!
gail
We have a teeny, tiny little house down at the coast with round walls and your vertical rack would be just perfect in the bathroom. Thanks so much Gail, I can’t tell you how long I’ve been looking for something that would work in that space
Michelle,
How wonderful that I was able to solve a problem for you. Thank you so much for letting me know, it makes my day!
gail
i need something like this for my bathroom…would make hanging the towels a lot easier than the way they are now! will have to see about creating my own, once we are done with painting.
Great project – and very clever to let it sit than long so it was truly ‘aged’ 🙂 I have several of these types of hanging ‘units’ since our house is SUPER tiny so space is always at a premium!
Awesome! I had never known anyone to use this type of hanging coat rack besides the show. 😉
gail
Very Cute! I was thinking of making something like this for my own bathroom using some reclaimed hooks 🙂
Thanks Melissa! Great minds think alike, eh?
gail