Follow our step-by-step tutorial to learn how to build and hang your own beautiful honeycomb wall shelf, made up of DIY hexagon shelves of various sizes.

How sweet it is to be reminded of buzzing bees and smooth honey with our new honeycomb wall shelf arrangement every time I walk into our guest bedroom!

We live in a 3-bedroom home with a master bedroom, kids’ bedroom, and a guest bedroom (AKA music equipment room/our 6-year-old daughter’s “office”).

Lately, we’ve been doing some rearranging in that third multipurpose bedroom. We replaced a full sized bed with a murphy wall bed that Drew built (blog post and video coming soon!) and removed some mismatched furniture odds and ends.

All of these changes freed up a lot of space in this bedroom, which I actually love. I’d like to keep it that way! But there was a little too much empty wall space, so it was the perfect opportunity to try our hand at some DIY accent shelves.

I had been eyeing different variations of honeycomb floating wall shelves for awhile. I love their simplicity and interesting way of bringing nature indoors.

Drew thought it would be a pretty simple, inexpensive build. So we went for it!

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Wall Space Before Hanging Our Honeycomb Wall Shelf:

Wall Space After Hanging Our Honeycomb Wall Shelf:

In the blank space beside our murphy bed, we now have a pretty accent wall with natural wood plant shelves and the perfect little nook to cozy up with a good book.

Customizing Your Honeycomb Wall Shelf

Part of the beauty of making your own honeycomb wall shelf arrangement is that it is totally customizable to your size and pattern preferences. So look around Pinterest and YouTube and get some inspiration!

I have seen beautiful arrangements of hexagon shelves all of the same size, ones that were touching or connected, and ones that were painted a contrasting color on the inside edges of the shelves. Really, the sky is the limit with these floating shelves!

I knew I wanted a natural wood finish, contrasting sizes, and at least one hexagon with a middle shelf. And Drew took care of the rest!

After a couple evenings spent in the garage after work, here is what Drew came up with:

1 Large hexagon shelf (roughly 26.5″ across, 23″ tall) with an inner shelf across the middle

2 Medium hexagon shelves (roughly 13.5″ across, 12″ tall)

2 Small hexagon shelves (roughly 11.5″ across, 10″ tall)

Watch Drew Build and Hang DIY Easy Hexagon Shelves

How to Build and Hang Easy Hexagon Wall Shelves

Materials

Protective finish, stain, or paint (we used Minwax Water Based Polycrylic Protective Finish for a natural wood finish)

3 pine boards size 4 in x 8 ft

Painters tape

Wood Glue (Drew used Titebond Quick & Thick Multi-Surface Glue)

5 Sawtooth hangers

6 Medium drywall anchors with screws

Scrap wood for practicing angle cuts and reaching desired sizes.

Tools

Miter Saw (with stop block for consistent cuts on each piece)

Eye and Ear Protection (Drew uses ISOtunes pro 2.0 headphones found here)

Bessey strap clamp

Wood filler

Palm sander or sand paper

Level

Pencil

Building and Hanging Hexagon Shelves:

Step One: Prep wood pieces by applying finish and making cuts with miter saw.

1. Apply desired finish, stain or paint to wood pieces (you could also wait and do this at the end if you prefer)

2. Set up a stop block on your miter saw for consistent cuts on your wood pieces. This will need to be moved depending on the size piece you are cutting.

3. Use the bevel adjustment setting to adjust miter saw to make a 30 degree bevel cut. TIP: Make some practice cuts on scrap wood to get your angle as close to 30 degrees as possible.

4. Make cuts, being sure to flip board after each cut so that angles face up on each end of the wood pieces. For each hexagon shelf, you will need 6 wood pieces of the same size with 30 degree angles on each end. This is totally customizable, but I will list our rough measurements:

• 1 LARGE HEXAGON SHELF WITH INNER SHELF: 6 total edge pieces (ours were 13 3/8″ on the long edge and 12 5/8″ on short edge), plus 1 piece measured to fit across middle of hexagon (ours was 24 3/4″ on long top edge and 24″ on bottom short edge, but we recommend measuring for this piece once you have assembled your shelf.
• 2 MEDIUM HEXAGON SHELVES: 12 total pieces (ours were 6 3/4″ on the long edge and 6″ on the short edge)
• 2 SMALL HEXAGON SHELVES: 12 total pieces (ours were 5 3/4″ on the long edge and 5″ on the short edge).

Step Two: Assemble your hexagon shelves.

1. For each shelf, lay 6 wood pieces flush against each other facing down against a straight edge and apply 2 long strips of painters tape across the 6 pieces.

2. Flip connected wood pieces over, and apply wood glue to each angle face.

3. Start at one end and roll all 6 pieces together into a hexagon shape for the initial joining of your shelf.

4. Wipe away excess glue.

5. Tighten Bessey strap clamp around hexagon to add pressure to the joints. Leave for several hours (follow instructions on wood glue container) to allow glue to dry.

6. Use wood filler to fill any small gaps in the joints. Allow to dry, and sand. If you do this step, you will need to touch up your finish in the spots where you sanded.

7. To add the middle shelf to the large hexagon shelf, measure and cut shelf to size with 30 degree angles on each side and glue in place.

Step Three: Add mounting hardware to shelves.

1. In order to mount the shelves flush with the wall, use a straight bit on your router (check out Drew’s DIY router table here) to cut a recessed area on the back of one side of each shelf.

2. Nail a sawtooth hanger to the recessed area. If you don’t have a router but you want to mount the shelves flush with the wall, you can notch out the recessed area with a drill bit and a chisel. If you don’t care about them being flush with the wall, you can attach the sawtooth hanger directly to the back of the shelf.

Step Four: Arrange and hang finished shelves.

1. Once everything is dry, it’s time to hang your shelves! First, measure your wall space so you know what you’re working with. Then begin arranging the shelves in your desired pattern on the floor, making sure it fits within the dimensions of your wall space.

2. Install drywall anchor according to manufacturers instructions. Hang first shelf and use a level to adjust, because you will use this first shelf as a reference for the remaining shelves.

3. For the remaining shelves, use a scrap piece of wood as a spacer to achieve even spacing between shelves. This part may take some tweaking to get it just right.

4. Finally, decorate your shelves with pretty things! Just keep in mind, these shelves are purely decorative and aren’t intended to bear significant weight.

Printable Instructions for Honeycomb Wall Shelf

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