Vintage doorknob coat rack

Magazines tend to stick around here at Cottage Life – you never know where you’ll find inspiration. For example, senior designer Steven Balaban was flipping through an old issue of This Old House and found a great piece on vintage metal doorknobs, which included some history on the hardware and a DIY coat rack project. As luck would have it, the entire article and a how-to video is posted online. For an alternative to metal doorknobs for the coat rack, try glass or porcelain ones, or even vintage drawer pulls (though depending on size, these may not hold bulkier clothing).

If you don’t happen to have any old knobs hanging around, you can find some pretty vintage-look ones at Anthropologie, which just opened a location in Toronto at the Shops at Don Mills.

Captured Light glass doorknob in pink, $49.

Garden in the Round ceramic doorknob in Kelly green, $54.