It all starts by clearing the snow off of these old apple bin. I got my hands on these old apple bins because they had lived out their useful life and the orchard was looking to scrap them so I took some off their hands.

Then it’s just a matter of a little disassembly magic!

Magic!

I start with the thicker pieces that will become the sides of the boxes. They start out at fairly random widths so I use the table saw to cut them all down to even widths on the back side so I maintain the rustic surface on the front.

Then I move over to the miter saw to cut the sides down to length.

It takes a little bit of planning because I want the set of 3 boxes to nest inside of one another to make transporting them easier so they don’t take up much space.

Since it’ll be hard to access the inside faces of the box after assembly, I take the time to sand everything down now just to take off the outer grime from the pieces.

To assemble the sides of the boxes I use this jig to hold the corners at 90 degrees while I predrill and screw them together.

I pre-drill for 2 screws on the corners using a countersink bit so I can plug the holes later.

Then a couple of 2″ screws and glue hold each of the corners together.

You can see now how these nest inside of one another. Now it’s just a matter of adding a back.

The backer boards are made from the thinner material from the apple bins. I just cut these to length and leave the edges rough.

I layout the pieces on the back of each crate and then rip down the final piece so it fits evenly on the outer edges of the crates.

To double check that the box is still square I check the diagonals and use a clamp to fix any discrepancies.

Then it’s just a matter of gluing and fastening the back panels in place with a brad gun.

Here you see the assembly of the crates complete, not it’s just a matter of adding some finishing touches.

I want to hide the fasteners so I cut some plugs out of the same type of wood.

To hold these in place I mix up some 2-part epoxy and then hammer them tight into each screw hole. Instead of cutting the plugs flush with the surface like I would typically do, I leave them protruding from the surface to mimic as if these were held together with dowels.

The finish is then applied — just boiled linseed oil to protect the wood but keep the rustic flat look and feel of the wood.

Then it’s just a matter of loading up the Element for install!

Since the boxes are all different sizes I lay them out to align them along a couple of perpendicular lines. I just use some black screws to fasten them so they are hidden and I fasten through the existing holes in the wood so it blends in even better.