Introduction
Refrigerators are one of the most important appliances in your home. If maintained properly they can last over a decade. When they are broken you can search for “refrigerator repair near me” to get them fixed by a professional. However, it feels wasteful to throw away an old unusable refrigerator in the junkyard. Let’s check out how you can recycle your old refrigerator:
The Details
- Make a couch – Your old refrigerator has a hinged door and plenty of room inside. Its rectangular boxy shape also has plenty of space to accommodate two seats. This allows you to repurpose your old refrigerator into a brand-new couch. The refrigerator body can be cut into two halves while the door can act as the backrest. Polish and repaint it while keeping the metal and chrome accents.
You can go a step further and use more unusable parts in your fridge couch. You can get cheap old leather seats from an automotive recycling store and use them as cushions for your couch. If your refrigerator has no parts that can be used as armrests, get some old car armrests to complete the couch.
- Use it as a bookcase – The above-mentioned option makes for a sick neo-retro couch. However, it involves a lot of metalworking and demands some serious craftsmanship. If you have those skills, you can do it yourself for a unique piece of furniture. Otherwise, it may cost you a fortune.
Instead, you can use your refrigerator as a bookcase. No need for any workmanship here. Just clean up your old refrigerator. Get rid of the coolant and any other liquid and keep it unplugged. Now you can use the space inside the refrigerator for keeping books. You can also adjust the racks to accommodate taller books and have more organizational flexibility. You can also get rid of the racks and place wooden dividers to create levels.
- Use the grill on the wall – None of the parts of the refrigerator goes to waste when you decide to recycle it. While the refrigerator can become a bookcase or a couch, the grill at the back for dissipating heat can spice up your wall. Remove the grill from the old refrigerator and clean it thoroughly.
You can paint the grill with any color that matches the room decor. After that, you can mount it to the wall with screws. The grills have plenty of slits to allow that. Attach a few hooks and the grill can hold your favorite paintings. You can also use LED string lights or strips to make abstract art on the grill and light up your room at the same time.
- Use it as a kitchen cabinet – With rising real estate prices, getting a separate pantry space is a luxury if you live in an apartment in the city. Instead, you can turn your old refrigerator into an additional kitchen cabinet. It can’t store meat, milk, and other perishable goods anymore. But it can act as a mini pantry.
You can also add a glass door to the refrigerator and make it into a showcase for your wine glasses and exquisite crockery collection.
- Refrigerator door table – Unless you have a very old refrigerator, your refrigerator door should be flat and rectangular with clean lines in all directions. This allows you to repurpose the door into a small coffee table in the living room. Moreover, refrigerator doors are also made from plastic and have stainless steel.
Remove the bolts and accessories and you have a water-resistant piece. That means you can also use the refrigerator door to make an outdoor table. You can also go one step further and stick to the theme by using the condenser coils of the refrigerator for support. Yes, you need to add a few extra metal structures to support the weight of the door. However, the condenser coils give it a unique look and truly make the table stand out.
- Make a rustic cooler – Everyone knows what coolers do. They don’t cool down the food and drinks inside them. Instead, they have stellar insulation and act as a giant thermos flask for food and drinks. While coolers are usually portable variants that go in the car, you already have a giant thermos flask in your home. It’s called the refrigerator.
Any refrigerator including your old and unusable one has excellent insulating material. The walls are thick, padded, and designed in a way to limit the exchange of heat with the ambient surrounding. This is necessary to keep your energy bills low and makes the refrigerator more efficient at cooling. That means you can use your old refrigerator as a giant cooler in the backyard for those barbeque parties.
To make it more appealing for the outdoors, you can cover the outside with old, salvaged wood panels or vinyl panels with wooden textures. The refrigerator already has moisture drainage built into it. All you need to do is add ice and let your drinks chill inside your new rustic cooler.
- Turn it into a doghouse – Building a doghouse may seem simple, but it isn’t. You need to make sure your furry friend is protected from temperature swings and the elements of nature. Fortunately, your old refrigerator can be turned into one. It’s already sealed in all directions and won’t allow rain or dust to breach the interiors.
All you need to do is clean the refrigerator and remove the racks. You can add as many pillows as you can fit to make your pup comfy. Keep the fridge on the side with the door open and held up with a metal rod so that it acts as a hard canopy.
Conclusion
If your refrigerator can still be fixed, you should search for “refrigerator repair near me” and hire a technician to get it repaired. It keeps you from contributing more carbon emissions into the atmosphere by buying a new fridge. However, when the old refrigerator has run its course, you can use the above-mentioned ideas to recycle it into something useful.
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