BATHROOM MEDICINE CABINET BECOMES ACCENT WALL PANEL

Kathleen Vitorio
Feb 25, 2021
3 min read

Updated: Mar 11, 2021

The debate on whether or not to remove the built-in medicine cabinet in our bathroom started at the beginning of this transformation and continued right up until the day we had no more time to spend thinking about it. We put in so much hard work for every other project, that we decided we couldn’t start slacking now and so the debate ended and now we have a beautiful green accent panel.

wondering what the point of this accent wall panel is?

Well besides it’s beautiful aesthetics, it would be covering the opening that would be left behind after removing the medicine cabinet. That’s why this debate lasted so long. We were weighing out all the scenarios + options. Of course, the plan was to use some drywall to cover the hole, but, since the bathroom wall is fully tiled, we wouldn’t be able to just leave the drywall exposed because it wouldn’t match the tile. Replacing it with a new mirror the same size as the medicine cabinet opening would have been the easiest thing to do, but the mirror I wanted was a completely different size. I needed to think of something that was not just going to serve the purpose of covering this hole, but come up with something that was going to add visual interest to the space and not cost a lot. So, that’s the story behind the green accent wall panel lol.

Here's a before and after photo to better understand what I am talking about!

I love how it breaks up all the white tile + gives the bathroom a focal point.

what we used to get the job done

› ½” Drywall

› 2 x 4 Pieces (to support the drywall)

› Drill (to screw drywall in place)

› ¼” MDF (for the panel)

› PL Premium Construction Adhesive

› Paint (I went with Sherwin Williams Courtyard)

› Lint Free Paint Roller

bringing the vision to life

REMOVING THE MEDICINE CABINET was that first thing that needed to get done. We were pleasantly surprised when what we thought was going to be a hard task, actually turned out to be pretty easy. Nelson just removed all the screws and pulled it out. If you think any thing like me, you’re probably wondering if we found anything behind the cabinet…but nope, no treasure lol. So, it was on to covering the hole with DRYWALL. I have to admit that for this DIY project I was mostly supervisor + assistant, while Nelson did most of the physical work lol. He installed a few 2 x 4’s within the opening to create supports for the drywall. In order to cover the opening and have it flush with the wall, we used 2 pieces of ½” drywall one on top of the other. Nelson cut both the pieces to the size of the opening and installed the first one by screwing it into the 2 x 4 wood supports. The screws weren’t long enough to do the second piece of drywall like this so we used some PL adhesive instead. Watch the video clips below to see how it all went down.

These are the paint samples below.

The light green shades are on the left and the darker green is on the right.

Something Worth Mentioning ↴

Before fixing the panel in place, we had to measure and cut out holes for the plumbing coming from the wall and the light fixture.

Now it was time to INSTALL this beauty! We used PL adhesive on the entire back of the MDF panel and positioned it accordingly. To hold the panel in place we had to improvise a bit. We had some extendable shower curtain rods laying around and we decided to use those to secure the panel tight against the wall. We waited 24 hours for it to dry and now that thing is not going anywhere. The last thing on the list was giving this bad boy a FINAL COAT OF PAINT. Watch the video below to see some snaps of the process.