DIY Candy Wall
About 2 months ago, my twin girls told me they wanted a Glamping themed birthday party for their 9th birthday. So of course, I headed straight to Pinterest for some inspiration. As I was scrolling through, I came across the cutest candy wall. But then I looked at the price…. it was $650! Honestly, my first thought was …wow people are actually buying this for $650? My second thought was I can definitely make that for a lot less!
Now let me just say, this is no knock against the hard working folks who are selling these on Etsy. There are tons of people who have no desire to build this or anything else and for those people, they can purchase it. But if you are anything like me, your motto is why buy it when you can make it yourself! So let me show you how I did it.
DIMENSIONS
I made my candy wall 6 ft tall X 24″ wide. The base dimensions are 35″ X 15″.
MATERIALS (list contains affiliate links)
- 3/4 inch plywood (I used wood I already had but any sanded plywood will do)
- 2 – 2x4x6 ft (Cut 2 pieces 36″ and 2 pieces 9″)
- 2 – Wall mount triple dry food dispensers
- Happy Birthday neon sign or Treat Yourself neon sign
- Paint
- Screws (1.5″ and 3″ long)
- L brackets (optional)
- Candy (i.e. Skittle, M&Ms, Jelly Belly, etc.)
TOOLS NEEDED
- Drill
- Spade wood drill bit
- Jigsaw
- Sander (Orbital or a hand sander works)
- Miter saw (you may be able to get cuts done at store…if so, you won’t need this)
STEPS
- Cut your wood down to 6 ft x 2ft (24 inches). You can get the store to do this for you.
- Next you’ll need to cut your arch. You can also leave it square at the top if you don’t want to bother with this step. If you choose not to do an arch, you don’t need the jigsaw. I chose to freehand my arch but I don’t recommend that because my arch wasn’t symmetrical. It was good enough though lol. Check this video out to learn a few different ways to create the perfect arch.
- Once you have your arch traced out, it’s time to cut it using your jigsaw.
- After the arch is cut out, sand the edges using an orbital sander.
- At this point, you can leave it in it’s natural state or paint it.
- Now it’s time to get this baby to stand up! There are a number of great ways to do this but I honestly went with the quickest thing I could think of that would be secure.
- Secure your 2 – 36″ pieces of 2x4s to the back. Then add the 2 – 9″ pieces as shown below.
8. After they are secured, add 3 inch screws from bottom of base and front of base to secure. Add extra screws as needed.
9. Stand it up and make sure it’s standing on it’s own. To add extra security, you can add weights or sandbags to the back of it when in use.
10. Next step is positioning your sign where you want it to go. This will determine where you need to cut your hole.
11. Once you’ve decided where to cut your hole, use your spade bit and make a hole in that spot.
12. Attach your neon sign and use small screws to nail it to the plywood.
13. Follow instructions to secure the dispensers to the plywood.
14. Add your candy and then pop them in.
Not too bad, huh?
TIP & NOTE about dispensers:
There are few different brands of these dispensers on Amazon. I went with this one because it had a ton of great reviews. But I did notice some people mentioning that the dispensers would not stay in the holders. So I was a bit nervous about that.
One tip I read that came in handy was to make sure I squeeze the actual metal holder in before popping the dispensers in them. This seemed to help.
Out of the 2 triple sets I ordered, only one of the dispensers seemed a little loose and it did fall out when one of the kids pulled too hard. But we were able to get it back in and it was fine the rest of the time.
So in total for me, this project was less than $100 (since I already had the wood). Much better than $650, wouldn’t you agree? 🙂
Now who’s gonna make one of these? If you do, be sure to tag me when you share it!
