Converting an Old Dresser into a Bathroom Vanity - Shelves

As promised, here's a quick look at how I handled replacing the runners for the reworked top drawers. This simply involved taking the partial runner piece from the single center runner and measuring its width, as well as the 'notch', then measuring the inside of the dresser to determine the length.

The original center runner used by both top drawers

The really tricky part is that the right-hand top drawer doesn't have perfect 90-degree corners - instead, it travels at a slight angle towards the sink. Due to the overall curve of the dresser front, you don't notice this when you're using that drawer, but it was certainly obvious during this reconstruction - and a major pain to deal with. With this drawer, I had to create two runners - one for the left and right underside of this drawer, and both at an angle. It's really amateur carpentry that I'm not proud of, but it works, and no one will notice it unless they take the dresser apart.

Creating the new runner

The left-hand top drawer was perfectly straight, and I got extra lucky because the original right runner for the right-hand drawer fell off the inside of the dresser. Its angle was already sized to fit the corner, but it wasn't not long enough to run entirely from back to front, so I attached it to an 'extender' piece rather than having to a new runner entirely from scratch.

Right drawer runners. See the 'notch' on the right side?

Left drawer runners

And that's pretty much it for now. Right now I'm putting on several coats of clear satin polyeurethane to protect it from the water, and I need to take off the hardware and paint it silver/chrome instead of gold (to match the forthcoming bathroom fixtures). I'll also have to rework the middle and bottom drawer, but that will have to wait until the pipes are installed and I see how much room I have to work with...