How to make a mailbox with your own hands?

Despite the modern development of technologies, no one has canceled paper correspondence as before. And if standard mailboxes are installed in apartment buildings, then on the site where the house is located, a cottage outside the city or a summer cottage, you can show your imagination and imagination and make an unusual original mailbox with your own hands.

Before you start making a new mailbox with your own hands, you need to decide on the style of the product and the material from which it will be made. In order for the mailbox to look harmonious on the site, it must be combined with elements of landscape design in its style and color scheme. In addition, it is important to determine the design details - shape, size, capacity.

The shops mainly sell items for letters, which are made of metal. But as for the material for the mailbox, made by yourself - most often they are made from plywood. It is an affordable, environmentally friendly and fairly durable material that can be purchased at any specialty store.

There are several types of boxes for newspapers and letters:

• traditional (classic);
• english;
• American;
• non-standard (original).

Classic containers for letters are ordinary rectangular boxes, usually made of metal, with a horizontal slot. To get correspondence, a door with a lock is used, which can be located on the front, at the bottom of the structure or on its cover. The box is fixed on the fence or directly on the wall of the building.

English boxes can be of two types. The first of them is a free-standing pillar-pedestal, which is usually laid out of bricks, but can also be made of metal. Outwardly, it looks like a miniature house. The second option is a drawer that is built directly into a door or wall.

Constructions American style are boxes, usually with a top of a semicircular configuration, which are installed on a special support - a leg. The door is located in front. A distinctive feature of American boxes is the presence of a special flag. When it is raised, it is a sign for the postman that inside there are letters prepared for sending. Thus, in America, postmen not only deliver mail, but also collect it for subsequent sending to addressees.

When it comes to custom mailboxes, there are absolutely no rules in this category. This includes design models and original alterations of various household items, for the manufacture of which a wide variety of materials can be used. Such designs in their appearance do not at all resemble classic letter boxes, but they definitely amaze the imagination.

To make one of these types of boxes, you need to decide on the size and draw all the details on a sheet of plywood - their number depends on the shape of the product. It is important to make two holes - one so that the postman can put the notice or letter in the box, and the other so that the correspondence can be collected. For a non-standard mailbox, you will need a drawing, because you can get confused during the manufacturing process. Parts are cut out with a circular saw or jigsaw and connected with self-tapping screws. All that remains is to decorate the box.

Creative people are unlikely to want to just buy a ready-made street mailbox and magazine box in the store. It is much more interesting to come up with and implement your own original idea. Even something as mundane as an ordinary classic letterbox can be turned into a work of art.

In order to make a container for correspondence yourself, you need to think over everything to the smallest detail. Despite the fact that this is a small object, it can either emphasize the beauty of the site, or, on the contrary, spoil the impression, getting out of the general style. Before starting work, you should prepare product drawings and cut parts strictly according to them.

If you plan to manufacture an American-type box on a leg, then it is necessary to choose in advance what the support will be made of and by what specific method the container will be directly attached to it... To make the model original, you can fix the box not on a rack, but on a decorative sculpture. What kind of sculpture will be, depends on the design preferences of the author. For example, a sculpture might look like a tree trunk, and a letterbox might look like a birdhouse. Or it could be the figure of a fairytale character holding a mailbox, shaped like a wrapped gift.

It is interesting to consider a few non-standard mailboxes that are made of very unexpected materials.

It seems that a plastic bottle cannot turn into a letterbox in any way. But this is not the case. To create, you need to cut off the neck and, after decorating, attach it with screws or nails to the desired surface.

The bottle can be placed horizontally or vertically, depending on the preferences of the owners of the site. When mounted vertically, it is worth taking care of the visor so that the mail does not suffer from snow or rain. This creates a simple yet functional mailbox.

To decorate the product, paints are required. You can color the model in different ways - with one color, several colors of the same tone or contrast, you can draw something specific or create an abstract drawing.

Another completely unexpected material is a plastic canister. Not only a plastic bottle, but also a canister that is suitable in size can act as a container for correspondence.

In addition to a plastic canister, you can also use a steel one. But in this case, the process will be more time consuming and take much longer, because working with metal is more difficult than with plastic. In addition, you will need special tools:

• Bulgarian;
• jigsaw;
• screwdriver.

But with a certain skill, it is quite possible to create this model of a mailbox at home.

You can make a box for letters from materials that were originally intended for completely different purposes.

• Unusual models include boxes made of tin. They look unusual and attract attention. Tin takes any shape well and retains it.
• You can also find products made from a pipe of a suitable diameter... But in order to leave mail in it, it will have to be rolled up, which is not very convenient.
• If the house has an old computer system unit, which is no longer used, then it can also act as a basis for manufacturing.
• Can be applied cookie tins of a suitable size.
• In some cases thick multi-layer cardboard is taken as the main material, but such a design can only be temporary, since it will not be able to serve for a long time in the open air.

Fastening of mail boxes is carried out directly on the wall or on the fence that encloses the site. Installation on a fence can take place either from the outside or from the inside. Usually, the box is attached from the inside if the owners are afraid for the safety of the container itself and its contents.

When carrying out fastening, it is imperative to take into account the material from which the fence is made. So, the installation procedure on a fence made of corrugated board, wooden boards or iron rods will be different. Also, we must not forget about the visor - it is he who will help protect correspondence from negative atmospheric phenomena.

Usually the shape of the mailbox is not original. However, if you want the product to be absolutely unique, then you should think about about additional decoration. Some owners only decorate postal designs with color, but modern technology makes it possible to use a wide variety of decorative elements. You can decorate a box bought in a store, or one that is made by hand.

Initially, you need to decide on the color of the mailbox. It should be in harmony with the shade of the fence or wall on which it is mounted. Not all products need painting. For example, various varnishes can be used for external finishing of wooden structures.

Quite popular are boxes for mail, which are made out in the form of houses. In this case, for decoration, the roof of the "house" is painted in a bright color, the windows and the door are drawn. The box can be presented as a book or cuckoo clock, a backpack for a student or a wine barrel, a chest or a coffee grinder - the choice is simply limitless.

Also popular are products that combine a letter box and flower pots, which are located on the sides of the structure. A mailbox decorated with fresh flowers looks especially attractive in the summer. The decoration with the help of various figurines is also interesting: gnomes, angels, birds or animals.

For Christmas and New Years, you can decorate not only the tree and the house, but also the mailbox. Ribbons and Christmas decorations, garlands and New Year's wreaths, cones and candies, figures of Santa Claus, Snow Maiden, Snowman can act as decorations.

The mailbox doesn't have to be boring and uninteresting.

You can learn how to make a simple plywood mailbox with your own hands from the video below.