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The first step was to find the best deal on cedar fence slats around town. The day I decided to purchase these they happened to be going for around $3.00 per board which was a decent price at the the current state of things. Depending on the size of your shutters you may be able to get away with not buying extra boards for your cross members as you may be able to use the cut off sections of the shutter boards. I made a few of different sizes. They typically will come in 6 foot lengths so many times there is some extra lengths for cross members when done cutting. The shutters shown in this demonstration are 48" long.
Once you have your best boards picked out it's time to sand them all. I just used my orbital electric sander and it worked like a charm. It took me around 10 to 15 minutes per board sanding only one long side, the short sides, and ends of each.
Now I lay all three boards out. It's now good time to cut all three to the length that you want. I like to cut them all three at the same time on my chop saw.
I took one of the slats and ripped it exactly in half with my table saw as this is the desired width for the cross members of the shutters.
One thing to note in the picture above is that I've used popsicle sticks for spacers in between the wood slats and clamped them together. I then took each half of the board I just ripped and laid them across the width of the shutter and marked the cut location.
Once I cut the cross members to their desired length, I cut 45 degree angles on each end of both boards to get the desired look. Once cut, I sanded smoothly both pieces.
I then placed the sanded cross members on the shutter to make sure the length and look is correct.
I decided to place the cross members 7" from each end of the shutters.
I used 3/4" brad nails. I wanted to make sure that I used long enough brad nails to hold this together but also not too long so as to protrude from the opposite side.
Just to get the cross member held in place, I only use one nail per board for the front.
I then flip the shutter over and nail the boards to the cross member using at least 4 or 5 brad nails per board.
Now it's time to take a paint brush and a can of sealer and get these shutters all stained and sealed up.
We decided to use this valspar brand one-coat exterior sealer. While it does say one-coat, I found it most beneficial to use two coats.
Once the sealer is dry I secure the shutters to the house with some hex head self tapping screws that bury the head of the screw once fully inserted.
Almost done. Actually, you can be done at this point unless you'd like to add some metal decorations to these to give them even more of a decorative appeal.
These are basically oversized tacks with a nice decorative hammered head.
They are really easy to install. I made sure to get these on the center of the cross member and hammered them in with a rubber mallet so as not to ding of up the finish on the head.
Check out the full video of the whole process in the video above.
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