How we hide the TV electronics

Hello there! First of all, I know there is a weird redirect going on with my site and I'm trying to get it figured out. I'm still here! Go ahead and click through if you get the notice and hopefully I'll have it fixed shortly.

You all have been so helpful the past couple of weeks! If you missed my review of our family room sectional earlier this week, check it out here. You all had some great ideas that may be helpful for you those of you with similar issues. I've already tried adding a pillow to our cushions and it made them way too thick, but I'm going to keep working on it.

I have a whole post planned soon about the best way to hang your TV without seeing cables and cords everywhere (safely). But this post goes into more detail on how we hid our electronics in our family room. I didn't want to have the components out if we could help it and this was a perfect solution!

When we took down a wall and extended our family room years ago we had to build our gas fireplace out into the room. Usually there's a little "dog house" bump out outside that your fireplace sits in, but ours had been a corner fireplace. Adding that bump out would have required permits and a lot more time.

Since the fireplace was going to come out into the room anyway, I figured out a solution to reconfigure kitchen cabinets (like I do a lot in our house) and make them into built ins to hide the electronics:

I didn't do that part personally -- the guys we hired expanded them in the back so they would be deep enough to hold the electronics. We used upper cabinets because the lower ones were too deep for what we needed. I had them extend these to 18 inches deep instead of 12 inches like the original cabinet.

I later cut the center part of the doors off and then installed metal sheeting so the components could breathe:

I love that the sheeting lets air flow, but also still hides the items inside pretty well. The best part -- the remotes still work!

Here's how it looks inside:

THIS is important and I will go into this more at a later date -- do not run power cords through the wall. I learned years ago this is NOT the correct way to hang a TV. We had an electrician/AV professional install the proper outlets and plugs behind the TV. (Power and receptacles for all HDMI, etc.)

I had the fake wall built above the fireplace so I could recess the TV back into it and have it sit flush with that wall when it's pushed back:

I love that you don't see the wires behind the TV or the mount when the TV is in it's regular position (it also pulls out, swivels and can go up or down). I highly recommend this little trick if you are considering hanging your TV -- especially with a mount that pulls out!

The other cabinet is pure storage which is awesome! Those fabric covered bins are from IKEA and I have all our extra remotes, phone accessories and random electronic stuff inside. I LOVE having this storage in the family room:

I love even more that there is empty space in there! :)

This fireplace wall is the focal point of our family room for sure. I think it turned out so well. The fact that the electronics are hidden away makes it even better:

I still haven't hidden the subwoofer, but now it doesn't even bother me. Years ago I was going to build some kind of cover for it, but now we hardly notice it.

These DIY tricks are what completely transformed this wall -- it's another spot in our home that looks good but also functions wonderfully as well.

Here are some more helpful projects from this wall if you are interested!

How I used $13 to panel the wall behind the TV: