Vintage nautical wall hook DIY

This September will mark four years since my grandmother passed away. It has been almost twenty-five years since my grandfather passed away and it feels a bit surreal thinking how fast the time has gone. I remember my grandmothers passing so well because it was less than a month after I was married that her health rapidly declined. I remember returning from our honeymoon to a call that we should come straight away to see her. She was a very resilient woman. She seemed like the type that would live forever; never sick, never made much fuss about anything and likely didn't give sickness or death much thought at all. My grandfather, who was an engineer, designed and built their home and as a child I remember thinking that their home was full of all things old! My grandparents had a few items that were left to them by their parents. One of those items was a dining table left to my grandfather by his mother. It had been refinished a few times that I was aware of and during my lifetime, was a dark oak stain. After my grandma passed away, the family prepared to sell her house which meant cleaning the house. As items were claimed by family members, the table sat and sat with no takers. At the time, I was living in a 400 sqft apartment in the West end of Toronto, certainly not enough space for a vintage dining table but I asked if my parents would hang onto it until I had space to take it. Fast forward four years and it now sits in our dining room and is used as our everyday dining table. Besides a good clean, it hasn't been changed. It certainly could use some reinforcement and refinishing but for now, it is being used as is. It is an oval table and when we took it, it came with two leaves, however only one seemed to fit. On a trip this summer, I found some cute anchor shaped hooks and since I have a small obsession with nautical things, I decided to scoop them up. Using the extra table leaf as a backing for the hooks, I figured I could create an interesting piece of functional wall art that had a bit of a meaningful story behind it. Here’s the step by step on how my husband and I made it.
Some initial notes: You’ll want to make sure you measure on the wall where you’d like your wood to hang and decide wether to drill into stud or use drywall plugs. We opted for drywall plugs as the spacing fit better this way.

What you’ll need:
Drill with various bits and a counter sink bit
long screws and short screws
heavy duty dry wall plugs (if using)
tape measure
level
pensil
hooks
wood plank (distressed or vintage)

Step 1
Measure and mark where to drill the holes to mount the wood plank and drill. We used a counter sink bit to prevent screw heads from sticking out.

Step 2
Drill in wall anchors into wall

Step 3
Drill screws through wood and into drywall plugs to mount the plank to the wall. Note: you may want to drill clearance holes into the plank so that it is easier to see the plugs as you are mounting the board to the wall.

Step 4
Mark on the board where you would like the hooks to hang and drill. We positioned the hooks so that they would cover the holes made to mount the wood to the wall.

Step 5
Screw short screws through the hook hanging hole and into the wood. For different style hooks, you may need to screw the screw into the wood then hook the hook onto it. Repeat this for as many hooks as you have.

Voila! You’re done. Now you have a beautiful, vintage wall mount with functional hooks. Here is what ours ended up like

Be sure to purchase high quality materials. As we found out, our cute and inexpensive hooks lacked structural integrity and when accidentally dropped, we lost one of our main hooks :(

My husband is in the process of having his metal guy quote on a new hook! Until then, we’ve got a stylish and almost completely functional vintage nautical wall mount!
Thanks for following along and happy DIYing.