How to hang a heavy mirror

You might remember this awesome little  Craigslist list trip Andy and I took when we first moved into our new to us house in Austin. I barley remember, so no worries if you don’t. This post will catch you up! Along with 3 chairs and a desk, we also bought a super awesome giant mirror. The mirror is 8 feet long x 3 feet tall. Next step, figure out how to hang a heavy mirror.

The heavy mirror sat in our house like this for way too long.

This sucker weighed about 86 pounds, and when you research how to hang heavy mirrors, they always say to double the weight to allow for the pull of you cleaning the mirror. So we were on the hunt for a 200 lbs hanger.

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What to use to hang a heavy mirror

We ended up finding these OOK french cleats on Amazon and each one can hold up to 200 lbs each! Perfecto. Oh and crazy Andy made us buy 2 pairs, because he did not like the idea of putting only one set in the middle o f the mirror. So our mirror is extra sturdy and has 2 sets of OOK french cleats. Wha to the hoo. I could basically lay on top of the mirror and it would supposedly hold me.

Andy was going to buy these L shaped brackets to brace the 4 corners of the mirror, but when we lifted the corner of the paper, we realized the mirror already had the L brackets. #OneLessThingToBuy Oh and I just think it is neat that our mirror came to us all the way from Chelsea Frames in New York City!

So each pack of OOK french cleats comes with 2 cleats that interlock together. You will attach one side to the wall and one side will be attached to the mirror. Andy is using a pencil to mark where he is going to drill the holes into the wall. The cleats are rated for 200 lbs each, but the cleat is only as strong as the material it is fastened to. Because of this, paranoid Andy, wanted to make sure that both cleats were secured to a stud in addition to using sheet rick anchors. Andy claims he likes to make things “bomb proof”. #BoysAreWeird

The tricky part to hanging these things is making sure that they are level. You have to make sure that each cleat is level, but then you also have to make sure that both cleats are level with each other. Volia!

The cleats are drilled into studs and now it’s time to attach the other half of the cleat to the mirror. The first thing is to make sure that the spacing of the cleats on the wall is the same distance as the spacing of the cleats on the back of the mirror. Then make sure that the cleats align perfectly with the edge of the frame. Next, make sure that your holes fall on a meaty part of the frame. Then pre drill holes where your screws will go so that you make sure not to split the wood frame. Finally, screw in your screws.

Now for the super tough part, at least for me, you have t0 lift this bad boy off of the ground and fit the cleats together. Yikes. It actually wasn’t that hard.

If you’re brave, once you get that sucker on the wall, stick a level up there and see how you did! Andy gets a gold star for this mirror hanging job… that bubble is dead center!

Have you had to hang a really heavy something on the wall? Have you ever used OOK french cleats? So you think the mirror can really hold 400 lbs? Should I try hanging from it? Tomorrow Sometime soon, I’ll share the fun table Andy and my mama bought me for my Burfday. It lives under the mirror, and it’s really cute. You can see it in the top picture : )