How do I make and fit a French cleat?
One batten ripped at forty-five degrees gives the strongest, most forgiving way to hang a cabinet, a mirror or a tool board — and the angle does the work.
- Difficulty
- intermediate
- Time
- 1 hr
- Read
- 3 min
Short answer
Rip a batten down its length at forty-five degrees. Screw one half to the wall, bevel facing up and out, dead level, fixed into studs or masonry along its whole length. Screw the other half to the back of the item, bevel down and in, then lower the item on. Add a spacer the same thickness at the bottom so it hangs plumb.
A French cleat is the most useful piece of workshop knowledge that never appears in an assembly instruction. It converts a hanging problem into a levelling problem: get the wall cleat level and fixed well, and everything you hang on it is level and well fixed, permanently and repeatedly. The diagram shows why the angle matters.
What you'll need
- A straight batten — 18mm plywood or a sound softwood board
- A circular saw or table saw that will tilt to 45 degrees
- A long spirit level
- Screws and fixings appropriate to the wall
- A cable and pipe detector
Step by step
- Cut the cleat.Rip a batten along its length with the blade set to 45 degrees, producing two matching wedge-shaped pieces. Plywood is more stable than solid timber for this and does not have a grain direction to worry about.
- Work out which way each half goes.The wall half has its bevel facing upwards and outwards, with the long point at the top. The item half has its bevel facing downwards and inwards. When they meet, the two sloping faces are in full contact.
- Find the studs or set out the masonry fixings.The point of a cleat is that it spreads the load along its whole length, so it wants fixings at every stud or at regular centres in masonry — not just two at the ends.
- Fix the wall cleat dead level.This is the only critical step. Everything you hang will be exactly as level as the cleat and no better. Use a long level or a laser, and check again after the first fixing goes in.
- Check for services before drilling.A cleat crosses a lot of wall, so it crosses more potential cable and pipe runs than a single fixing does. Check the whole line.
- Fix the item cleat to the back of the item.Screw it on with the bevel facing down and in, near the top, and check it is parallel with the top of the item. Screw and glue it for anything heavy.
- Add a bottom spacer.A packer of the same thickness as the cleat, fixed at the bottom of the item's back. Without it the item leans back at the bottom by the cleat's thickness.
- Hang it and check.Lower the item so the bevels engage. It should drop onto the cleat and sit tight against the wall — the weight itself pulls it in, which is why the joint gets firmer as the load increases.
- Secure it if it could be lifted off.Nothing mechanically locks a cleat. Where the item could be knocked upwards, or where a child could pull on it, drive a screw through the bottom spacer into the wall as well.
Tips
- This is the standard way to hang wall cabinets, tool boards, mirrors, headboards and heavy artwork, and it is how a lot of shop fitting is done. It also lets you take the item down in one movement.
- A whole wall of horizontal cleats turns a workshop wall into a re-arrangeable storage system — every holder, shelf and rack gets its own cleat half and moves anywhere.
- The cleat does not have to be full width. Two shorter cleats at each end of a wide item work as long as both are on the same level line.
Common mistakes
- Fixing the wall cleat with two screws at the ends — The whole advantage is load distributed along a run. Two fixings concentrates it, which is what you were trying to avoid.
- Forgetting the bottom spacer — The item leans back at the bottom by the thickness of the cleat, which looks wrong immediately and puts the load in the wrong place on the joint.