So this has been in the works for quite some time now. We saw one similar at the first belt testing operation at our current gym, and I thought that it was a lovely way to display my daughter’s dedication to the sport/martial art. It will have taken her a number of years to move up through all of the belts she chooses to do, so it’s a compact way to symbolize all of those years of effort.
Right now she is a red stripe on a blue belt, and will have a red belt, then a red belt with a black stripe to go before she can make it to black belt territory. Plus you have all of those Dabs levels to progress further up in the black belt tiers. If she sticks with it for several more (expensive) years then she can try to get into teaching/instruction at the gym. Or because she’s a great swimmer maybe she will be a life guard, I don’t know, I couldn’t say which area tickles her fancy more. But the important thing is, she has options!
We have room for all the belts. Well depending on just how many black belts she gets to, it might get over crowded on the top tier, but I’ll worry about that in five or six years time. Too early to be bothered by it now.
I made the whole thing out of walnut, but had some darker poplar dowels for the upper pegs, which seems to work well enough. I have screws on the back so that I can add picture wire and hang it from a stud if it needs to come up off the ground. We are in a bit of a transition period where the kids are moving (ever so slowly) away from toys, into devices, electronic games, and hobbies, and experiences. Also clothes are becoming a bigger deal now, more than ever, as they are growing up, changing shapes and sizes, and building their own tastes in what they like to wear. So their bedrooms might fluctuate as they release toys to the younger cousins, or take them to the cottage, which opens up floor space to keep the display on the ground, or if they start to pull down the kiddie posters, drawings, and wall decals, I can put it up over the bed. It’s all a slow moving jigsaw puzzle at the moment. I can’t pin anything down just yet.
I’m also now aware of how much different the sizes of belts are. I may have mismeasured because I based my overall design on the first three belts I found on the top of my daughters armoire, and now I am concerned it isn’t going to be wide enough for her teen year belts that take much longer to achieve! D’oh! Oh well, I know I made some mistakes building this one so if I did it again 8 would make the vertical supports thicker, so that as I dado cut the horizontal pieces into them I didn’t weaken it so badly. I ended up having to cut, and glue two additional pieces to the back of the struts to strengthen them up considerably. As you could audibly hear it cracking, or creaking as I moved it around, just under its own weight. That was a mood crusher hearing that noise so soon after I had glued it all together — pre added strut support.
I’m happy with the medal hangers, I got her gold and bronze medals from the Taekwondo Black Belt World June 2025 tournament up on there, proudly displayed. I found her first medal for outstanding achievement too. And a medal from this year’s Regatta at the lake. Looks cool up on there too.
I had originally planned to use dark dowels to hold all of the belts on, but I soon realized elastic rope was the way to go. Now if it gets knocked, or tips the belts should stay out no matter what. That’s a nice touch in my mind. I am kind of sad I messed up the top plate as I had hoped to router in some words to make it really feel like it was specific to my daughter you know? But I got carried away, muddled my measurements and fucked it up, good & hard. So I had to cut it down. Oh well! Live and learn.
Greatwall Studios Graphic Design 