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DIY Pallet Wood Dog

I’ve got a fun project to share with you today, dogs made from pallet wood.  We made one DIY Pallet Wood Dog to keep and another to give as a gift.  If you are a dog lover, you’ll most likely love this project.

Learn how to make a decorative dog to hang or display using pallet wood.

How to Make a DIY Pallet Wood Dog

Supplies

  • Aged boards from a pallet – Order pallet wood if you don’t have a source.
  • Luan or thin plyboard
  • Dog silhouette – We used this one.
  • Bandsaw and/or Jigsaw
  • Wood glue, pencil, clamps
  • Hanger

Procedure

Obtain Pallet Wood

This past spring I had a few pallet projects in mind and asked on Facebook if anyone had a pallet that I could have.  Several people responded and I was able to easily obtain two pallets.  I never got around to my intended projects but I did use a board from one pallet to make this sign for our lake house and we used other boards from that pallet to make two pallet wood dogs.

Pallet wood ages nicely and neither my lake house sign nor these dogs required any stain.  If you have new pallet wood, you’ll need to stain or paint your finished project.

Make a Template

Find a dog silhouette picture that you like and print it out.  We found one that looks a lot like our dog, Sherman.  Draw the dog the size that you want on a piece of luan.  We didn’t have one sheet that was large enough, so we used two scrap pieces.  If you can’t draw, enlarge the picture ( I like to use Block Posters), print it out, and tape the sections together to make a pattern. 

Instructions to make a decorative dog to hang or display using pallet wood.

Trace Dog Template on Pallet Wood

Line up pallet wood pieces and hold in place with a board clamped to the wood pieces.

Position dog template on wood.  Our dog was wider than the boards, so we cut the tail separately.

How to Make a Pallet Wood Dog - Silhouette of a dog on pallet wood ready to be cut out.

Clamp the template into place so that it doesn’t move when you trace it.

Steps to Make a Pallet Wood Dog - Trace the dog template onto the pallet wood.

Trace the dog onto the wood.

Step-by-step directions to make a pallet wood dog. Trace the dog template onto pallet wood.

Cut out the Dog

Use either a jigsaw or band saw to cut out the dog pieces.  We found that a band saw made smoother cuts.  Our regular band saw’s blade broke during this project so we had to switch over to my granddad’s.  This baby is ancient but still works perfectly.

Craftsman 1950's or 1960's Band Saw

We ended up using the first four boards for this section of the dog and then cut the remaining pieces using two more boards.

Make a dog using pallet wood. Step-by-step instructions.

The dog pieces are cut out and ready to be glued together.

Pallet wood dog - Pieces cut out and ready to be attached together.

Attach the Pieces

Pallet wood isn’t regular.  The wood has different widths, some boards are slightly cupped, and it hasn’t been planed to make it smooth.  If the wood was regular, we could have connected the pieces with biscuit joints but since it was irregular and we wanted to see a small space between each board, we chose not to connect the pieces using biscuits, instead we used strips of luan.

The strips are in place here but not glued.

How to Make a Pallet Wood Dog - Pallet pieces cut in the shape of a dog connected together.

Glue the pieces together one section at a time.  Clamp into place until the glue is dry.

Use pallet wood to make a decorative dog.

Here the dog’s nose is glued to his face.

Use pallet wood to make a dog wall hanging.

Now his body is glued together.

DIY Pallet Wood Dog - Attaching the pieces together

Now the tail piece is glued to the middle body piece.

DIY Pallet Wood Dog - Attaching the pieces together

Attach a Hanger

Estimate the center of mass for the hanger placement so that the dog will hang evenly.  Another options for hanging include screws with wire or drill keyholes.

We made two dogs, a large one and a small one.  Here you can see the large dog’s hanger placement.

Make a dog using pallet wood.

We used a saw tooth hanger for the small dog.  We like to stamp our projects with our personalized branding irons.

Dog made from pallet wood - Step-by-step tutorial

The Finished Products

The large dog is for our home but we’ve yet to decide on a place to display it.  The small dog was a Christmas gift for Mr. SP’s sister.

How to Make a DIY Pallet Wood Dog - Follow these step-by-step directions to make a pallet wood dog for your home or as a gift.

We love this project and are looking forward to finding a special place to hang it. 

Use pallet wood to make a decorative dog to hang on a wall or display.


The smaller dog will make its home in California in my sister-in-law’s home.  

Make a dog using pallet wood.

Pin It!

DIY Pallet Wood Dogs - Make decorative dogs using pallet wood. This step-by-step tutorial shows you how.

Pallet Wood Dogs to Buy

If you want a pallet wood dog but don’t want to make one yourself, check out these pallet wood dogs:

Other Pallet Wood Projects

DIY Pallet Wine Rack

DIY Pallet Wine Rack

DIY Pallet Wood Arrow Sign

33 Comments

  1. Your project turned out great. I had several pallets but ended up just taking them to the dump because they were impossible to take apart. I’m sure if I had more patience I could have found a YouTube with handy dandy tips but nope.

    1. Pallets aren’t easy to take apart. I leave that to my husband because I once tried and I wasn’t successful.

      Paula

  2. Love this idea! Well done.
    As to books, I just finished The Pilot’s Wife, what a wonderful book! It isn’t a long book but gets you hooked and stays that way due to the well done writting. It’s about the airplane crash her husband was flying. Not saying more, but it’s like an onion with many, many layers to peel back! Another book is The Great Influenza, the pandemic 1918 flu that killed millions. A true book that examines Pres Wilson, the Johns Hopkins hospital and so much more. I love almost all of the Dick Francis books. Try Hot Money, Straight or Banker. Horses are always involved somehow, you always learn a lot in an interesting fashion. Hope you enjoy my suggestions, I’m beyond being an avid reader! If you like sifi try Anne MacCafery, she has The Dragon’s of Pern series, plus tons of other things. For great characters try Charlotte Armstrong, The Family Vault is the first in one run. Outrageous, nutty people bent on murder! Happy reading!

    1. Thank you, Shelley! Now I need to find the perfect place to hang this. It probably will end up either in our office or at the lake.

      Paula

  3. The knot in the the wood is at the perfect spot for the dog’s eye/ eyebrow area! I like it. I sure do appreciate how much goes into a blog post like this now that I know all that’s involved! Did you see my candy cane pictures in front of beadboard?! It makes a good background, doesn’t it.

    1. Thank you, Liberty! I’ve got to find a place to hang my dog. The little one is now at home in CA with my husband’s sister.

      Paula

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    1. One of these made with an Australian Sheep dog silhouette would be a great project for your nieces to make or for a gift for them. Glad I could join your first party.

      Paula

  6. Paula, brilliant idea, just made two silhouettes of our two spaniels, happy to share so you can see! We live in northern Scotland.

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