Woodworking: Bookshelf Project

We finished our first woodworking furniture piece – a bookshelf! My partner did most of the work, but I’ll take the credit – we designed it to blend into our space and house as many books as we could (many are still in boxes!).

With each design feature we chose, we learned a lot and hopefully gained some skills to make the next one easier:

• Building a custom design: There are lots of plans online where they tell you the exact dimensions and order to put everything together. We had found a plan we liked, but when the shelter -in-place hit, we hadn’t bought everything we needed to build that specific one, so we started to build something similar but we were forced to design our shelf much differently. I think making something custom is more fun/challenging and you can make something that fits your space better, but in the future, I would design more carefully before starting and not just put things together as we go. 
• Dado joints: Dado joints are very strong and at the time, seemed like the easiest. We are happy with how it turned out, but cutting at an exact right angle and parallel, especially given wood that can be slightly warped and not perfectly straight which are highlighted when using this method. A lot of bookshelf guides use pocket holes to hold up the shelves and we plan to try to use those for our next shelf. 
• Plywood with Poplar wood on the top and trim: Plywood is strong and cheaper than solid wood, but the edges are not good for painting because each slab of wood absorbs paint differently. This is why we use solid wood for the top and trim – we weren’t picky about the type of wood because we planned to paint it; however, some types of wood are harder or more durable than others. Adding bits of wood here and there can be confusing when you’re measuring out depths and lengths – we learned how important it is to carefully plan and think about each piece of wood, where it connects with other pieces, and which sides are being exposed. 
• Trim on the top and bottom: We wanted to add trim to match the classic details of our apartment and make it a little more finished looking. Cutting the trim is so confusing – you don’t just cut a 45 degree angle and put the 2 sides together…good thing we had extra! 
• Eggshell white with a Blue backboard: we wanted the color to be simple and bright, but add a little color. Painting a smooth surface was next to impossible using what we had – looking online, spray paint is the smoothest finish. We found that the softness of the paintbrush and how you apply it really makes a difference – practice helps. 

I am very happy with our results and our bookshelf is already completely filled, but we still have many more books to be put away so we’re already thinking about building the next one!