Furniture - Book Shelves

[j44ke]

When you get wherever you are going, look for a custom wood worker. Someone who builds bookshelves like people here build bikes. You may be surprised at how similar their prices are to production stuff - again, same as custom vs. production with bikes. Nothing beats handmade.

If you move to Virginia Beach, I can probably dig up some candidates. Minneapolis seems like a place that should be crawling with woodworkers. You want that guy whose garage lights don't go off until late at night.

[omnigrid]

eh, just go to a vintage furniture store or hit up craigslist when you arrive. I bet all the cool mid-century modern stuff is still floating around and hasnt been price-gouged yet down there.

no need to buy new furniture, unless that's what you want.

ikea is the worst.

Or if you want new, I saw some sweet powdercoated steel bookcases at CB2. Those would last quite awhile.

[spopepro]

Here's the solution *if* you will be living in locations with standard, or mostly standard, ceilings.

Get 2x4s, route a channel on each 4in side and tack in a metal shelf standard (some call them pilasters, the metal things with slots for clips to put shelves on). Put a tee nut in the top and screw a rubber foot of your choosing in. Cut 1x10 or 1x12 to whatever shelf lengths you want. Or cut them from 3/4 ply. The 2x4s go in pairs and are tightened by the caps from the floor to the ceiling. Make as many sections as you want. Make it out of whatever wood you want. Even recovered/recycled would work great.

My parents made a set for me when I was very small. We moved them 3 times, I took them to college through 3 appartments, moved 4 more times and now have 16ft ceilings and can't use them. However, now my brother has them and they are still going strong.

[Saab2000]

Maybe one day I'll build my own. My brother has a history of wood working and has a Shopsmith that was acquired by my late father for pennies on the dollar.

Today I moved some of my Ikea garbage to my storage unit. It looks decent on the surface but it's true junk underneath. Thankfully I got the good dresser and night tables with the wheeled drawers. They're at least not totally mad painful. But yeah, IKEA is kind of a waste.

The next stuff will either be made by me or by someone who really knows their stuff. I think it would be a fun project to make some of this stuff with my brother with his digit and limb eating Shopsmith.

Two of my pieces of furniture - my bed frame and a leaf living room table - are from Ethan Allen. They are family heirloom type stuff. I asked my mother about the living room table. She said it's been in the family since the 1960s. It was refinished at one point and that's why I didn't recognize it. But then I did. It's decades old and looks great and feels solid. The other stuff is years old and the particle board underneath the veneer is crumbling.

It feels less grotesque if the tree sacrificed to make that Ethan Allen stuff lasts generations and looks better with age. The Ikea stuff will just end its life in a dumpster and landfill. That kind of sucks.

[spopepro]

I say roll your own but...

When I moved into our loft the first thing we did is have someone build 10ft tall bookshelves. I've always had a thing for library ladders.

[Saab2000]

I say roll your own but...

When I moved into our loft the first thing we did is have someone build 10ft tall bookshelves. I've always had a thing for library ladders.

If I ever use wheeled library ladders I'm using ceramic bearings and tubular tires for maximum smoothness. I freaking love those wheeled ladders than run on guides!

[airedale]

Go the vintage route. This stuff is beautiful to look at and made to last. I found my couch on the curbside during council cleanup, small cost for restoration and it came up beautifully. My kitchen table was also a curbside find, 4 - 6 seat extendable table in absolutely mint condition and perfect working order.

I can't drive by this stuff knowing it's headed for landfill or to be destroyed. There must be comparable bookshelves out there to be had. I struggle to understand how people can throw this stuff out.

[benkiel]

For wall mount shelves, Rakks (website sucks, but is rakks.com — the store section is easier to navigate). Aluminum made in MA. I use the C standards, tons of brackets and then you can use whatever you want for shelving material. Right now finish grade ply, but in the next move that will change. Such a great system because the track is continuous, not holes you have to line up standard to standard. Downside is tons of holes in walls. You get good at patching when you move (this may be a bonus?)

[caleb]

If you end up moving to MSP: Handcrafted Mission Arts and Crafts style by dalemartinfurniture

[s_curran]

Go the vintage route. This stuff is beautiful to look at and made to last. I found my couch on the curbside during council cleanup, small cost for restoration and it came up beautifully. My kitchen table was also a curbside find, 4 - 6 seat extendable table in absolutely mint condition and perfect working order.

I can't drive by this stuff knowing it's headed for landfill or to be destroyed. There must be comparable bookshelves out there to be had. I struggle to understand how people can throw this stuff out.

That couch is perfect, my grandparents have a very similar one that I eventually plan on re-upholstering, maybe I'll try that one myself. We got ourselves a great crate and barrel couch with a chaise for 150 on CL. It was faded and in red, but its an outstanding couch for 150, and the faded look works.

I scour the internet for MCM stuff. I have 3 eames chairs now, 1 new one that was a gift, 1 pulled out of an old schoolhouse that is in green vinyl with the stacking legs, and one thats got arms, with the swivel base and black fabric, I especially love that one. Also have two real old tulip chair fakes, there beat, but I kind of like them.

[Brandon White]

Go the vintage route. This stuff is beautiful to look at and made to last. I found my couch on the curbside during council cleanup, small cost for restoration and it came up beautifully. My kitchen table was also a curbside find, 4 - 6 seat extendable table in absolutely mint condition and perfect working order.

I can't drive by this stuff knowing it's headed for landfill or to be destroyed. There must be comparable bookshelves out there to be had. I struggle to understand how people can throw this stuff out.

Wow - those are great finds. Maybe we should start a Sweet Furniture thread.

[caleb]

I found my couch on the curbside during council cleanup

You must drive through different neighborhoods than I do. If those pieces were on a curb in my neighborhood they'd be in the back of a truck in five minutes, either as personal furniture or to be resold at a flea market.

[airedale]

You must drive through different neighborhoods than I do. If those pieces were on a curb in my neighborhood they'd be in the back of a truck in five minutes, either as personal furniture or to be resold at a flea market.

Ha. It's true, other side of the Pacific. There is a large crew of people out looking, but this sort of stuff isn't usually the target, most are after metal that they can cash in for recycling. I rode past it on my commute in the morning so around 6am, then promptly forgot about it till 9.30 pm. Drove across and it was still there. So I loaded it up on the roof racks, which was an ordeal in itself, and drove it home.

Naturally it didn't look quite like so neat when I picked it up, but the bones were there.

[rowdyhillrambler]

AIT

We make this. Everything done here in my shop. metal/wood/plastic
This is our old site, our new one is in the works. I will deliver it to you anywhere in the world. If you want custom one off stuff.

[rowdyhillrambler]

fly to nashville, i will pick you up. come to the shop and make whatever you want. i mean this.

we can ride the best roads, drink the best beer, fish, make furniture, shoot the shit, shoot a turkey, and chew tobacco

Maybe one day I'll build my own. My brother has a history of wood working and has a Shopsmith that was acquired by my late father for pennies on the dollar.

Today I moved some of my Ikea garbage to my storage unit. It looks decent on the surface but it's true junk underneath. Thankfully I got the good dresser and night tables with the wheeled drawers. They're at least not totally mad painful. But yeah, IKEA is kind of a waste.

The next stuff will either be made by me or by someone who really knows their stuff. I think it would be a fun project to make some of this stuff with my brother with his digit and limb eating Shopsmith.

Two of my pieces of furniture - my bed frame and a leaf living room table - are from Ethan Allen. They are family heirloom type stuff. I asked my mother about the living room table. She said it's been in the family since the 1960s. It was refinished at one point and that's why I didn't recognize it. But then I did. It's decades old and looks great and feels solid. The other stuff is years old and the particle board underneath the veneer is crumbling.

It feels less grotesque if the tree sacrificed to make that Ethan Allen stuff lasts generations and looks better with age. The Ikea stuff will just end its life in a dumpster and landfill. That kind of sucks.

[deano]

Alright, rowdyhillrambler, my inlaws live in TN - if Saab2000 doesn't avail himself of your offer, I might, should it be transferable.

But seriously, my wife and I just bought our first house. Coincidentally, the family is calling in the grandfather's bookshelves we absconded to North Carolina with. Evidently they were made for my wife's brothers, and we didn't know this when we moved with them, and so we need a book-shelving solution soon. I have some shop class experience from a dozen years ago and access to a table saw, so someone talk me out of making some built-ins.

Has anyone done built-ins themselves? I'm in seminary and my wife is an English teacher, so our book collection ain't getting any smaller... I haven't undertaken a furniture project like this, someone talk me down off the ledge...