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Monday, March 9, 2015

DIY Book Covers

 
I've been working on some built in shelves in my bonus room for the past two months. They are now ready to have books back on them, so I've been doing some purging, selling, and organizing to keep this space as dejunked as possible and only keep those that I truly love and will read again. I do think books in and of themselves are beautiful, but I have a few mismatched series (some are hard copy, some are paperback, some are library discards or used, and some are new) that are an eye sore.

I saw this Vintage Circus Elephant Graphic from The Graphics Fairy and thought it would make an excellent overall picture for a set of books. Then I found some white wrapping paper at the Dollar Tree and got to work.

Here's my set of books that I wanted to cover (don't judge)


First, I covered all the books text book style. The paper was thin, but since I was putting the elephant image over the spines, I didn't worry about it. For the other books, I doubled up the wrapping paper so you couldn't see through it.
 



I lined the books up and measured the width and length of the spines combined. Then I opened the image in a Word Document and resized it to 8.25" x 10.5" and printed it in black and white.


Next, I flipped the image over and one by one traced a book's spine and then cut off the section. I couldn't find an uneaten glue stick in my house (I have a 2 year old), so I used double sided tape. I have since bought and hidden a glue stick to help seal down all the corners and edges, so that's why they aren't as sealed down in these images.







My next series, I double wrapped and cut some numbers with my silhouette machine. You could easily find some stickers that would work.





I also wanted to cover my Percy Jackson books since they are all used and varying in wear, but my boys relocated most of them to an unknown location. I decided to use Roman Numerals for the ones that weren't missing. Randomly, I found this elephant bookend at a thrift store after I made the elephant book covers and couldn't pass it up. I think I might spray paint it, but I can't decide on a color yet.


Since I started planking the ceiling, I can finally finish the face frame on these shelves! The Bonus Room is coming along slowly, but surely.

Other Bonus Room Projects:

Faux Fireplace and Cabinets
http://www.mysocalleddiyblog.com/2014/12/project-bonus-room-faux-fireplace-and.html

DIY Murphy Bed
http://www.mysocalleddiyblog.com/2014/10/project-bonus-room-diy-murphy-bed.html

Linking to:

http://www.myrepurposedlife.com/2015/03/catch-as-catch-can-204.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+blogspot%2FPgMj+%28My+Repurposed+Life%29http://www.domestically-speaking.com/2015/03/inspire-monday-50.html


http://tatertotsandjello.com/2015/03/link-party-palooza-and-50-lowes-giveaway.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+blogspot%2FOivM+%28Tatertots+and+Jello%29http://www.remodelaholic.com/2015/03/budgetfriendly-diys-march-link-party/


http://diyshowoff.com/category/other/that-diy-party/



7 comments:

  1. Love this! Whoever thought of putting a picture (elephant) on the spines of books in a series is genius! Your projects always amaze and inspire me. Beautiful, classy work!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Love the elephant picture. What a great way to class up some of those not-so-pretty books.

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  3. What a great idea and I love the idea of using a print on the spines.

    ReplyDelete