Turn a worn or outdated hardcover into an awesome portable art studio with this recycled book art kit tutorial that Shaunte shared on Crafts Unleashed.
“I am inspired by vintage or used objects: records, books, furniture, anything that has a history.” —Mike Stilkey
Artist Mike Stilkey, whose amazing artwork was featured in an exhibition here in Houston five or so years ago, turns everyday objects into eye-catching sculptures.
If you’ll be in the San Francisco area this month, you can catch several of Mike’s pieces, along with those of two other artists who work with books — Cara Barer (mentioned previously here) and Melinda Tidwell — at the Andrea Schwartz Gallery through April 26.
An Australian design firm worked with a publisher to start redesigning book covers: now, the dust jacket of some new novels in Australia can be flipped around, bent around the book, and sealed to be sent to a nonprofit that gives books to the homeless. The design is flexible, so it can easily be adapted for different book sizes and edited to include a different nonprofit’s address in the region where the books are sold.
More, including a video, here: A Dust Jacket That Transforms into a Shipping Box to Donate Used Books | Australia on GOOD
The laudable trend toward free book-sharing setups has gotten plenty of attention, and here at Unconsumption we have highlighted many notable examples — some involving phone booths of all sorts; informal street versions; and of course the Little Free Libraries initiative.
But this particular book-share project happens to have an Unconsumption connection: It’s located in the community Metro Star Garden in Savannah, GA, where Unconsumption co-founder Rob Walker (that’s me) has some involvement.
In fact, if you happen to be in Savannah this Friday night April 5, the Metro Star Library makes its official debut in connection with the monthly Art March. Several of us from the garden will be around from 6-9 pm, showing off the garden and library and just generally hobnobbing with neighbors and Art Marchers. Perhaps there will even be refreshments? Only one way to find out for sure!
Anyway, the Metro Star Library was built at the Savannah College of Art and Design’s Boundary Hall, and came about thanks in large part to the efforts and generosity of SCAD’s Scott Thorp and Todd Yuratich, as well as a number of students. Scott, a professor and the design program coordinator at SCAD, arranged for a bunch of students to sign on for an extra-credit series of workshops organized around building little libraries. Todd, an amazing woodworker who oversees the Boundary Hall shop space and also has his own practice, Miel Manufacturing (don’t miss his very cool “wooden paintings,” made completely from offcuts), led the workshops.
The blue/grey library was the one Todd built as a demo, and the second structure, which the garden is using as an “information” box (which we needed) was created by students Sydney Barnett, Taylor Olenik and Jamie Karaat, who I believe are all fashion majors.
Both structures were designed and constructed entirely from excess materials around the shop — pretty cool!
And they look even better in person. So Savannah folks should come by the garden Friday night!
More pictures of the garden itself (which is also a repurposing project of sorts — it used to be a vacant lot) here.
And of course, there’s much more elsewhere in the Unconsumption archives about swapping, sharing and the sharing economy / collaborative consumption, libraries, and books.
—rw
Metro Star Garden Library Debut: Friday Night April 5, 6-9 pm, corner of 38th & Howard, Savannah, GA.
Need I say more?
(Image via Wall Envy Art on Etsy, who paints inspirational messages on vintage book pages and music.)
Massive river of 10,000 discarded books flows through Melbourne.
For The Light in Winter Festival, Spanish art collective Luzinterruptus was commissioned to create a work of art that, quite literally, stopped traffic. 10,000 discarded books, donated by public libraries and collected by the Salvation Army, were lit up and then arranged to look like a massive river flowing through the city. On the final night of the installation, visitors were encouraged to take the books home.
Via My Modern Met.
Wow, what an interesting project.
Apparently, librarians considered the books to be obsolete. Pretty cool that visitors were able to take home books that they wanted.
Books = headboard
To make the headboard pictured: Kassandra of the Design Every Day blog nailed 27 books found at thrift stores (including books printed in languages she didn’t understand) onto two pieces of wood. Kassandra provides how-to info here.
In case you missed it: Our post about making a headboard from book covers.
Find other uses for books that are past their reading prime here.
Caveat about using books as raw material: here.
Book spine bookmarks, a great way to save old books that have seen better days! (via Green Paper: Now the Clean Up Begins…)
I thought we’d already added this idea to the Unconsumption gallery of creative new uses for old (beyond repair) books; turns out, we haven’t … until now!
If you make something like this from book covers with front and/or back panels in good shape, what would you make from the cover panels? (If I needed a headboard, I’d consider making something like this!)
Caveat: here.
London-based graphic artist Daniel Speight (aka The Soft City) turns rows of books into detailed images in his Book Block series. Instead of seeing individual spines on a bookcase, you can view different buildings in a London neighborhood.
Speight’s designs are handcrafted by screenprinting on books that have either been abandoned or are destined to be pulped. His project transforms old reading material into detailed three dimensional art that celebrates the unique architecture of London’s streets.
(via Artist Turns Discarded Books Into Images Of London Streets - PSFK)
We’ve published volumes of book-reuse-related posts (heh), browse ‘em here.
Turn Old Books into a Smartphone Dock:
Surprisingly, you won’t need too many tools to make this work—a drill, a utility knife, a trusty binder clip, some metal files, and a few other items you probably have around the house are all it takes to make this one happen. Of course, you also need a book you’re willing to carve up to turn into your new dock. From there, lay the charging cable on top of the book so you can measure where the cable will run inside of it, then cut the slot into the cover for the connector to peek through. Open the book and carve out just enough from the pages for the cable to slide through and go up into the slot you just carved. We’re oversimplifying the level of effort a bit, so make sure to hit the link below for a walkthrough, complete with tons of photos.
The design here is definitely iPhone-centric, but it wouldn’t take much tweaking to make this work with a miro-USB port and an Android phone charger. All you need it to cut out the slot to the right size slide the charging cable into place, the same as you would with the iPhone.
Just don’t use perfectly good books that someone might want to read, okay?
Meanwhile, we’ve noted other iPhone dock projects here, and here.
Literary jewels by Littlefly:
“Jeremy May has captured the beauty of paper via a unique laminating process. Littlefly paper jewellery is made by laminating hundreds sheets of paper together, then carefully finishing to a high gloss. The paper is selected and carefully removed from a book, and the jewellery re-inserted in the excavated space.”
via LittleFly
Mushrooms + 40,000 (outdated) books = 1 garden of knowledge
Almost two years have passed since we mentioned the public art installation known as Jardin de la Connaissance — garden of knowledge — at Reford Gardens in Métis, Quebec.
The project, established in June 2010 by Canadian designer Rodney LaTourelle and Berlin landscape architect Thilo Folkerts, consists of open-air “rooms” demarcated by walls, flooring, and seating areas constructed from some 40,000 books (reportedly outdated schoolbooks). The project’s meant to be ephemeral, to decay, over time, in the forest where it’s located.
Dezeen reports news of more mushrooms and moss growing on and between books.
(Photos via Dezeen.)
