Here are some added images of the front room in its current state. The first image shows the wall color "Wolf" next to the trim color...something like "Frozen Phlegm". The shelves are painted "Half-Tone" (a real cop out, if you ask me...N.B. Martha Stewart holds the current best paint color name with "Pudding Mold"). The bottom picture allows you to see all three colors on one wall (and the old door color as I have not yet painted the inside of the closet).

The bottom image also shows "things to be". The shelves will run over the two doors to the wall and there will be a very narrow vertical bookshelf between them. It should, I hope, look very cool with nice narrow tomes in it...

The last extremely cool element will be the "notch" built into the case at the wall above the little space behind the closet door. If all goes according to plan, there will be a notch there that will receive and hold the library ladder that will fit into spaced grooves that will run along the fascia of all the cases. Shelves running 11 feet require a good library ladder. I just hope it all works out as currently conceived.

Update on the front room project...

Well, the boxes for the shelves are finally here (most of them). These are, as you can see, just the boxes...though painted in a spray booth (anyone who has ever had the pleasure of painting installed shelving knows how nice this is). The color looks great with the "Wolf" on the walls (I just realized I did not post pictures of the wall color, will do so as it does not show in these as I did not paint that which is to be hidden)...the jury remains out as to the trim color.

It is a little hard to get the scale in these pictures. We have 11 foot ceilings on the first floor. The boxes are currently sitting on the floor, but will be sitting on about 8 inch boxes so the rooms baseboard molding can be carried across them (if you look in the first picture by the bottom edge of the fireplace, you can see a bit of the baseboard). So the shelves will start about 8 inches or so off the ground and once the crown molding goes on, they should pretty much run the full 11 feet.

The bottom boxes are 2 or so inches deeper and designed for folios and similarly difficult to shelve volumes. The boxes as shown are not yet trimmed out, as they will be getting 3/4 inch trim that will tie everything together and, eventually, frame the glass doors that will be installed (the final design calls for full-height glass inset doors on the upper and bottom shelves...providing both an aesthetically pleasing finish and, more importantly, dust and UV protection).

These weigh a ton...everything you see is 3/4 inch ply-wood (even the backs). Each box is insularly strong enough to take pretty much any load and, when they are all fused together, they should be structurally significant to the house as a whole...

If you look at the first box, you can see the step that will box in a vertical steam pipe running to the second floor. All the shelves for that section are notched to fit. Two point to the Opus. We are planning to tile the fireplace as it was rebuilt at some point and of a brick type that does not fit the house, period or any reasonable aesthetic measure. The current plan also involves rebuilding the mantel to bring it up several inches to balance the size/scale of the shelf between the upper and lower portions of the bookcases. If all goes as planned, the mantel will have a shelf for 12mos and smaller built into it, carrying the books across the chimney span.

I am waiting for the thin, deep shelf that will go in between the closet and interior doors and support the shelves that will carry over the two doors. It should look wonderful when it is done. I'll try to get some other pictures of the walls, etc. shortly.

Serendipity at Serendipity (or: how I spent the nicest afternoon I can recall)

So shortly after my last post I set out for Serendipity Book in Berkley. The shop is legendary, as its owner, Peter B. Howard. One of the things I was looking forward to on this trip out, and part of the reason I came out early was to be able to spend time at this shop. Six hours later, I can attest that it was one of the very best days I've I had in a long time and that I only just scratched the surface (I did not even get upstairs at all.

The definition of serendipity is the art of finding something while seeking something else. I suggest it is impossible to enter Peter B.'s shop seeking X and not finding wonderful copies of A, G, Q, V and Z. There are just so many books...great books, unique association copies, you name it...that you simply can't process it. I arrives shortly before noontime and do not think I left until around 6pm or so. I spent the first hour or so just wandering around the labyrinth-like rooms and sub-rooms, trying to make some sort of sense of where to start and how to proceed. Ultimately, I started and the front and worked back (to the back of the front room....argh).

A quick description of the pictures might help. The first is taken at the front doors looking in, diagonally across the front room (in the shot, r to l, are Joe Maynard, David Bergman and Peter B. (seated)). The next image is looking at the front wall from about the middle of the room [N.B. the white space above the windows is at 8 or 9 feetish...and then there is another five vertical feet of books...I have not idea what is up there, but I want to know...]. The next is looking down the main side room, brown bags filled with amazing things, you carefully go down through bits of this and that and suddenly happen upon something remarkable...serendipity, indeed [N.B. at the right side you can see one of the two sets of sliding shelves allowing Peter B. to keep far too many good books on site]. Finally, though hard to see, is the two volume set of The Key to Serendipity [Vol. 1, How to Buy Books from Peter B. Howard and Vol. 2, How to Find Books in Spite of Peter B. Howard]. Every shop should require at least one book to understand its working and nuances....some obviously might need two...or more.

It took a great deal of self control, but I managed to only leave with a half dozen books. The range of what I took home gives a great micro-glance of the shop. Item 1: a wonderful little collection of hand-colored erotic plates of the The Seven Deadly Sins; Item 2: a lovely copy of a Nonesuch Press volume that is very hard to find in nice condition; Item 3: a 1803 imprint of Astle's The Origin and Progress of Writing in the remains of its original binding (and with all its fabulous plates present). Just a ridiculously diverse group of serendipitously found books.

To top off a lovely day, I managed not to have to ride the BART back as Craig Harris (Bridge of Dreams) was in the shop for most of the afternoon and offered to drive me (and my new friends) back to the hotel. We were joined my Suzanne (who had been working in the hotel all day) and went out for a nice dinner of Greek food. Yum.

Set-up is tomorrow, starting at 9am. I'll keep you posted.

Engineering a Solution to the "Library Problem"

A husband and wife pair of engineers had 3500 books and no shelving or organizational scheme. The solution is explored, in detail, at their blog Hackito Ergo Sum. It is a sound plan and they seem happy. All is well.

Interestingly, the "geek factor" of it was enough to get it posted on Slashdot (N.B. the couple hosts their blog on their own hardware and he wisely posted it immediately to /. to avoid having the hordes of /.ers crash his system. The posts there are a riot. My personal favorite:

Oh, painful memory (Score:5, Funny)

...of my ex-daughter-in-law, who decided to surprise me for my birthday by reorganizing my (3500) books:

By height.

Great fun, all around...

The conversion of the front room begins...

So here are some images of the front room for
comparison...the "before", as it were. The images cover the two walls that will be covered with bookcases. There will be shelves on both sides of the chimney and the chimney itself will be covered with wood paneling to tie it all together (we will also be covering the cheesy "rebuilt" bricks in tile...the best solution we could come up with short of rebuilding it.

We will be shelving over the radiator with a reflector and fan integrated into the design. That wall, once finished, should be quite lovely and will be the first thing one sees when they walk in.

The back wall (facing the bay window, the corner of which can be seen in the first image), will also be covered with shelving...running over the doors. My favorite part is that there will be a very narrow case running up between the two doors...basically wide enough for two or three books per shelf.

Built into the "end" of the of the case at the far left (just beyond the closet door) will be a ladder (to reach the top of the 11 foot shelves). My understanding is that there will be a "notch" at the end of the shelf at the wall so that the ladder can be held in place when not in use.

The "boxes" have been built and are being lacquered. We decided to paint them in the booth because it allows us to lacquer them...same color we intended, but *much* harder...it should hold up pretty much forever. We will be spraying the shelves, too...but then I will hand paint the trim fore-edge.

We have begun the painting the room...which is great because it gives that sense that something is actually happening. We are using Pratt & Lambert paints: Wolf (25-20) for the walls, Manchester (29-27) for the trim and shelves and Half-Tone (29-25) for the inside of the boxes. If you are *really* interested, you can "Launch Color Visualizer", choose "Explore our Colors" and type in the color code in the "Quick Search" field. In short, the walls will be a dark grey/clay, the trim a light grey and the inside of the boxes a sort of pewter. It should be quite striking in the end...or horrid. Time will tell.

Brian has moved in already and the rest of the floor is now filled with bubinga furniture. Brian is particularly fond of this wood and uses it a fair amount. I'll put up an image of the coffee table that will be in the front sometime soon. Amazing. More to follow as images/events require.

"...I've just ordered some special plywood from Russia..."

So our tenant moved out on rather short notice. Our hope was that she would not get married off for another year or so and that Lux Mentis would take over the rent on the 1200 square foot space (we live in a row house with a rental unit on the first floor). Our fiscal conservatism is such that we just don't want to stretch inflict that kind of overhead on the business until it can absorb it with relative ease. So just when we are at wits end about what to do, good things fall into place.

We have a very good friend who happens to be an artisan woodworker. For those of you who have seen my booths at shows, Brian designed the strange little table that it held together under tension without traditional fastens (mind you, in about an hour from concept to execution). Brian owns Opus One Studio...making wildly beautiful and wildly expensive furniture for individuals, institutions and museums (think $12K barstools (a set of six), a 15 foot long, 6 foot wide oval table that can split apart lengthwise (so a bartender can work in the middle) and remain stable, etc.). You can see one fun example here. The last line remains the same. Unlisted number. No sign. Work into the indefinite future.

So, while kvetching about needing to find someone for the apartment while not *really* wanting one...or wanting one with some flexibility, Brian says, "hey, I need a place to stay". Long and short, Brian is moving in downstairs, into the back 3/4 of the apartment. The front room will be "shared". Best yet, he is going to be designing and installing 11 foot tall bookshelves along two walls of the front room. They will, apparently, be stepped back at 50ish inches (so folios can be shelved down low) and will eventually have 6 foot tall narrow glass doors for the top shelves.

Brian stops by this evening to get some measurements and talk about design options. That's when he off-handedly says says that he's ordered plywood from a Russian disty. Apparently, they make some thicknesses that are very difficult to secure otherwise *and* comes in 5x7 sheets (rather than the traditional 4x8). I'm not certain why 5x7 is better for this project, but I am certain there is a reason and that the results will be fun.

Speaking of bookshelves, these, these and these are interesting...not exactly my cup of tea (not enough volume)...but the aesthetic is interesting.

"Before" pictures will go up shortly and I will, undoubtedly, post updates about the project. Rent and ridiculously well made furniture...reality tossed us lemons, and we apparently are making Lemonchello martinis.