Our DIY Home Library build was inspired by my grandma and my love for reading. If you love to read, I hope this space inspires you as well with our homemade DIY bookshelves! Save it to Pinterest so you can remember all the details.
Growing up, my grandparents had a home library. It was my favorite spot in their house. It was quiet, cozy and it smelled good – like old books, leather and warm afternoon sunlight. I always wanted a space just like it. With some DIY bookshelves and a little bit of paint we finally turned our formal living room into a place that I’ve been dreaming about for decades.
Before
What it looked like before. I don’t have a great picture of what the space looked like before this DIY project. Honestly, I was a little bit embarrassed by it. I had not updated it in a really long time. Prior to this it was the exact same space that it was when we moved in 5 years ago. The only difference was that I removed all the decor from the floating shelves and started filling them with books. I had moved some of the furniture around over the years, but that was about it. I’m the main user of this room. It is my winter reading room. (Other seasons too but I read so much more in winter.) We have always called it the adult room and that means no electronics. All of my books were crammed into the buffet I designed and mostly hidden. But based on how this room felt, I always knew it would make the perfect library space.
First thing is fire
Before we started anything on our DIY Home Library Build, I painted the room a lighter shade. I’ve been slowly painting all the spaces on our main level a color called Black Pepper by Behr. It is a ver, very light grey that we have had in our bedroom forever. I know grey isn’t really popular anymore but this one is so light and I feel like it warms up or cools down based on other items in the room.
But even before painting, I had some work to do on the walls. The floating shelves left giant holes and there were a lot of nicks that i had to fill.
The DIY Bookshelves
We went back and forth on make some DIY Bookshelves or buying some for the DIY Home Library. In fact, originally, I had planned to use some IKEA shelving that I had purchased for a different room. However, that shelving had glass doors and I decided I just didn’t want that look. Also, while we had one shelf, we would have to buy another. They weren’t overly expensive but building our DIY bookshelves cost less than buying another IKEA shelf. And I got exactly what I wanted – real wood shelves with clean lines and a little bit of rustiness to them. I purposely didn’t fill in the knots on the wood because I love pieces where you can see that detail.
My buffet piece
As I mentioned earlier, I designed this buffet piece back when we lived in our old house. That lower piece and the floating shelves used to sit in our dining room there. Each offer that came in for our old house requested to buy this piece. I wasn’t ready to give it up yet. I’m still not fully ready to give it up so instead of making floor to ceiling DIY bookshelves, I painted this piece and made it the base.
The paint color
The paint color on this piece was really important to me. I wanted to be brave and go darker but I wasn’t sure what color to use. It was always going to be a green or a blue because I naturally veer towards those two colors – almost always. Since I knew I was staying lighter on the walls in the DIY home library space, I felt like I could be a little bit bolder on the color for the DIY bookshelves. It just so happens that we had an extra can of paint leftover from Roman’s room update last year {HERE}. It is called Light Sage Green by Sherwin Williams. I decided to go with that since the paint was free and I already knew I loved the color.
The DIY Bookshelf measurements and supplies
Kevin and I designed these together based on the size of the buffet and the mirror in the DIY home library. Since I knew I wanted to keep those pieces in those spots, I basically measured around them. In the future we will also add crown so the DIY bookshelves feel more like builtins. We are getting our floors refinished this year and didn’t want to have an extra steps when we removed all of this from the space. Here are the measurements for 1 bookshelf:
- 2 – Side boards – 3/4 of an inch thick by 60 inches tall and 11 5/8 deep
- 3 – Shelves – 3/4 of an inch thick by 40 wide by 11 5/8 deep
- 1 – Top piece – 3/4 of an inch thick by 41 1/2 wide by 11 5/8 deep
- 1 – Piece of 1/4 inch plywood for the back at 41 1/2 inches wide by 60 3/4 tall
- 2 – Trim pieces – 1 1/2 inches thick by 62 1/2 inches tall by 1 1/2 inches thick by 3/4 of an inch wide
- 1 – Top trim piece – 1 1/2 inches thick by piece 42 inches wide by 3/4 of an inch wide
- 16 – L brackets, 4 per shelf including the top piece
- Sandpaper
- One gallon of paint/Paint brush
Hardware
Originally, I intended to completely swap out the hardware on the buffet piece. However, they ended up being a specialty size because I think the builder I used bought them from Hobby Lobby. So, I ended up spay painting them instead. I thought I would be disappointed with this, but as it turns out I really do like the hinges and the door/drawer pulls in the updated color. The color I used Rustoleum Metallic in Warm Gold {HERE}. I decided not to paint the screws because just in case, I didn’t want to have issues getting them off. Although, I think the color provides a nice worn looking finish and I don’t mind the contrast of the screws.
As mentioned above, I always sprayed painted the L brackets and I used this same color. You can’t really see them, but for consistency sake I decided to do it anyways.
Everything else…
Everything else in the space are pieces that we already owned. I didn’t buy anything new for it (unless we are counting more books). The wingback chairs we’ve had for a few years. The old table is something we thrifted last year that I’m going to make into a chess table. All the plants we’ve had for several years and even the globe in the corner has been mine for a decade now. And while this post is about our DIY Home library, I know my library wouldn’t have been complete without that piece. It is probably the most important item in our library now because it used to belong to my grandma.
When my grandma died and the house was sold, the only thing I really wanted was the globe in their library. We used to spin it and talk about how we would go wherever we landed. My grandmother took us all to Hawaii, Alaska and Italy. She probably never would have picked Michigan as a landing spot for me. But her globe sits here in my library now, in a place inspired by her choices and home. It’s a drastically different look from her space, and yet somehow it still feels the same – warm and cozy with beautiful light. What do you think of the space update?
Looking for more DIY projects?
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- DIY Puzzle Board {HERE}
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Thank you so much for following along today, friends! I hope you love our DIY Home Library Build with our DIY bookshelves and I hope to see you here again!
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