Lindsay Makes Cloud Bookshelves

Our son, JR, loves books and as such they’re all over the house.  Lindsay wanted a nice way to store and display the books so looking for ideas on Pintrest she came across some shelves shaped like clouds.  Being the wife of a woodworker, she went with a combination of spalted maple and walnut for their construction.

cloud-bookshelf-ledges

The inspiration for this project came from Erin at How to Nest for Less.  Her painted version is above.  Be sure to check out her site to see how she made hers.

1 - breaking down material

Lindsay chose some interesting spalted maple for the clouds.  These boards had a lot of color variety with blue, red, and grey tones as well as the typical spalted black streaking.  She cut the boards down to rough length, jointed, and planed them.

2 - paper template

We made a template of the cloud pattern in Photoshop based on Erin’s shelves.  The templates got printed out onto a few sheets of paper which were then taped together and the shape could be traced onto the stock.

3 - cutting at the bandsaw

Lindsay cut along the lines at the bandsaw to reveal the cloud shape.

4 - belt sander

Lindsay used the belt sander to finesse the shape and remove any flat spots along the curves.

5 - spindle sander

The inside corners couldn’t be cleaned up with the belt sander so she used the oscillating spindle sander to reach into those areas.

6 - roundover

The last bit of shaping was to add a 1/8″ radius roundover to the edges.

7 - final sanding

The faces were sanded smooth and the edges were finalized with some handsanding to remove any burning and deep scratches left by the sanders.

8 - glue up

Lindsay resawed a thicker board of walnut into thinner boards to use for the bottoms and glue is used to assemble the shelves.

9 - finishing

To maintain the natural color, Lindsay used a water based polyurethane for a finish.  She applied one coat to give the shelves some protection.

10 - cleat

The shelves are mounted to the wall on a cleat.  The cleat is secured to the wall and two screws hold the cloud shelf to the cleat.

11 - shelf 2 12 - shelf 1

Products Used

Jigsaw: http://amzn.to/2hu8Lz1
Bandsaw: http://amzn.to/2rS3mLx
Triton Belt Sander: http://amzn.to/2qwJn5h
Triton Spindle Sander: http://amzn.to/2qwZUG8
Triton Router: http://amzn.to/2qyFuZr
Triton Work Centre: http://amzn.to/2rBLkO1
Triton Router Module: http://amzn.to/2sbcLLt
Push Block: http://amzn.to/2rh8ZA9
1/8″ Round Over Bit: http://amzn.to/2qyxibx
Miter Saw: http://amzn.to/2sj7S2k
Glue Bottle: http://amzn.to/2siZeAC
Finish: http://amzn.to/2rBIQiv
Triton 12v Impact Driver: http://amzn.to/2rgX4m4

Download the free templates and make your own cloud shelves!

get-the-templates

Follow Lindsay

Instagram: http://instagram.com/lindsaycremona
Twitter: http://twitter.com/LindsayCremona
Pintrest: https://www.pinterest.com/lwcremona/

Lindsay Carves a Spoon - Get Woodworking Week 2016
Lindsay Carves a Spoon – Get Woodworking Week 2016

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