Flada Blog

(Relatively) Easy Homemade Bookends

This won’t exactly be a tutorial since I didn’t think to take pictures during the building process, but my sister sounded interested when I told her about the bookends I’d made, so here they are for everyone. I plan to make quite a few more of these for personal use as well as a selection of them to sell, so maybe I’ll be able to make an actual tutorial then.

Anyway, I recently built a large freestanding bookshelf from pretty cheap pine boards and 2×2’s. The bookshelf turned out really nice since I did quite a bit of prep work on the wood–proving that even cheap wood can make nice furniture with enough elbow grease. Most of the elbow grease came in the form of sanding, but there was also staining and finishing involved.

The bookends that I have made are composed of cedar, although any other wood would work just as well. I just happened to have some cedar boards lying around, so that’s what I used. If you are going to buy wood to make these, pine is actually a little easier than cedar since cedar planks are usually only planed on one side. I have a DeWalt planer so I can easily plane the other side, but if you don’t have this it’s quite a bit of work to prepare a rough-hewn board.

It’s pretty easy to see how I’ve constructed these by looking at the pictures of the finished products. Basically, it’s two pieces of wood, three deck screws (holding the two pieces of wood together), a rock (or something else that’s heavy), hot glue, and four cork pads that serve as feet.

The important things to remember are to pre-drill holes before driving the deck screws. It’s also a good idea to use a counter-sinking bit because even the head of the screw can easily crack the wood.

To prep the wood, as previously mentioned, the sanding is the hard part. The better your sanding, the smoother your finished piece will be, and the more clear the grain of the wood will be. The stain manufacturer recommends using a conditioner prior to staining soft woods, but frankly I don’t notice a difference on the pieces I’ve done. I like using a stain and a separate glossy clear coat, but the all-in-one Poly Stain makes a nice finish, as well.

After the two pieces of wood are assembled, it’s a simple matter to find a heavy object and hot glue it to the base. Finally, the cork pads are self-adhesive and are simply pressed onto the bottom of the base.

If anyone chooses to make some of these, I would really love to see your end results.