Who knew rain gutters could be so useful inside the house? We noticed a neat post on using them to wrangle computer wires on Unplugged a few weeks ago, and now this: using them to make really cool bookshelves on the wall.
Standard white rain gutters create this library effect. The photos come from mom Nicole's Flickr stream. If it looks a little school-like to you, it's because this "playroom" is also used as a school room. The children are home schooled. What a bright, and inspiring space.
Anyone else use rain gutters for a project recently?
Via Shawn and Frank.
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Comments (7)
Love it. Great idea. I'm a proponent of book shelves that display the fronts of books instead of the spines, especially for young kids.
And this is where I shamelessly plug the "book slings" for sale in my Etsy shop (sorry):
http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5696551
I love the orange walls! This is such a happy room.
Jim Trelease(The Guru of Reading Aloud) helped popularize this method:
http://www.trelease-on-reading.com/rah-ch7-pg3.html#raingutters
we recently used rain gutters for our craft room.
perfect for spools of ribbons, odds and ends and even as a tray for paintbrushes and cookie cutters and the like.
we love it!!
(and it was WAY cheaper than shelving!)
That's our plan for the playroom. I'm also a big proponent of spines-facing-out book storage.
I got saw this idea on-line earlier this spring and then researched it on the Jim Trelease site mentioned above. The gutter shelves were very easy to install, and my 3 year-old loves it! The only hitch was that neither Home Depot nor Lowe's would cut the 10 ft. gutter pieces so my husband cut them down to 5 ft. pieces with a hacksaw. Even that step was easy though.
Jim Trelease was also where I first saw this idea. I was teaching at the time and wanted to put these up in my class but was not allowed. No worries- I just made portable bookcases instead! Here's a flickr photo of the two I made. http://www.flickr.com/photos/threebysea/3723005663/
I did miscalculate when cutting the one set of lumber, so the sets don't line up, however, no one ever seemed to notice. I received a ton of compliments on them and have since passed them along to another teacher now that I'm home with my son.