A new bookcase from Office Depot

DiscussieBookcases: If You Build/Buy Them, They Will Fill

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A new bookcase from Office Depot

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1jenreidreads
aug 14, 2008, 2:25 pm

I just wanted to share this story with people who would hopefully appreciate it. My boyfriend and I recently purchased a bookcase from Office Depot. After being unable to find our apartment to deliver it (our apartment is not difficult to find), the canceled the order instead of trying again. But Office Depot's customer service really helped us out, and we were finally able to get our shelves, about a month after we originally ordered them. The full story (with pictures) can be found at our blog, http://davenjenny.com

2booklover33
jul 2, 2013, 10:35 am

The site has not been created yet.

3dukeallen
jul 2, 2013, 8:17 pm

Well the post was 5 years old, it could be long gone.

4nandadevi
Bewerkt: jul 10, 2013, 2:47 am

Just in case you ever wondered what the Romans did, here's a link. And it gives you a kind of super-nerd status to be able to say, "Hold on a moment old bean, I'll just fetch that volume down from my pegmata." Well if you are inclined that way....

http://www.historyofinformation.com/expanded.php?id=3089

On a more serious note, I'm writing a bit of a story about downsizing libraries over in the Wiki and one of the suggestions there is to switch from horizontal to vertical shelving in order to getter a higher density of books on each wall (we are talking about some very desperate people here).

Basically it ties in with a notion - mentioned in this discussion page earlier (and I'll will attribute it) - to sort your books simply according to book-height, and load and adjust the height of each book shelf so that there is no 'daylight' between the top of the book and the bottom of the shelf above it. This requires great fortitude in destroying the 'logic' of the way your library is organised, and access to an infinitely adjustable shelving system. Usually though there is some compromise between having truly 'infinitely adjustable' shelving and the need to give strength to shelves that are carrying considerable weight. Even where the shelves are 'adjustable' in the sense that they are held up by pins set in a series of holes drilled in the bookcase uprights, the holes are drilled in at regular intervals, and hence only a certain range of shelf heights are available. In theory, however, going to 'same-height books with adjustable shelves means that you might be able to fit an extra shelf (or two) in the space between the floor and the ceiling. I did mention these were desperate people.

I am wondering if anyone has ever built (and has photos of) an alternate system with places books in stacks, with the books lying horizontally with the spines facing outward. The stacks of books sit on an angled base (that given the stack a shallow 'tilt' backwards and stops it toppling forward) and are contained (left and right) by fairly lightweight vertical boards. The boards in this case don't carry weight like a shelf would, they just give rigidity to the stack. The books carry their own weight. Again, if the stacks are made up of like-sized books then a very high density of books per wall could be achieved. Because the vertical boards don't carry weight they could be adjusted relatively easily. In essence you have created a floor-to-ceiling narrow pigeon-hole and filled it with books. In theory you could even do without the vertical boards and just create a 'wall' of books.

Removing and inserting a book in the stack is easy (or very hard) depending upon how tall and heavy the stack is). If you were looking at a floor to ceiling pile then you'd only ever be able to re-insert the book at the top of the pile. Even extracting it might be difficult. I'm also mindful that the weight of books (if carried to extremes) might be damaging to the spines of those at the bottom of the pile. Some compromise between vertical and horizontal might work, breaking the stacks into shorter piles. But if you divided the vertical space up with a few horizontal 'shelves' you sacrifice the lightweight nature of the uprights, and also sacrifice the ability to do away with uprights altogether. However, if the horizontal shelves were fixed to the wall (rather than supported from the floor), then effectively you create two or three 'short' walls out of one, and could proceed to fill them with stacked books as described above. The 'base' of the bookcase would have the angled feature, as would each of the shelves, to ensure that the stacks didn't topple forward.

The question is has anyone ever seen or heard of anything like this? Kind of curious. Curious enough in fact to use it on the next room I take over with my books. To placate others who live here I can imagine making the intermittent horizontal shelves (say three per wall) incredibly strong and actually 'flat' rather than angled on top. This allows these shelves to be used for more normal purposes at other times. I'd then manufacture a kind of chamfered plank that sat (with a 'click in' dowell connection) on top of the flat shelf, thereby creating the the angled base for the book stacks. No liability is accepted by anyone who is injured by falling stacks of books after trying this (if you were mad enough to try that is...)