Invisible Bookend; Save Space

Bookends, they allow for storing books on floating shelves, and sharing shelf space with other objects, but most of them get pushed away, or they are clearly out of place. This instructable will show you how to transform an unwanted, but pretty, book into the perfect bookend.

For this you will need:

- L shaped piece of sheet metal or plastic; you can bend a piece of sheet metal, but if it is too thin it will just bend back, and if it is thick enough to work, it will be hard to bend (use a solid reference shape and a hammer). In my case, I used a piece of the casing of a scrap ATX power supply.

- sacrificial book (depending on option of construction, simply to put at risk of damage, or intentionally destroyed)

- optional: glue

First you need a book that you will use as a bookend. If you are going the glue-less way (as I did), pick one that is not too expensive or dear to you. Nothing bad should happen, but you are keeping a piece of metal in the book.

If you are going the glued path, then you want a book that you are okay destroying, but that is also pretty \ fits with your book collection.

Insert what will serve as a footing. As other books sit on it, it will hold the whole thing together.

Make sure you put it in the right direction. I opted for no glue, luckily, because I put it backwards the first time!

This is the part that really ruins the book, but makes it look nicer. With the book glued shut, you won't have the bookend opening and spreading. After the glue has been applied, leave the book on it's side until the glue has dried, and you are good to go. Putting glue on the side of the pages (with the book closed) should suffice and save you a lot of gluing time. Brushing on wood glue or white glue will do the trick. A glue stick should work if you press hard enough.

On the other hand, if you want to keep the book, you will end up with a bit of fanning. With hardcovers, this is less of an issue. If you go with a paperback as I did, as you can see in the picture, slight fanning does occur (not much to be fair though).