Custom Bookcases

Designing fine furniture may be out of reach for most DIY builders - but a simple custom bookcase is the perfect project to try your hand at woodworking. What you'll discover is that the construction of a bookcase goes together fairly quick and easy - with only a few common power tools and some inexpensive lumber. You'll also appreciate that most bookcase plans gives you a variety of options in how you bring the boards together - from the most simple joinery using cleats and shelf supports - to custom building the shelves with dado and groove joinery.

The biggest challenge building your own custom bookcases is making sure the cabinet goes together true and square. What we're dealing with is a large box, essentially,- with lots of corners and intersections that can easily be out of square if we don't use a few precautions during assembly. I like to have my carpenter's square and level close at hand when assembling my custom bookcases, and I always do a tape measure check from corner to corner to make sure the numbers add up.

My EZ bookcase planner can help you brush up on the basics of bookcase construction - showing you up close how the shelf joinery works - as well as giving you several options for different joinery options. You decide which type of construction best fits your needs - and then use the how-to guides for completing the project. I've also included some handy printable graphs and templates to help you draw rough layouts for your custom bookcases design.