I received a book nook as a gift for Christmas. It is one of these trendy dioramas which are meant to be a bookshelf insert but now, when looking at it, I dream of building a real one!

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The book nook I got is called the Library of books and it is the perfect representation of what a book nook should look like. Plenty of pretty book shelves of course, overflowing with dreamy or obscure books with ancient looking covers with a few odd modern ones. An old desk with carved details, lots of antiques laying around like a telescope to look at the stars, vintage maps to escape reality, and an assortment of decorative items which could have only been brought back from travels in far away countries. There is of course a fireplace to keep warm and cosy, an old rug, and beautifully framed art pieces. The delicate arches are leading to the next bookshelves or maybe to the 2nd floor where there are of course more books, neatly tucked in gothic style bookcases… A dream!

It looks like another world, a world where time doesn’t exist and you can stay as long as you want reading books, learning about anything you want, or just being.

For now, this book nook is going to be tucked in between my Harry Potter books and some architecture books. For now, I’m going to dream about the day I’ll have a library, which will hopefully look as fantastic!

The library of books book nook

Well, as you can read above, I love it! When I opened my present I wasn’t quite sure I would.

I immediately realised that considering my personality, the building process was going to be exhausting. And it was! I just couldn’t stop! I started one evening and barely slept that night. The next day, I had to finish it. I had to!!

For someone slightly more patient than me (!), someone who can work on it an hour or 2 per day and come back to it happy, it has to be a lot of fun, to see it come to life. Once you reach the stage where you get to start building the walls, it is mesmerising to see how it all comes together.

What you receive: A book nook in kit

What you get is a flat pack book nook. The book nook is made up of various wood boards which are pre cut with all the parts. This means that everything is flat. When looking at the book nook from a certain distance, it doesn’t show. If you get too close, you can see the plant is flat, the pot, the statue… everything is flat.

Don’t worry about it too much because it really doesn’t show that much when built.

The kit also includes an electronic box with a sensor, led lights and a battery box as well as a few tools needed. Tweezers or something alike would be a nice addition.

My kit also came with a music box but it seems that not all of them do. I wouldn’t worry about this either, because the placement of such music box in the back, means it isn’t very practical to use.

And the kit comes with very detailed instructions. You really just have to follow and be patient.

Building process: Use caution at every steps

It seems kind of obvious, but you do have to be very meticulous. To handle the parts as some are tiny & some extremely delicate and to follow the process.

As stated in the instructions, you need to cut out the joints of each part before trying to remove them, from the plate. All the parts are laser cut but little joins remain to ensure the parts do not just fall off. These need to be cut in the front and the back, to not damage the parts. Some parts are small and delicate and this will ensure nothing gets broken. When the joins are cut properly, most parts just fall off the plate, without even pushing.

I wanted to mention this because you may read comments from people complaining about the wood quality and I think these people just didn’t follow the above instructions.

Yes, it’s time consuming! But also totally worth it.

Sanding the joins is also recommended and although I may have not done it thoroughly with all the parts, I did it when it mattered most, like when the protrusion could have prevented 2 parts to fit together.

You do have to glue everything. Things are not meant to hold just because they are precut to fit together. In my kit, the glue was included and was great. It seems that maybe, with some other kits, most things snap in place. I really can’t say what works best as this is my first kit ever.

The stickers provided to hold the electric wires weren’t that great and I used my own tape, in most places. Time will tell, which holds best.

To address another comment that comes every now and then, yes of course, you should test the lights before installing and check you have everything before starting. Kind of obvious as well!

One recommendation I would add is to be very careful to the colours in the instruction. The brown shades used do present the parts front and back and show how to face the correct side of the parts. As you can maybe see from the picture below, I messed up when gluing the desk and the ‘unpainted’ side of the desk leg show in the front.

Overall, I think that if you follow the steps and instructions provided, you probably won’t have any issue putting this together.

Having said that, I ended with one piece left and I still haven’t figured out where it goes! And I’ll admit I got creative with the book placement, because why not!

Who is this for?

Book lovers? Maybe. It will take the place of 2-3 books so book lovers may not like it that much!

Puzzle lovers? Probably. 3D puzzles are super cool in my opinion but this isn’t a true 3D puzzle either.

Dark academia lovers? Definitively! They will want to move in the library 😉

Most importantly, I’ll say it again, this is a great gift for someone very meticulous and very patient. The recommended age for this book nook is 14+ years old and I can’t comment on this but I would add that it requires a steady hand and maybe delicate fingers. Just saying here that you probably shouldn’t buy this for your grand parents and certainly not for a child.

In short

I got this book nook for Christmas and I wasn’t sure I would enjoy it but I love it. It was quite a process to build it, a little stressing at times but also quite fascinating. And now, I’m happy to see it in my library!

It really is a great gift if given for the right person.