No doubt many of you are familiar with the famous one-piece bookstand from plate 331 of Roubo’s “With All Precision Possible” popularized by Roy Underhill. This past week, we decided to build a nice bookstand for the shop copy of the incredible deluxe edition of the Roubo text on furniture, and while looking at the same illustration found a second bookstand on the same plate that seemed a more fitting design for the hefty tome.
Using some mystery wood that I picked up at the final closing of Midwest Woodworking (I believe it’s a rosewood, or possibly Pao Ferro) I built a slightly redesigned version of the bookstand illustrated in the Roubo text. I’ll be making a measured drawing for the blog in the next few days for those who might be interested in making their own but I wanted to share a short video Chris and I shot that shows off the details of the piece. UPDATE: The measured drawings can be found here.
Stay tuned for more details on building one of these bookstands – it can be easily scaled to any size of book and I think it’s a rather poetic build for those of you who might have one of the deluxe editions already (or maybe a good reason to buy a copy!). There’s some fun chisel work, careful joinery and simple shaping, which all lend themselves to make a bibliophilic piece of kit. I had a blast making it, and look forward to building more for my bookworm friends and clients.
— Brendan Gaffney
Roubo Bookstand from Christopher Schwarz on Vimeo.