Juniper Books – Thatcher Wine

Images Across Multiple Books

Posted on 05. Mar, 2012 by Thatcher Wine in Blog, Book Styles, Ideas and Advice

We invented custom designed and printed book jackets for a variety of reasons, but turning book spines into a canvas with unlimited possibilities was definitely one of them. The elephant image, one of our first creations which was inspired by an antique engraving, was made semi-famous by the New York Times article Selling a Book by Its Cover in January 2011.

Since then we have gone on to design and print a number of cool graphical images across book spines that turn bookshelves into art – the projects shown here are just the tip of the iceberg. Example of some of the innovative designs we can custom print across book spines. The elephant series uses an antique engraving on the spines, this set is for sale as a product in our online store.

Customers may supply images for us to print, or we can create them. The underlying books used in this series are generally “filler” books, but we can also coordinate the books with the jacket designs, please inquire for possibilities. Our Jack London project shows the possibilities of building a real book collection and designing jackets around and inspired by the content of the books.

See also our post regarding the custom jacket library we created for the Green Room of the 2012 Academy Awards® using images of classic film scenes across the books.  Also our write up of some of our larger projects where the installations are getting larger and more creative – Going Big – Large Scale Custom Book Jacket Installations.

We  love working on custom book jacket projects for clients.  Truly anything is possible, so please feel free to contact thatcher@juniperbooks.com, call 303-946-1494 or use the form below.

Tags: creative book art, creative ideas, custom book covers, library artist, visual merchandising books

Oscars Green Room Press Release

Posted on 26. Feb, 2012 by Thatcher Wine in Blog, Press and News, Recent Projects

Nominees and presenters in the Academy Awards® Green Room this year will be treated to a visual timeline of film history in a way no one has ever seen before.  Custom library designer Thatcher Wine of Juniper Books created a unique library for the shelves in the Waldo Fernandez designed Architectural Digest Green Room. The bookshelves feature images from the archives of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences skillfully printed on book jackets so that groups of four to eight books make up individual film scenes.

Wine and his team at Juniper Books in Boulder, Colorado spent several weeks designing and printing the custom book jackets after being called upon by Green Room designer Waldo Fernandez.  With access to the archives of the The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, Thatcher immediately knew what he wanted to do.  “My idea was to put classic film scenes on book spines in a way that honored the history of the movies and eight decades of the Academy Awards® – it really seemed to fit the nostalgic spirit of this year’s Oscars.”

Spanning the bookshelves are scenes from Citizen Kane, Gone with the Wind, Sunset Boulevard and several dozen other films, arranged chronologically.  Actors including Elizabeth Taylor, Audrey Hepburn and Marlon Brando inhabit the Green Room in a way they have never done before. Wine flew out to Los Angeles several days before the Academy Awards® to personally install the library backstage at the Kodak Theatre.

“When the audience for a project includes many of the most talented and creative professionals in the world, the pressure is on. I wanted to do something that was original and inspirational.  The guests in the Green Room may only have a few minutes to appreciate the space and I wanted the library to put them at ease and perhaps give them something to talk about.”

Created by renowned AD100 interior designer Waldo Fernandez, this year’s Architectural Digest Greenroom is inspired by Hollywood of the 1930s and 40s.  Fernandez’s vision for the Greenroom references the Billy Haines-decorated Beverly Hills home of director George Cukor, who was legendary for his glamorous parties. Fernandez’s invitingly harmonious interiors stand out for their subtle, easygoing style. His impressive portfolio, spanning more than three decades, not only includes homes for an incredible roster of clients—Elizabeth Taylor, Brad Pitt, Keanu Reeves, and Darren Star among them—but also a number of commercial projects, such as his own Trumps restaurant, the Beverly Hills Hilton, and most recently, the West Hollywood Soho House club.

About Juniper Books:

Since 2001, Juniper Books has carved out a niche at the intersection of books and design by delivering a level of service, attention to detail and creativity that no bookseller has ever provided.  To Thatcher Wine, the possibilities of a custom library are endless – he personally designs and curates libraries of leather and vellum books; books by author, color, subject and/or size; or creations using various papers, fabrics, or custom printed book jackets.  Custom book jackets can rapidly and economically change the look of any book.  This innovative concept has attracted many fans among interior designers, architects, visual merchandisers and private clients around the world.

Juniper Books Oscars Green Room Library

Contact:

Thatcher Wine

303-946-1494

thatcher@juniperbooks.com

Tags: custom book collections, custom book covers, custom library, library artist

Academy Awards Green Room Sets

Posted on 25. Feb, 2012 by Thatcher Wine in Blog, Recent Projects

Here are the book sets we created for the Green Room of the 2012 Academy Awards, each individually photographed.  A few weeks ago when Waldo’s Designs asked us if we wanted to get involved with creating a library for the Architectural Digest Greenroom, I jumped at the chance and immediately pitched him the idea of creating a film strip with classic film scenes across the bookshelf.   I knew we could make this concept a reality and it would be something that nobody had ever seen before – a challenging given the creative talent who will be in the room on Oscar night!

The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences gave us access to their archives and I spent many hours selecting images to use for the project.   As a fan of classic films, and at one time an aspiring screenwriter, I enjoyed every minute of combing through the archives, choosing pictures, then printing them on book jackets and with my team in Boulder, Colorado making them line up perfectly so when you push multiple books together they form many classic movie scenes from the past 85 years!

Enjoy, and feel free to let me know which ones are your favorites!

Thatcher

thatcher@juniperbooks.com

Tags: books as art, curated library, custom book collections, custom book covers, library artist, thatcher wine

Going Big – Large Scale Custom Book Jacket Installations

Posted on 10. Jan, 2012 by Thatcher Wine in Blog, Ideas and Advice, Recent Projects

One of our plans for 2012 is to work with clients to make  large scale book installations using our custom book jackets unlike anything the world has ever seen before!  But first a little background . . .

Custom book covers have a lot of uses and we have worked with clients on some very beautiful projects over the past couple years since introducing them.  The basic idea for custom book covers (aka custom book jackets) is to quickly change the look of a book without the time and expense of rebinding it AND be able to achieve any color and style desired.

Some clients have had us personalize their book collection with modern / contemporary jackets, others have opted for a classical look using leather or vellum designs.  In 2011, we designed, printed and shipped our custom creations to clients all over the US and Canada, Europe and Asia.  We supplied approximately 1,000 of our vellum wrapped books to Darren Henault Interiors for his show house design at the Rumson Stately Homes-by-the-Sea. Other jacket related highlights of 2011 included having our elephant set appear in the New York Times, our vellum style jackets mentioned in Veranda, and also a couple of projects for yacht libraries that were incredibly fun and unique to work on but for very private clients so we can’t disclose much else about them!

Now back to the large scale designs – the concept for these is straightforward – turning book spines into a canvas for personal expression.  Push the books together and they make up a single unified design and that design can be anything.  We have a patent pending on this multiple book cover creation system.

This product/service has both home and commercial applications.

• Home libraries can be modernized, shelves turned into art displays, with book titles integrated into the jacket designs if desired -  we can make book jackets out of  photos, paintings, illustrations, engravings, maps, other artwork, typography and text designs, etc.
• Hotels, restaurants and retailers can have book displays with corporate logos, product photos, nature images, or just about anything else.

Here are a few of our recent creations:

Giant Book Elephant

George Hincapie Bike Racer Library

Medieval Knight Books

Ridley Road Bike

Bookcase Biker

As one can imagine, some very cool installations can be created for homes, galleries, retail stores, trade show booths, showrooms, hotels, spas, restaurants, and so on!

If you have an interest in learning more about this type of work, please contact thatcher@juniperbooks.com or call 303-946-1494.  We are always interested in working with designers, architects, visual merchandisers and private clients who want to do something creative and unique with books.  We look forward to working with you.

Thatcher

Tags: books as art, creative book art, creative ideas, custom printed book jackets, library artist

Christmas Tree of Books 2011

Posted on 13. Dec, 2011 by Thatcher Wine in Blog, Ideas and Advice, Recent Projects

It’s becoming somewhat of a tradition at Juniper Books – every year we build a Christmas tree constructed out of  books, but we change how it is made each year as the possibilities are truly endless.   Last year we made a 7 foot tall tree made up of about 800 green books stacked layer upon layer.  This year we made a more subtle creation – a tree made up entirely of olive green law books, some of which we carved form the tree’s branches.

Before anyone gets upset about cutting books we should explain a couple things – first of all we re-purposed about 10,000 law books this year this year that law firms and law libraries no longer needed as their content has all been digitized.  Thousands of these very nice substantial matching books went to retailers and designers for decoration and visual merchandising, and hundreds more we have used many for Juniper Books’ custom  jacket creations such as our Elephant Six-Pack.  So, cutting, chopping, carving or drilling through a few books that we know are plentiful and may face worse fates if we don’t do something creative with them makes perfect sense to us!  We won’t be dismembering a first edition of Pride and Prejudice anytime soon, don’t worry.

The tree is about 8 feet tall on 7 shelves, plus the star.  Christmas ornaments dangle from the page edges – we shaped them to hold the ornaments – a very organic and 100% natural approach.  Christmas lights are wrapped around the tree so it glows beautifully.

The tree was the centerpiece of our holiday party this past weekend where we invited numerous friends, customers, suppliers, designers and others to celebrate the holiday season and browse our warehouse for various book gifts to buy for their friends and family. Thanks to everyone who attended and complimented us on the tree.  There were a number of lawyers in attendance (my wife is a law professor) and they all got a kick out of the creative use of law books.

Technical questions: 30 books were used in the creation of the tree, of which 24 had to be cut in some way to create the tree.  While we originally considered gluing the parts together or constructing supports to hold the books up, we did not end up doing so as the law books are substantial enough to support themselves, even after being cut.

Happy holidays to you and yours, I wish you the best for the holiday season and a happy healthy 2012!

Thatcher

thatcher@juniperbooks.com

Tags: books as art, creative book art, creative ideas, decorative books, library artist

New Decorative Book Six Packs Available

Posted on 08. Nov, 2011 by Thatcher Wine in Blog, Recent Projects

After years of working primarily with interior designer on custom projects, we are starting to take some of our most popular designs and make them available directly to the public, including some for purchase on our website.  Customers, including homeowners, are always welcome to inquire directly about anything they see on our website and we can let you know if specific books or sets are available or often if an equivalent product is for sale.

Today, I’m pleased to announce a new product line of “six packs” – these are groups of 6 uniform size books (made using re-purposed law books which are large!) with our custom designed and printed book jackets wrapped around them.  They come in several styles, all reasonably priced at $90.

All of the books have similar dimensions -

14″ wide

10.25″ tall

7″ deep

Please click on the photos below to be taken directly to the item in our store:

Elephant Six Pack

Vellum Six Pack

Red Leather Six Pack

Brown Leathe Six Pack

Black and White Leather Six Pack

Tags: antique leather books, antique vellum, book accessories, books as art, books by the foot, custom book covers, library artist

Magnetic Bookshelves

Posted on 02. Oct, 2011 by Thatcher Wine in Blog, Ideas and Advice, Recent Projects

The idea for these magnetic bookshelves came from wanting to do something about the messy pile of books next to my daughter’s bed that we generated reading her children’s books every night.  I thought “what if we could read her favorite books then stick them to the wall instead of dropping them on the floor?”

I set about designing a shelving system that would look good and hold the books safely above and next to her head.  With the help of a metalworker and a woodworker, and some experimentation with magnetics, glue and rubber bands, the idea I conceived of came into being and my daughter loves going along the line of books, reading them all, and sticking them back in place before bedtime – it’s neat and tidy, as well as fun to play with.

Custom versions of this product can be commissioned.  Please contact me at thatcher@juniperbooks.com or 303-946-1494 if you are interested in the magnetic bookshelves.

Tags: book accessories, childrens books, library artist, thatcher wine

The Book Mobile

Posted on 02. Oct, 2011 by Thatcher Wine in Blog, Ideas and Advice, Recent Projects

I have always loved the word “bookmobile” even before I found myself the book business – the concept of a traveling library is fun and useful to society.  About a year ago I drilled some holes in books and spun them around and the first “book mobile” was born.  We have since evolved the concept to become a much more balanced and decorative item – it is very fun, but hardly as useful to society as the bookmobile that drives around and brings books to the world!

Thanks to Alexander Calder for some inspiration on this, and thanks to Zac for perfecting the production and balancing act required for the new book mobile.

This project is current on Instructables.com with complete DIY instructions.  The editors of Instructables apparently liked our concept and featured the project on their homepage!

Tags: books as art, creative book art, creative ideas, library artist

Buying our books – one set at a time

Posted on 28. Sep, 2011 by Thatcher Wine in Blog, Press and News

This fall marks 10 years since I got into the book business.  It’s been an amazing evolution from occasional online seller of things rare and collectible to being referred to as a “library artist.”  These days, my time is mainly spent working on projects involving thousands of books for complete libraries and creative installations.  However, I am returning to my roots now of selling things “one at a time” . . . sort of.

Today, AHAlife featured a couple of my “products” on their site – a cool collection of 5 brand new cookbooks with custom book jackets as well as our antique leather books, available by the foot in different colors.

Cook's Books Set from Juniper Books

We are getting ready to launch a store on our website soon too – the link is available and a couple test products are there, however I recommend e-mailing or calling with your order for now, hopefully everything will be ready in early October to sell online.

So, things are coming full circle in some respects.  While I don’t think ebay is necessarily the best venue for what I’m doing with books these days like it was for say a first edition of Emily Post’s Etiquette 10 years ago (one of my first sales), the web has been phenomenal for growing a niche business like mine.   I have shipped books and libraries all around the world.  Everyone from celebrities to politicians, hotels to country clubs, art galleries to retail chains have found me and hired me to do various creative things with books and I have enjoyed every project!

The fun sets of books and creative book covers we have been working on deserve to be in more than one home.  We will still create one-of-a-kind books, sets and libraries for anyone that orders them (some of our latest and greatest will be published soon!) – but we are also trying to make what we do more available to designers, architects, homeowners, and anyone else who wants to brighten up their shelves and do something creative and well integrated with their spaces.

Read Me Literary Classics from Juniper Books

Thanks to everyone at AHAlife for featuring our products, perhaps this is an “Aha” moment for Juniper Books – after a few years of selling books 500 at a time, it can be just as fun and rewarding to sell 5 books at a time!

Thatcher

thatcher@juniperbooks.com

303-946-1494

Tags: antique leather books, books by the foot, creative ideas, custom book covers, custom printed book jackets, library artist

Juniper Books in the New York Times!

Posted on 23. Jun, 2011 by Thatcher Wine in Blog, Press and News

Thatcher Wine in the New York Times - Jamie Schwaberow for The New York Times

It’s been almost six months since the big article on what I’m doing with books came out on Thursday January 6th, in the New York Times.  It was a great article by Penelope Green.  Plus the story was accompanied by a fantastic slideshow – a Times photographer visited our warehouse in Boulder and they sent photographers to several of our projects in Austin TX, Miami FL, and New York City.  A special thank you to our clients who were willing to be interviewed and have their libraries photographed.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/06/garden/06books.html

Here is a photo of my father, Barry Wine, reading the paper when it came out!

Barry Wine reading The New York Times

The past 6 months have been incredibly business with new orders – customers all around the world have discovered what I’m doing – especially with the custom designed and printed book jackets I launched in 2010.  Also our custom curated book collections on a whole variety of subjects.  Orders have come in from Italy, Mexico, Singapore, Australia, and beyond . . .

The article begins:

“IT took Thatcher Wine a year to amass 2,000 well-preserved white vellum and cream-colored leatherbound books for a “gentleman’s library” in the Northern California estate of a private equity manager. Perfectly matched sets of books bound in antique vellum, a pale leather made from goat or sheep skin, are an elusive quarry, especially if they all have to be in English, said Mr. Wine, a former Internet entrepreneur who now creates custom book collections and decorative “book solutions,” as he puts it, in his Boulder, Colo., warehouse.”

To read the full article click here.

Tags: antique leather books, books by the foot, books for interior design, custom book collections, custom book covers, custom printed book jackets, custom wrapped books, decorative leather books, home library, juniper books, library artist, repurposing books, thatcher wine

Airan Kang Art Mixed with Custom Book Jackets

Posted on 07. Jun, 2011 by Thatcher Wine in Blog, Recent Projects

Recently my friends at the Bryce Wolkowitz Gallery in New York City loaned me a few of Airan Kang’s book sculptures for a few weeks.  I’m a big supporter of all things creative having to do with books in this world – from publishing attractive books to manipulating books in to art, or manipulating art into books!  Thus, the Korean artist Airan Kang’s work fits right into my interests.

In the Juniper Books studio, we took the opportunity to design and print some new book jackets to hang with the electric book art and I also “curated” a few mini book collections for the photos.   Airan’s work changes colors (I should have shot some video – sorry) so these photos don’t quite show off how dynamic the pieces are.  What I like about these works of art is that they can really modernize the bookshelf and make it hip and fluid.  With all the talk of e-books, these really are electronic books.

One concept we had was to mix the old and the new using one of Airan’s works – Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Stories – mixed with an antique set of Nathaniel Hawthorne.

Another uses our custom printed silver book jackets to a nice effect with a couple of the electric books.

Perhaps my favorite arrangement is the electrical storm dustjackets we made that appear to relay the electricity conveyed by some vintage bookends I found through to power the book in the center.

These book sculptures of Airan Kang’s are available from the Bryce Wolkowitz Gallery in New York and I thank Bryce and Meredith for sharing the artwork with us.  The artist has made several hundred other works and also accepts commissions in this style for favorite authors and titles.

Tags: creative book art, creative ideas, custom book covers, custom wrapped books, library artist

Fun with Book Jackets and a Camera

Posted on 07. Jun, 2011 by Thatcher Wine in Blog, Ideas and Advice, Recent Projects

OK, maybe I had too much fun with this one, but I wanted to show what is possible with our custom designed and printed book jackets and a little creativity.

For one photo shoot, we made book covers using an image of pizza then I played around with placing them in a pizza box and with a pizza cutter!

For another one, I brought in one of my Navajo blankets and rounded up some western americana items, then arranged them with the books we made with images from an old sioux ledger drawing.

Lastly, the most fun I had was with my son’s toy ride on car (awesome vintage roadster from babystyle) and some of the miniature formula 1 style cars weaving in and out of the vintage race car book jackets.

I can make just about any design on book spines, and as you can see it can be whimsical and fun from these Juniper Books projects.  Or it can be serious as with our vellum style or antique leather style book covers.

Tags: custom book covers, custom printed book jackets, custom wrapped books, juniper books, library artist, thatcher wine

Antique Leather Style Book Covers

Posted on 19. May, 2011 by Thatcher Wine in Blog, Ideas and Advice, Recent Projects

Antique leather books are beautiful and timeless.  However, not all books are available or affordable in antique leather editions!  That’s one of the reasons I invented custom book covers that can be designed and printed in any style.

Juniper Books is the first company to design and print gorgeous book jackets that really look like leather books at a fraction of the cost and with many more possibilities for color, design details, and coordinating bookshelves or entire libraries.  Please browse some of our recent creations and feel free to contact me about your project involving books and how our custom book jackets can find a home on your shelves.

Thatcher

thatcher@juniperbooks.com

303-946-1494

Tags: antique leather books, books by the foot, books for interior design, creative ideas, custom library, custom made books, custom printed book jackets, custom wrapped books, decorative leather books, library artist, thatcher wine

Valentine’s Day Inspired Custom Book Covers

Posted on 13. Feb, 2011 by Thatcher Wine in Blog, Recent Projects

For the Valentine’s Day holiday, we created a few new custom book cover / jacket designs including these below.

Valentines Day Custom Book Covers

The books in the photo above were made for Bayleaf on Pearl, a retail store in Boulder, Colorado.  They are for sale and they also look great to help establish the mood for Valentine’s Day shopping.

Pretty Lady on Horizontal Book Stack

As with all of our custom book covers, they can be purchased to use on generic books, so that they are just decorative objects / decorative book stacks, or we can assemble a mini-collection of books that coordinates with the covers.

Simulated Leather Book Covers in Pretty Colors

The idea for these books above is to create a new line of books that look like antique leather or vellum books, but in vibrant colors, such as pink, lavender, purple, red, turquoise, teal, etc.  If you have always wanted the look of a library of leather books, but want something more interesting than browns, contact us and we’ll custom design something in the color of your choice.  We have a lot of experience matching books to Pantone colors, paint chips, fabric swatches, etc.

Brightly Colored Ladies Book Collection

The collection above integrates poetry, novels, and biographies with custom designed book covers in bright colors.  The titles are printed on the jackets.  Note that these colors, as with all of our designs and work, can be modified to your preferences.

As you can see from these photos, anything is possible with books if you contact Thatcher.

Happy Valentines Day!

Thatcher Wine

thatcher@juniperbooks.com

Juniper Books

Boulder CO

Tags: books for interior design, custom made books, custom printed book jackets, custom wrapped books, juniper books, library artist, thatcher wine