Upcycled Book Jewelry Box - 7 Days of Thrift shop Flips

19 August

It's Day 3 of 7 Days of Thrift Shop Flips!! Woot woot! 😁

So far we have upcycled an orphaned sugar bowl and sweaters. Both of those items are super easy to find. In fact, you probably already had those items lying around the house!

This next item is also something I'm almost positive you can find or already have too... it's an old hardcover book!

Today's project is a jewelry box made from a book.

Upcycled Book Jewelry Box - 7 Days of Thrift shop Flips

book jewelry box supplies
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Supplies You Will Need:
  • Hardcover book (I used an old Reader's Digest Books because they have such pretty covers)
  • Scrapbook paper to coordinate
  • Yardstick (or any wood strip that will fit between the covers of your book)
  • Scroll saw or handsaw to cut the yardstick
  • E-6000 Glue
  • Mod Podge

7 Days of Thrift shop Flips

I love the pretty covers on the old Reader's Digest Books but any hardcover book will work for this project.

To begin, you need to remove all the pages from the cover. The whole chunk of pages should come out really easily, just slice down along the edge of the pages with a utility knife. Be careful not to slice through the cover!

Remove the book pages from the cover

The inside of the cover on mine was a really pretty aqua color but one side had a little bit of a stain so I decided that would be the bottom of my new jewelry box and I covered it with a cute piece of scrapbook paper!

cover the inside with scrapbook paper if desired

The endpapers of my book were also the same pretty aqua so I saved them to use for covering the yardstick.

endpapers

Measure and cut the yardstick. You will need two long pieces and two short pieces that fit just inside the cover. You want the cover to hang over the top just a little bit (just like when the pages were still inside), so keep that in mind when measuring. You can cut the pieces with a scroll saw or hand saw (heck, you might even be able to cut it with a very sharp utility knife!)

cut the yardstick to the sizes needed for the box

Cover each piece of the yardstick with paper. I used the endpapers that I saved but scrapbook paper will work too... or maybe some of the book pages?! Use Mod Podge or white glue that you have watered down a little bit. (Tip: If you put a thin coat on the yardstick piece and a thin coat on the paper you won't get any bubbles).


Use E-6000 adhesive to glue the pieces in place. You may need to prop them up for a while. Do it in the following order for the best results:
  1. Glue one long piece flat to the inside spine of the book.
  2. Glue the remaining 3 pieces standing up like the picture below.
  3. Test to make sure that when you fold up the back piece to complete the box shape it will fit nicely between the 2 side pieces. You don't want it to be off-center and not fit once it has dried.
  4. Allow that to dry.
  5. Once dry, fold up the one that is glued to the spine and glue it on the sides to the 2 short pieces to complete the box shape.
  6. Allow that to dry.
  7. Cover the raw edges with little strips of paper or paint to match.
making a jewelry box out of a book

I added the ex libris thing from the endpaper to mine and I had to cover the gap between the back/spine piece and the top cover, I used a piece of the old book pages.

diy book jewlery box

how to make a jewelry box from an old book

Upcycled Book Jewelry Box

It can be used as a jewelry box or even a secret book safe if you put it on the shelf with some other books!

book jewelry box DIY

jewelry box from a Reader's Digest book

Book jewelry box

book safe

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Here are the other posts so far:


For tomorrow's project, we will be using these supplies. I'm super excited about this project, you definitely won't want to miss it! 😉

7 Days of Thrift shop Flips supplies for day 4

Posted by: at 19 August Tag:

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