Built-in Bookshelves... and more

Jacobson Construction presents...

This wall of built-ins was designed to fulfill several functions.  The upper portion is for books and is accessed with a rolling ladder.  The bottom is split.  A desk in the middle is flanked by two sets of drawers.  They are capped with antique pine.

A view of the installed work.

LED pot lights were installed along the top for display items, and underneath to light the workspace.  The switches (the brushed nickel discs visible on the facing panel) are three step touch dimmers.

The rolling ladder is custom made, with hardware from Richelieu.  It rides along the length of the piece on the black, aluminum rail.

These boards were salvaged by Historic Lumber.  They are floor joists from a circa 1860 building.

The happy accident with these boards is that as I prepared them I noticed that the boards had knots in identical locations.  This seemed quite odd and impossible, until I realized that the boards were from the same tree.  The tree was most likely milled on-site, so the fact that some of the floor joists are from the same tree is not remarkable in itself, but what is remarkable is that they have stayed together all these years and found themselves laminated together here. 

I enjoy the counterpoint between the antique timbers and crisp, white, inset drawers.  The piece was designed to look more like furniture than cabinets.  Note the tapered legs.

The nightstand.

I wanted it to match the built-ins, but stand on its own as well.