My New Cookbook Shelf

Like many home cooks I do have a larger cookbook collection.  Sadly in all the kitchens I've had there has never been an actual spot to display cookbooks.  Most of my cookbooks are stored in the pantry.  I had an industrial metal shelving unit at our house before our last house where I was able to display a few of my cookbooks but not many as the house was very spatially challenged.  At our last house I displayed a few select cookbooks on my rolling metal kitchen cart, changing them out as desired. 

My new kitchen presented the perfect location for a cookbook shelf!  The area over the sinks is partially tiled leaving what I think is a rather awkward un-tiled section resulting in a rather unfinished look.  Ideally this section should have been tiled and with the boxes of tiles left in the garage we know there was enough tile to do so.  I pondered removing the half tiles to finish the tiling job properly but then came up with a more practical solution - a built in shelf.

One of our friends is a cabinetmaker.  He does absolutely amazing work in solid wood with custom lathing and routering.  He made my husband gorgeous, triangle shaped drink tables on wheels for the games room.  He is not cheap but he is well worth every penny paid!  So we called him in to do the shelf for the kitchen, make a custom medicine cabinet and mirror frame for the upper bathroom and install my husband's new dry bar on the lower level.  He's coming back to frame in the lower bathroom mirror.  I imagine with our plans for this house he will be here quite a bit!

Our friend has an excellent eye for detail.  He does some of the nicest custom wood router work I've ever seen.  He took one of the cabinet drawers from the bathroom (same as the kitchen cabinets) to match the stain and finish.

The new cookbook shelf finishes off the awkward division between tile and painted wall nicely.  There are two under cabinet lights completing the installation.  Both can be on using the main switch when each light is left in the on position.  The lights are then both on or both off.  Each light has it's own switch to be controlled individually by leaving the main light switch on so one or the other or both can be on.   The upper book light is cool tones accenting the taupe wall.  The lower light is warm tones bringing out the warm beige tones in the tile.

Here is a picture of the shelf with just the lower light on so you can see the difference.  I have already placed some of my favourite cookbooks on the shelf.  The second from the left (faded orange) is my most used cookbook - a circa 1969 Betty Crocker Cookbook.  Beside it to the right (dark red spine) is my brand new Betty Crocker Big Red Cookbook courtesy of Mom Central.  It arrived a couple of days ago, much to my surprise and delight.  I was elated so will tell you more about this lovely gift shortly!  I am very much looking forward to discovering all of the wonderful and easy recipes in the newest addition. 

To the right is my hand crafted soup tureen made back in the 1980's when both my husband and I were very much into ceramics.  We made a full setting for 8 with a lot of specialty extras all in the same finish called 'eggnog'.  The pieces were always in a refinished 1950's blond china cabinet that we later sold to a friend so the set has been in storage for about fifteen years.  I'll tell you more about them when I write about the my gorgeous china cabinet with bowed glass.  The eggnog handmade pieces are slowly making their way out of storage, getting back into use where they should be.