Easy Vintage Chic Lace Edge Books
Add vintage chic style to dollar store or thrifted books with lace and crocheted trims! You'll appreciate the tips in this tutorial to get the vintage look on any budget.
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Give books vintage chic charm with lace spines
I recently shared how I used
floral scrapbook paper to cover books with vintage charm. I love the soft vintage florals so much. But sometimes you need something
neutral and still feminine, and that's what I'm going to show you today, by
adding neutral trims to deconstructed books.
Supplies
- lace trims, white lace trim
- off white crochet trims
- fabric glue - I used this glue
- fabric scissors ( these are my favorite and they're only $7!)
- flat craft brush
- books
Directions
Where to find books
My favorite places to find free books to use in projects like this are the
little book libraries that are popping up in neighborhoods. You can visit
this site to
search for little libraries in your area.
If you don't have any free libraries near you, you can find inexpensive books
at dollar stores, yard sales and thrift stores.
And don't forget your own home! I'll bet your kids (or grandkids) have books
from school that you can upcycle for this craft!
Prepare books
Decorating the spines of books is a great project for any books with damaged
covers. You can gently remove the covers so you're left with a neutral
spine.
Rather than using more books, I recycled some
previously stamped books. These books were already deconstructed by gently removing the covers. I
used some coarse sandpaper on the spine to remove the ink. You can see that I
didn't get it all, but most of it was removed in just seconds.
Prepare glue
Squeeze some white glue onto a paper plate and add a few drops of water to get
a thinner consistency. The purpose of thinning the glue is to make it easier
to brush onto the book spines. You'll want a ratio of about 3-1 glue to water
(the consistency of chocolate milk).
Adding lace to books
I gathered all the lace scraps and crochet ribbon that I had in my stash. Some
of it was too narrow to adequately cover the book spines, and some was too
wide. I had some pieces of vintage lace that I inherited, as well as new trims
bought at the craft store.
- Match up the right size trims to your book spines.
- Brush glue across the entire spine.
- Press a piece of trim to the top edge of the spine, and hold it while you gently stretch it to the bottom edge.
- I found it was best to let the glue dry before cutting the excess trim, but you might choose to precut the trims to fit before glueing them to the books...either way is right.
- You might have some trim that overlaps the spine on the edges a little bit as I did. Simply brush a little glue and press those pieces down, holding for a few seconds until the glue grabs.
Set the books somewhere while the glue dries. I found the tops of candles or
canned goods were a good fit because you don't want the glued areas to touch
anything and stick.
If desired, secure a grouping of books together by wrapping them in ribbon or
a strip of lightweight fabric. I love to tear fabric (this is an old sheer
curtain) to get frayed edges and it looks beautiful with the lace spines.
Decorating with these vintage inspired, feminine books was so fun. I gathered
some of my vintage blue and white dishes, and an antique mason jar filled with
the leftover trims.
One of my
DIY ruffled flour sack towels
made a soft, feminine base for my vignette. To add a little rustic to the
display, I added some of my mini chippy white spindles (refer to
this post to see how to add chippy goodness to spindles).
I'm absolutely delighted with how these lace trimmed books turned out, and I
know I'll be using them frequently in my home. They're such a pretty little
touch.
Wanna know a secret?
Some of my books are double-sided! I stamped some books with a
patriotic saying, so I can simply flip the books around to get two different
looks! I added the book stack to this corner of my office on a shelf that I
recently picked up on the curb. I'll be sharing that trash to treasure
makeover soon!
I just realized that the books are in the wrong order lol...it should read
"life liberty happiness". Oh well! Here are the same books, just flipped
around to the crocheted and lace edged spines. So pretty in any neutral
setting, and if you already have the books and trims, this is a $0 project
👏😍
Let me know if this is a project you're excited to try!
Don't forget ❤ Pin to Save
Thank you so much, love this books, such a cute idea.
ReplyDeleteSo glad you love this easy project!
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