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Bathtub with built-in bookcase

Cory Doctorow at 8:16 am Thu, Mar 27, 2008

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Antonio Lupi's Biblio free-standing bathtub incorporates a generous book-case for your bathroom reading. I do much of my best reading in the littlest room -- the tub, in particular, is conducive to productive reading. Link

See also:
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Armchair incorporates 5m of bookcase
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HOWTO make a bookshelf out of books
Bed built into an "igloo of books"
Equation Bookshelf with nesting parens
Xmas tree made from books
Hang your books from the rafters
Giant freestanding letters with bookshelves inside
Invisible bookshelf - floating stacks of books for your walls
Coffee table with integrated book-shelves like hanging files
Library built into a staircase

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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  • M

    And another one to check out:
    http://theworldofm.wordpress.com/2008/03/24/lego-bookshelf/

  • santellana

    Its about darn time. maybe now there will be more of an interest in making all magazines, books and bookmarks water resistant.

  • Chris Schmidt

    I drop my Sony Reader into a heavy duty ziplock bag. Works great.

  • Wiley Wiggins

    Well, at least it’s not a (*^#%@%)( steampunk disney-themed bookshelf bathtub.

  • Mitch

    Damp books would be a perfect habitat for silverfish
    and other moisture and cellulose loving creatures.

    I might like it for a place to put bathroom
    knicknacks, like the jars of colored soap balls
    you don’t actually use.

  • Songe

    I always have trouble keeping my hands dry.

    #12 lol

  • Jake0748

    I guess many of us do some reading in the “littlest room”, but I’d never store books in there. The humidity makes them get all swollen and ugly. There is an aquarium bathtub at the same link Cory mentioned. Now THAT would be cool.

  • badger

    Kinda neat, I can see where water would be a problem. That could be fixed with some legs to elevate it. Would be a good place for all those magazines that accumulate.

  • Elapsv

    I guess the shelves are perfect for storing almost anything. Females are used to have tons of bottles and stuff like this. Anyway, I use my book shelves (surely not in bathroom) to store lots of other things, not only books.

  • jonathan_v

    that looks like a great way to get books wet!

    i’ve never seen a tub that didn’t form puddles on the platform area that drip down the sides

    then you have to deal with kicking water every each way off your feet/legs as you walk

  • mikesum32

    I’m guessing the book drying attachment is extra ?

  • Jeff

    No. I mean, why even bother thinking this might work? Bathrooms get wet without trying. If your house is so tight that you need to store books in the bathroom, I’m willing to bet that the bathroom itself is small and doesn’t have the extra surround space the tube requires. And if the bathroom is big enough, I bet there are better things to store, such as towels, bath products, electrical appliances, children’s bath toys…

  • cisco

    Is there some correlation between the push for ebook adoption and the insistence with incorporating a book shelf into every piece of furniture? I know, probably not ;-)

    It’s more likely a case of people seeing that something gets attention, so they crank the wheel on it.

    The last person to jump on will only have one option. Look! A shelf … with an integrated book shelf!

  • Clumpy

    Perfect place for those thrift store / cheapo bookstore books. The sort of books and magazines that you like to read in short bursts like “Mental Floss”, but won’t get choked up about if they warp. And they will warp.

    I still find this bookshelf stuff interesting. Hearing the word “steampunk” is starting to make me queasy, though.

  • Takuan

    never mind ebooks, all I ever wanted were printed page books on material to read in the sauna,the shower, the tub, the rain, the boat

  • Marshall

    This is totally a bad idea from a “keeping your favourite books dry” angle, but it’s totally tempting, as I would spend 8-12 hours a day reading in the bath if I were idle rich or retired.

  • hoguguy

    Further proof that the fastest way to get something posted on BoingBoing is to add a bookshelf to it.

  • pendraphen

    This may not be the dumbest idea ever, but it’s certainly in the Top 100. As five other people have already mentioned, a book’s worst enemy is water.

  • ouvintes

    must be dangerous for the books though, if you get too excited with your rubber duck

  • mikesum32

    #12 Wiley Wiggins

    You just gave me a great idea !

  • Hunty

    @#12: Don’t forget the DRM! :)

  • Geektronica

    I could see this possibly working for either magazines and books that you don’t care about getting wet (such as Cradle2Cradle, which is made of plastic), or for non-book items as others have said.

    It seems only basic common sense, though, that the top of the tub would have to have some kind of lip to keep water from running over the edges and down into the books. Even if you could tolerate having books in your bathroom on a permanent basis, this has got to be the worst possible way to store them. It looks as if no attention at all has been paid to the path water will follow after it inevitably gets on the top surface of the tub.

    Clean lines may work well for the MacBook Pro, but on a bathtub, they’re just stupid. On a bathtub that’s also a bookshelf (a $17,500 one, no less), they’re fatal to the form/function synergy that designers are supposed to, you know, be good at creating.

  • Merc

    So let’s see, I get out of my chair with a built-in bookcase, walk up my stairs with a built-in bookcase to take a bath in my bathtub with a built-in bookcase.

    It’s probably just more practical to put in a bit of shelving.

  • Takuan

    for $17,500, couldn’t I hire someone to hold the book and turn the pages for me? Don’t worry, I’d use bubblebath

  • artbot

    Pointless and stupid design hybrids make the baby Jesus cry.

  • leo

    Pointless and stupid design hybrids fill Boing Boing editors with glee.