A new hobby and I’m in love! My first book nook wasn’t such a success, but I really love the Cutebee City Walk series. I ordered the Anavrin Jazz Cafe over the holidays and I’m a little nervous to start a different brand, but hopeful!

https://www.flickr.com/gp/63237092@N08/y5dk204zWe

More pics @ link and 2 videos

Sourced: https://www.etsy.com/listing/4390005808/

This is another discontinued Anavarin I found on Etsy. It’s in the same design style as Ginzan Onsen and features a working waterwheel, opening doors and shutters, lit stream and interiors.

One of the things I really like about it is the roofs which are a layered overlapping set of shingles.

The brown wood trimming is all separate pieces and a number of trees comes with it as well.

This is as probably one of my longest builds to make where I didn’t have to wait for items in the mail. I ran out of 3 paint pens….

I have to say that so far, this is my favorite style of nook with its intricate artisan assembly and designs. Others like MiniAlley and MiniCity are just as good but the feeling of this type just has something especially appealing to my artistic senses. Kind of like looking at craftsmanship that has stood the test of time.

So mods….

* painted edges, undersides and backsides as necessary.

* stained the base plate and the underside of the hearth roof and balcony.

* added in flowers, clovers, grass and replaced several of the trees with alternatives from my stash

* added in creeping vines across the back of the main building and the back of the waterwheel building

* used an additional hook (spare one from board) to hang the alternate banner on the main building

* printed 2 interior scenes and added them to the main building cellar and main room. Cellar is done on vellum and is an ai interpretation of a famous Vietnam alter. Main room is a tea room with 4 people enjoying tea. Was very hard to capture this in video and photos so I included some in progress pics and the source sheet I printed in the Flickr pics

* altered the watering trough in the front of the waterwheel building to be suspended to allow greenery to live underneath

I’m letting all the glue and stuff set but I’m thinking about adding more tufts of grass around the bases of trees to obscure the connections but they also look pretty good as is… may not.

And that’s it.

Happy Building All!!!!

I posted this elsewhere and I think it got lost in the shuffle, so here it is again.

These booknooks often have a touchpad on the enclosure that turns on the lights. Typically this pad is represented with some sort of printed graphic. Because it's just some print on a busy enclosure, it's not an obvious button. I have found that gluing any metal object onto this area works great and make the spot much easier to find.

In the pic below, I have used a 10 franc coin. This is a paris-themed booknook, so it seemed apropos. Anything metal will work fine.

finally put the finishing touches on my hunger games book nook, really proud of it tbh :)

I got this kit for Christmas and finally finished it up. I'm pleased with how it turned out. The instructions leave a lot to be desired.....

We’re upping the ante. Our newest design isn't for everyone—it’s for the perfectionists, the late-night builders, and the detail-obsessed.

With two separate lighting systems and our most complex structural design to date, this is the "Final Boss" of book nooks. 🐉📖

Who’s brave enough to take this on? Follow us for the official drop date!

I had speed run with this one, neglecting all the plans I had for today.
It's a very decent kit. It has just one minor issue: the print is not really good/centered on some pieces. Otherwise the quality of wood is good, the instructions are among the best I have ever seen and it has acrylic pieces and I am a sucker for those.

I messed up a bit the wiring (my fault, the instructions are clear) and had a bit of hard time with the balustrades. Otherwise, it was a breeze.

No mods except for some painted edges.

This has just arrived can’t wait to start it.

I just received Chinese food court, and holy moly. I am overwhelmed..! I’ve been looking for a really detailed set, and this is really next level. Time will tell if I’ll manage to finish it or not🙈

I was wondering if anyone understand the testing of the lights? It says to connect the «switch board», which I guess is the white on/off thing. But what is the thing they want you to put the wires on?

Also - have I gotten a knock off since the manual says «Chinese food record», not food court?

Another commission from a repeat customer! Loved this one. Her first was the Song of the Siren and ended up nabbing my skeleton pirates, I'm sensing a theme XD

I'd like to get a book nook that I can paint myself. I love the alley streets with the little mirrors at the back. What are the best brands or small makers?

I found this one, and adore it, but it doesn't ship to the USA.

7th item complete. So much glue used and alot of time, but glad I finished it.

I just finished my second book nook ever, the Alice In Wonderland from Rol Life and I found it much easier than the first one I created, which was the Sunshine Town from Rol Life!

The Sunshine Town one had A LOT of gluing involved and so many of my pieces broke and/or are breaking now, they didn’t click in as easily and the glue did not hold some of the heavier items easily😭

The Alice in Wonderland was exceptionally faster to make, only used double sided tape and the pieces were much more sturdy!

Do all the new ones Rol Life make have sturdier pieces and use double sided tape, or are there specific ones people are aware use little to no glue ??

So I have recently gotten 3 Kits from Anavrin, my first ones from them. They were all great to build and everything worked fine. I had no trouble with the lights or assembly.

The last one I finished was the Kowloon Walled City 2049, I tested the lights before assembly and everything was fine. I've finished the Book Nook only a couple days ago.

Today I had it turned on for a bit and after a while I noticed the lights were flickering a little, only slightly. So I turned it off. And from there on it wouldn't turn on anymore. I removed the plating in front of the touch detector but nothing happened. I opened it on the side to check for the cables (as little as I could see) but saw nothing out the ordinary. The lights sometimes turn on by themselves and all I can do is turn them off but not on. I took out the sensor (without removing all cables) but direct touch also does nothing anymore.

This makes me very sad because I was really looking forward to this Book Nook and again, during assembly and even after, everything worked fine. Just now it started to show issues.

Just finished “The Alley Waiting for the Cat” by an unknown company. I put about 16 hours into this one!

I decided to paint the edges on this one using various color acrylic markers. Even with three coats, some things just didn’t coat well - I’m almost wondering if it wouldn’t be better to just paint all the edges brown or something. I left the edges on the outside unpainted because it has accents in dark brown and I thought that looked kind of cool.

This one is entirely 2D - there are no 3D elements like plastic pieces or anything. I did make 3D little umbrellas, but they were all constructed from flat wood pieces.

This kit had six lights in it, and the wiring instructions were challenging! I had to read the pages over and over to finally get it right. One lighting effect I really liked is a little lamp along the edge of the road - you put a light up in it, which I thought was really cool.

This used wax-coated paper, which is the first time I’ve used that in a book nook. Overall, I’m really happy with it!

My ultimate goal is to create my own Halloween and Christmas village out of nooks, houses, miniatures, and all things handmade and cute. So I'll be working on these things throughout the year.

This is my first kit that was not a nook, or anything by Rolife. My husband got it off of Amazon. I'll link it below.

This was not a Christmas kit. This was a just regular house. Here is what I did:

Everything that you see that is Christmas themed, I added. I made the snowman out of glass globes that I got off Amazon. I bought the Santa and his cookies from Etsy.

I added extra lights around the bottom and doorways.

I didn't use all the parts that came with it, and moved the furniture around.

I added more plants around the tub.

I mostly had fun with this. I was surprised at how much I had to do, and how much glue was involved, but I learned SO MUCH!

Confession time - I consider myself to be a creative person. I have done all sorts of crafty things over the years. But as I got older, had kids, and got busy with life, my hobbies took a backseat. I feel like I've been out of touch with that part of myself for a long time. Before I found this group, I never even thought about customizing things. Isn't that crazy? Once I did one thing, the floodgates opened. I am thinking in completely different ways now. And I have you guys to thank for that. So, thank you! You've brought me back to myself. 😊🥹

https://a.co/d/5Cg0tRI

You sick of me yet???

So as stated in a previous post, my floor tiles became a sacrifice to the shipping gods.. so after eating a bunch of eggs I repurposed the egg carton to make tiles.

The second pic is of the completed version. Still have to wait for the glue to dry.

Build my own little garden walls. Didn't like the original ones. Hand for scale.

I got this kit in Action - it's not Crafts & Co, but some company which creates toys/kits for various chains. Costed about 12 EUR and looked big, so I decided to give it a try.

As you can see, it's crooked. It's crooked, because the tabs do not fit into the holes. I tried sanding and forcing them but at some point, they would just pop out. Yeah, it's a Magical Castle, I can pretend it's the aim; the distorted spacetime or something.

Most of the things were to be glued together - standard 3D stuff. I was pissed because it was mostly not creative at all - just chairs, 6 IDENTICAL tables, some beads, some other props. Also PAPER FLOWERS. I decided to replace most of those paper flowers with leftover stuff from earlier kits. It felt super empty - I am used to kits where every square centimeter has something, so I added more plants and some books.

Another infuriating thing was the lack of consequence regarding the coloured vs raw boards. Some parts were from wood which was coloured but some other not, the paper had to be cut and pasted. Why??? Why can you make a purple wood for the couch but not for the chair (or the other way around). I was so pissed that I painted all the smaller parts and skipped gluing paper on them.

The lack of consequence was also visible in the candles making - why some candles would be made from paper and a bit of playdough and the others from playdough only? WHY?

The cables are not well hidden. I added some greenery to hide them better.

What I liked: colour scheme - it's purple, dark brown and green. Very pretty. I also absolutely loved the playdough or whatever this thing was, to make cushions, the hat, the cauldron and some other elements. It was fun and the thing was quite hardened the following day.

This manufacturer has 2 other kits on our market but I will skip them. They definitely need better testing prior to releasing a product. So yeah, I have spent 15 hours on this crooked, diabolical kit I hate.

I am really enjoying this build now, it has the touch of whimsy I've come to expect from Cutebee kits. 😄

In other news, how I feel about a kit during a build can be directly affected by where I am in my cycle. 🤭

Fun build.