For many years I have wanted to create a lightweight modular bookcase. Having researched lots of different approaches, I settled on a simple design, of 10mm bent wire frames to support 18mm birch plywood shelves. The idea being to line a bedroom wall with shelves to hold momentos and knick knacks and possibly a few books.

There were lots of sources of inspiration, firstly Sam Weller’s Holdfast shelving. His video of his shelves being made encouraged me to get in contact with AWB Ltd and their boss Silvio. I was also thinking about the retro future look that wireware and tubular furniture has, my old ladder stool, Ernest Race’s Antelope Chair for the Festival of Britain in 1951, even Delfinware kitchen drainers. Thinking about how to make a modular structure I started with the Serpentine Pavilion by Sou Fujimoto, but Draht bank by Johanna Dehio and the delightful V&A chairs by Tomas Alonso actually made me think sensibly about how I could put it all together.

I sent Silvio at AWB (Automated Wire Bending Ltd) a lot of vague emails and Illustrator drawings and he said he could manufacture the bent wire frames for the shelves for me. There was a bit of backwards and forwards on how we would fix wire frames to the shelves, eventually it was decided to weld on some small lugs. I then went a bit overboard when Silvio told me I could have them powder coated in any colour. I got 20 white, 5 orange, 2 blue, and 3 yellow, in RAL 2004 Pure Orange, RAL 5015 Sky Blue, and RAL 1018 Zinc yellow. My family felt multi-coloured was the way to go.

AWB manufactured the wire frames for me and sorted out the powder coating and sent them on their way to me in Herne Hill. They arrived on a rather wet and rainy day.

It took a while to get around to constructing the plywood shelves. Because the plywood would have to span the whole wall, I had to connect two lengths with dowels. I made a little jig so that they all lined up. Also to ensure that the shelves wouldn’t sag there is a 50mm strip of ply at the back. This also strengthened the joints.

As it was all an experiment, it wasn’t clear how wobbly the shelves would be. Or even if it would support its own weight. It is actually very stable.

So I have tried various ways of making or buying shelving, and not only do I think this offers the best value I think aesthetically it is the most pleasing. Each bent wire frame cost £26.72, and I ordered 30 so they came to £801.60. There was of course also VAT and transport costs, so all in all the cost was £1,015.92. But I must add that Silvio was really helpful and thanks to AWB I got some perfect powder coated steel wire frame supports.

I bought my birch plywood locally and that came to £319.68. So my total outlay for some custom birch plywood shelving with 30 wire frame supports, which span a 3.6 metre wall was £1332.60.

I have made other custom shelving out of CNC cut plywood, using the Hubworkshop and that came to £1,485.17. Interestingly the CNC fabrication came out at £880 a bit more than AWB making the wire supports. I have also purchased shelving from Tylko, and a rough estimate for doing the same size shelving would have come out at about £2396 at the cheapest.

In conclusion I think this set of wire frames and shelves wins out for good looks, flexible layout and great value.