At an AAB Productions wedding—this one at the Altman Building in 2012—the groom was a writer. In that spirit, the table numbers popped out of the pages of open books. The numbers themselves were carved out of book pages using an X-Acto knife.
For an October 2012 wedding at the New York Public Library, Xochitl Gonzalez of AAB Productions designed a chuppah made of books. "We were inspired by the location, of course, but also by a display of books that the groom liked in a bookstore—and, of course, the lightbulb room at the Gramercy Park Hotel," Gonzalez said. "We used books to create the wedding canopy and created spirals as well as a 'shelf' at the top. We wanted a grand library feel, so we used the red drapes as a backdrop, and we opened them up after the cocktail hour. The canopy served as a bar backdrop."
In 2011, Target made perhaps the biggest statement possible using books—a 26-foot-tall sculpture made from 25,000 books. The installation, part of a kickoff event in New York for the retailer's Read Across America campaign, used Dr. Seuss books, which were later donated to local schools.
This year's Romance Novel Convention was held at the Golden Nugget in Las Vegas August 7 to 11. For an appropriately lavish—and bookish—prop, Romantic Victorian Home Collection designed a dress using the covers and pages of damaged books that had been marked for disposal by the local library.
At the 2012 design showcase, David Stark's whimsical installation for sponsor Benjamin Moore played off the slogan “A whole new chapter in paint color technology is being written.” The library-inspired setting featured a table made from actual books with handcrafted pop-up books serving as a centerpiece.
At the Toronto gala in 2012, stacks of books supported and decorated the dessert tables. Desserts were served on open books, and chocolate petit fours were topped with a decorative page of writing. Typewriters, globes, and open books added to the presentation.
Bulgari's 2011 fund-raiser for Save the Children and Artists For Peace and Justice used real books—and graphic versions—to create a lavish library look at Ron Burkle's private Los Angeles manse. Sketched fabrics on the tent walls imitated library shelves, while children's books redone with white book jackets served as centerpieces for the tables.
