make it yourself

Apothecary Bottle Shelf

A weathered shelf of glowing bottles, labelled in a hand nobody can quite read. Built from a pallet board and whatever glass is in the recycling, and it is the thing that turns a cauldron on a lawn into somebody's workshop.

• $36 ish
• 4 hrs start to finish
• confident beginner
• 3' 4" tall when done

grab this stuff

What you need

• Pallet boards or one 6 ft length of 1x10 $12
• Glass bottles, 10 to 15, from the recycling you have these
• Green and amber LED tealights, 12 pack $14
• Exterior screws and two stakes $6
• Cheap paper, a black pen and a teabag $4
• All in $36

Tools, and that is it

• A saw, hand or power
• A drill or a screwdriver
• A kettle, for the tea

here we go

How to make it

1. Two shelves, not four

   Cut two boards about 3 ft long for the shelves and two about 40 in. for the uprights. Screw the shelves between the uprights, one at knee height and one at waist. Rough is right: the gappier and more crooked it is, the better it reads.

   oops-proofing

   Resist building it properly. A neat shelf reads as garden furniture somebody left out. Uneven boards, visible screws and a slight lean are the whole look, and they are free.

2. Collect bottles, not matching bottles

   Ten to fifteen, in as many different shapes and greens and browns as you can find. Wine, olive oil, medicine, anything with an interesting neck. Soak the labels off in hot water.

   oops-proofing

   Clear glass is the one to avoid unless you fill it. Empty clear bottles look empty; green and brown ones look full of something even when they are not, which is the entire trick.

3. Light from inside, one per bottle

   Drop an LED tealight into each bottle, or into as many as it will take. Mix green and amber rather than making them all one color, and leave three or four bottles dark so the lit ones read as chosen.

   oops-proofing

   Battery tealights, never real candles and never a mains string. This thing is wood and glass standing on a lawn and it wants no flame and no cord anywhere near it. It also means you can put it where it looks right rather than where an outlet is.

4. Label them badly on purpose

   Tear the paper rather than cutting it, write on it in a hurry, then wipe a cold teabag over it and let it dry. Curl the corners. Glue the labels on crooked and let a couple hang half off.

   oops-proofing

   Do not write anything anybody can read from the sidewalk. The joke is that there IS writing, not what it says, and legible words make it a prop from a film set. Shapes that look like handwriting beat actual words every time.

5. Weather the wood, then stake it

   Dry brush a little black and gray along the edges and let the grain show. Then screw two stakes to the back of the uprights and drive them in: a top-heavy shelf full of glass is not something you want going over.

   oops-proofing

   Stake it before you load it, not after. Everybody does this the other way once.

6. Put it beside the cauldron, not near the door

   This is the bench the potion came from, so it belongs within a few feet of the cauldron and turned slightly toward it, as though somebody just stepped away from it. On its own by the path it is a shelf of bottles; next to the cauldron it is the reason the cauldron is there.

where it goes

Layouts this one lives in

Same build, any yard shape. Here is where it lands.

• → Witch's Brew on a Wide Shallow, No Porch A cauldron going hard, hats hanging in the air and green light coming up out of the ground. It is a scene rather than a scatter of props, so it wants a yard with one spot you can build everything around.
• → Witch's Brew on a Narrow Shallow with Porch A cauldron going hard, hats hanging in the air and green light coming up out of the ground. It is a scene rather than a scatter of props, so it wants a yard with one spot you can build everything around.
• → Witch's Brew on a L-Shaped with Projecting Garage A cauldron going hard, hats hanging in the air and green light coming up out of the ground. It is a scene rather than a scatter of props, so it wants a yard with one spot you can build everything around.
• → Witch's Brew on a Deep Narrow A cauldron going hard, hats hanging in the air and green light coming up out of the ground. It is a scene rather than a scatter of props, so it wants a yard with one spot you can build everything around.
• → Witch's Brew on a Corner Lot A cauldron going hard, hats hanging in the air and green light coming up out of the ground. It is a scene rather than a scatter of props, so it wants a yard with one spot you can build everything around.
• → Witch's Brew on a Split-Level or Raised Ranch A cauldron going hard, hats hanging in the air and green light coming up out of the ground. It is a scene rather than a scatter of props, so it wants a yard with one spot you can build everything around.
• → Witch's Brew on a Sloped or Terraced A cauldron going hard, hats hanging in the air and green light coming up out of the ground. It is a scene rather than a scatter of props, so it wants a yard with one spot you can build everything around.
• → Witch's Brew on a Small Urban Postage Stamp A cauldron going hard, hats hanging in the air and green light coming up out of the ground. It is a scene rather than a scatter of props, so it wants a yard with one spot you can build everything around.
• → Witch's Brew on a Circular Driveway A cauldron going hard, hats hanging in the air and green light coming up out of the ground. It is a scene rather than a scatter of props, so it wants a yard with one spot you can build everything around.
• → Witch's Brew on a Long Driveway, Rural Frontage A cauldron going hard, hats hanging in the air and green light coming up out of the ground. It is a scene rather than a scatter of props, so it wants a yard with one spot you can build everything around.