Assembly Puzzles: 5 Types to Beautify Any Bookshelf
When you think of assembly puzzles, what comes to mind? Jigsaws usually. Modern assembly puzzles are so much more. They can give you a great mental workout, quieten your mind, enhance the visual narrative of bookshelf displays, and create bespoke accessories that’s awe-inspiring.
Every guest to set eyes on the masterpieces you've carefully hand-assembled will be intrigued. No more dull conversations with guests again. Some of the display ideas are so mind-boggling that people visiting will be asking how such an impossible object is possible.
5 Types of Assembly Puzzles Guaranteed to Get Guests Talking
1. Put-Together Puzzles
When most people think of puzzles, top of mind is jigsaw puzzles. Good luck using those as display pieces. There’s a wider variety than these though. Modern variations include DIY book nook kits, DIY bookends, and 3D puzzles. This category could also extend to twist puzzles like Rubik’s Cubes and dodecahedrons, which are ideal sizes to decorate a bookshelf.
For a changing art display, tangrams made with thin enough materials, such as thin pieces of plywood, or glass tangram puzzle games, could be used in a frame. A tangram is only 7 pieces, from which, numerous designs can be assembled - A house, a bird, a plane, rocketship, running man, a letter, or a number. Kits that have magnetic pieces in a frame can have the design changed throughout the year. Perfect for a rotating shelf display.
2. Secret Puzzle Boxes
Ian Dexter Marquez (Flickr) | CC BY-SA 2.0
Secret puzzle boxes are a type of sequential puzzle, meaning that solving one part of the puzzle provides the clue for the next part. Other names they’re referred to are sequential discovery puzzles and sequential assembly puzzles. Solving them is a step-by-step process, a bit like sudoku and kakuro, only with these, the puzzles are hands-on. Think of these like a miniature escape room that you can work on with your hands, alone.
Given the small sizes of these, they make great gifts for bookworms looking for unique miniature 3D puzzle ideas for adults that can be assembled and used as intricately designed bookshelf decor pieces. Some could be small enough to hide a set of cuff links in, others large enough to store a watch, bracelet or similar jewelery items.
Not all puzzle boxes are secret. Some are lock box designs that can be used as presentation boxes. An idea for international travelers would be to use a money puzzle box to display a foreign currency note as a travel-inspired bookshelf accessory. That way, a Japanese Yen could be displayed in a money box puzzle beside an assembled Tokyo Alley book nook kit that is a realistic display of the real place, or a Euro note displayed near one of the European destination book nook kit themes.
3. A Mechanical Puzzle
A mechanical puzzle blends puzzling with engineering. The kits are usually made of wood and metal parts and consist of a hand-crank, or have a key to wind it up to make it move. Some models like mechanical trains can be assembled, then when wound up, it sets the wheels in motion.
Others, like mechanical clocks get wound up and create the ticking sound of a clock as the pendulum swings back and forth. Ideal as an aid for deep breathing exercises and meditation. If you can’t keep your mind focused on your breathing, keep your ears focused on the tick-tock sound of the clock. Usually for time keeping, the clock is battery powered with the mechanical gears only being used to make the pendulum swing. The clock part on some models like the ROKR Owl Clock are battery-powered with the wind up mechanism being used as a timer that sounds a bell alarm.
Another type in this category are marble run kits. These are the more dynamic type of mechanic puzzle as once it’s assembled, it can used for interactive play. Yes, adults can play! You could even find it therapeutic dropping marbles into a marble run and watching them whizz around the course like carts on a roller coaster.
4. A Take-Apart Puzzle
You could consider a take-apart puzzle as a 2-in-1 puzzle. (Unless you cheat by taking notes on the steps you took to take it apart). Once it’s disassembled, you have a put-together puzzle. Seems simple enough, however, some designs boggle the mind so be forewarned. Take for example, Churchill’s Cigar and Whiskey Bottle. A wooden block replicating a cigar with a nut and bolt going through it making it appear impossible to get it back out of the bottle. The design has evolved from the ship in a bottle puzzles.
If you were to be decorating bookshelves with 3D wooden puzzle kits, your books, and an impossible bottle, it’s going to get attention and be an instant conversational piece. How did you get that in there? Can you get it out?
5. Matchstick Kits
Matchstick modelling is a hobby that’s been around for decades. Now though, there’s matchstick kits that speed up the assembly process. Within the kits are pre-cut matchsticks (minus the combustible heads), instructions and card formers. The models aren’t assembled by gluing matchsticks together, but instead, gluing the card and attaching the matchsticks to that. The focus is solely on assembly rather than measuring, prepping, and cutting.
A twist on matchstick modelling is using toothpicks to build a toothpick bridge. It could be a fun family activity that kids can learn from using the math project book: Building Toothpick Bridges. A good structure could hold the weight of decorative materials like sphagnum moss, several air plants and have space under the bridge to place miniature figurines. Use it sort of like a decorative DIY cornice for the top of a bookcase.