Several years ago, our store carried birdhouses designed by Dave Vissat for his company Wild Wings Literary Lodgings. Made from repurposed library books, they were sturdy and beautiful and clever as can be — I especially loved the delightfully fitting objects Vissat chose to use for perches. Unfortunately the birdhouses were also pricey, so at the time I didn’t invest in one, but… I frequently think of them and wish that I had. A recent seach found a few Wild Wings Literary Lodgings online that I thought I’d share with you so that you can covet them along with me or (better still) secure one for your own literary lodging.

The Winnie the Pooh birdhouse to the right, above, is available from Art Effect, Figpickel’s Toy Emporium (what a great name!), and Uncommon Goods: 

Figpickel’s Toy Emporium and Uncommon Goods also sell this To Kill a Mockingbird birdhouse, which would have fit right in at the wedding I blogged about a couple months ago.

The same two companies carry the Wizard of Oz birdhouse: visit Figpickel’s Oz page or the Oz page at Uncommon Goods.

Uncommon Goods carries an Adventures of Tom Sawyer birdhouse, but you can also purchase it from (how appropriate!) the Mark Twain House and Museum, which I recall visiting as a child and being VERY enchanted with. (Clearly I’m due for another trip…)

And now we hit the disappointing part where I show you birdhouses that are NOT currently available online but have been in the past. (I know this might be torturing you, but it’s the only way I can showcase a bit more of Dave Vissat’s work.)

This butterflies birdhouse was formerly carried by Kate’s Paperie, but is currently sold out:

as is this birdhouse made from Wild Birds and Their Music:

and not available anywhere that I could find is this birdhouse made from The Field Guide to the Birds:

Lorna and I have been scheming for years about trying to make similar birdhouses ourselves, but (as one blogger who tried it soon discovered), it’s not as easy as you might think to produce anything that looks half so professional as the ones featured here. For one thing, it looks SO MUCH COOLER to have an actual book functioning as the roof of the house, rather than a book (or its covers) glued to the top of an existing wooden roof, like the ones you can sometimes find on Etsy. But, hey? If you’re not picky about such things, I say try making your own. And let me know how it turns out!

I recently bought a prefab, unfinished birdhouse, not thinking I’d attempt anything as elaborate as a Wild Wings creation, but that it might make fun fodder for a collaborative art project at our house. First I yanked out the pegs that came as perches, painted the whole thing (robin’s egg blue for the sides and taupe for the roof), and collaged the face of it. I then handed it off to Gareth so that he could draw birds on the sides, which he did using colored pencils. 

Eventually (as this is just "pick it up when I feel like it project") Gareth will draw birds on the roof and we’ll attach some funky perches — probably a fountain pen and a paintbrush, to represent our twin talents and favorite pasttimes. It may never look half so polished as any of Dave Vissat’s creations, but hopefully it will have the same sense of fun, as that’s just what we’re having while making it.