Glue the spines from an old encyclopedia set to slats of wood, back with
a piece of fabric (a “tambour”) and top with woodscrews as makeshift
rollers that run along a routed track, and voila, you’ve got a hidden
stashbox that slides aside to reveal whatever you want to hide there.
My problem is that if I made this, it would remain a secret for
precisely zero seconds as I excitedly showed it off to everyone who
would come see it, because it is just that cool.
The original project is by Keith Decent, with a great accompanying writeup by Hackaday’s Tom Nardi.
Decent uses “reclaimed” materials (presumably spines from damaged books), but if you’re the kind of ignoramus who likes decorating with wrong-way-round books, you could remove all the spines from your decorative elements and sell them to people making these.
