How To: Design a Bookstore Window

Tips and examples for creating a window display for your own book as an author/illustrator.

I recently had the great honor of creating a window display for my local bookstore—Thank you, Kidsbooks! I had so much fun putting this together, even though I was a little time-crunched because I was moving houses the same week. In this post, I’ll share some of the things I learned along the way, including ideas I’m hoping to incorporate into my next window opportunity.

Planning

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I knew I’d be putting together the window, so I watched the space for a few months. I took note of how the bookstore did their own displays, took pictures of the display case, and noted how other authors used the space, like Kirsten Pendreigh’s takeover for Camping is a Terrible Idea.

I mocked up some ideas in Canva, to get a sense of the space and what different ideas might look like.

Painting a Window

Painting the window was my original plan, as I’ve been so inspired by others’ windows! One of my favorites is Lian Cho’s awesome Pig Town Party display for Books of Wonder.

I dug into the process, and received some helpful advice from people who have actually done it. Colby Lavigne has some great and inspiring videos on IG that I recommend checking out. Basically, you can paint on the inside or the outside, using acrylic or house paint or paint pens. Outside means you don’t have to worry about reflections, so it will pop a bit more, but you do have to worry about weather elements. Printing out your design across sheets of paper that you tape up is helpful if you don’t want to freehand the drawing. Clean-up appears to be a pretty simple process of soapy water and a scraper. I’m storing away all this information so I can do a window painting some day, but I just didn’t have the time to do it for this one.

Cardboard Cutouts

This is what I ended up doing because I could front-load the work and have a quick setup on the actual day. I got the idea from somebody else’s IG post, but I can’t remember who now. (If somebody else has seen this, please share in the comments.) This ended up being a fun, crafty art project! I used a lot of old boxes, sketched out the shapes I wanted, cut out the shapes 2-3 times to create layers and sturdiness, and painted them with acrylic paint. I used bent wire hangers to create stands on the backs. I was excited to create something more quirky and crafty as I’m a little tired of things looking too slick these days.

I made a couple characters and some simple hand-lettered signs (inspired by Joanna Muñoz’s Domestika course on hand-lettering.)

Foamcore Posters

Because I knew I needed something big for the window, I also ended up getting a large foamcore print-out of my book cover. I used a local printer (Bright Side Art) and it didn’t cost much (about $35 CAD). This was a huge timesaver and looked great, so I’m glad that I did it.

Window Decals

I admit, in my quirky handmade mode, I wasn’t sure about window decals until I saw Li Chen’s post, but her window decals look great! This is something I will definitely consider for future windows.

Tips

These may seem obvious, but I really did have to remind myself or discover some of these along the way:

• Think about layers. Try to vary height and depth.

• Think BIG.

• Light colors will pop more than dark colors against the window reflection.

• Keep it clean. (I had a bunch of props and risers that just ended up looking sort of sloppy, so I left them out.)

• Make sure to feature the actual book(s) prominently. (Okay, really, I was relying on my cover poster with books in the background until the bookseller pointed out I should probably put the actual books in front, too.)

• Plan! A window is a big space to fill, and the more you can plan up front, the better the final result will be.

Combine It All

I think the coolest window displays use several of these techniques together. Lian Cho’s Pig Town Party window has character cutouts and window painting, while Li Chen’s Detective Beans window combines character decals with window painting. Both of them play with depth and height as well. My brain is already thinking about what I might do for a future display. I hope you have fun thinking about it as well, and please share your creations if you’ve created a window in the past.

And of course, a huge thank you to the staff at Kidsbooks for letting me take over the window!