I wanted to give my three kids a screenless story box (inspired by the Toniebox gesture) but I was deeply annoyed by the closed ecosystem and subscription-like models of commercial alternatives.

So, despite knowing absolutely nothing about electronics three months ago, I decided to build one myself using an ESP32, an NFC reader, and a Bambu Lab printer. I learned everything the hard way, from accidentally creating short circuits to routing 491 tracks by hand on my first custom PCB with KiCad (and using Claude to double-check my math).

The box serves its own local web page to upload MP3s/M4As, streams web radios, and handles self-updates over Wi-Fi with a built-in safety net in case the network stack crashes.

Everything is fully open-source (firmware, KiCad files, 3D models under MIT license) on GitHub: link in the article

I’d love to hear your thoughts, feedback on the PCB routing, or answer any questions about the build!