{home} styling the bookshelves

Slowly, but surely the boxes are being unloaded. I decided to knock the bookshelves out as best I could. I have never found it particularly easy to style bookshelves, they house so many things and it feels easy to overload them with a chaotic collection of “where can this go” items.

There were a couple of key things that I changed from the last time I reorganized these mighty shelves, after painting them from a sage green to this gray. Key points include:

{Books Organized Loosely by Color} I like the visual. It is less chaotic and easy to look at, but, after arranging them strictly by color the last time, it was driving me nuts that I couldn’t always find books easily. So as I unloaded book after book onto the shelves, I found a balance. These books are loosely organized by color, but they are also organized by topic. Attractive and functional, gotta love it.

{Cute Bookends} I have come to the conclusion that when a bookend is basically a piece of art, it helps with the styling process. I used to only roll with the black metal Ls, but am a somewhat recent convert to the cute. I picked up the little owl, which I think is technically a paperweight, at a little shop in Santa Cruz. The A-Z bookends screamed at me from across the store in Barnes & Noble.

{Open Space} Our bookshelves were previously crammed with books. They were shoved in every corner you could fit them in and then others rested horizontally on top of the vertical ones. It was madness. In an attempt to calm the storm I put a bunch of the paperbacks in the basket on the bottom shelf, hauled a load to Salvation Army, and I boxed up all our childhood favorites and put them in the basement. We are book junkies, but only so many have to be out at one time. I love that now I can grab books and put them back without a battle.

{Small on Top, Big on Bottom} I tried to anchor the eye with the larger items on the bottom shelves. I really tried to keep the top shelves fairly clear. In the future I would like to have even less stuff up top, but I couldn’t help myself. There are only so many things I can let go of at once.

I’m lovin’ the end result. I love the color of the bookshelves against my persimmon walls. I love the little pieces of art the peek out. I love that the vinyl is all out in the open and easy to access. Mission accomplished.