Words to Live By
Anne Yackee 10/07/08
Floor to ceiling shelves add height to small rooms
My bookshelf is stuffed. Books are stacked in front of each other, shoved into crevices, spilling out onto bedside tables, stacked beside chairs. I used to fight this overcrowding, obsessing over how to best organize my shelves, until I realized that to create a more streamlined look I would need to throw copious amounts of books away. As this was something I was unwilling to do, I realized I would need to stop letting my lack of space hamper me creatively.
I stopped trying to make sense of their placement on my shelves, stopped separating them in terms of genre or alphabetically, stopped focusing on how I thought a bookshelf should function and instead focused on the thrill I got when moving a haphazard stack aside and finding an unread book lurking, aching to be read. It was then that I realized how much my bookshelf added to my tiny apartment, with its random mosaic of new and battered spines.
As it turns out, if there is something that you truly love, and you can accept the idea that perfection is not always orderly and neat, then everything truly does have its place.
To that end, some advice on creating your own book haven for those with and without space:
1. Floor to ceiling shelves add height to small rooms and grandeur to large ones.
2.Open shelves create an illusion of more space, particularly if they match or are close to your wall color.
3.Separate case units can appear blocky if not anchored by a softer element in the room (an overstuffed chair, for example).
4.Utilize empty wall space below your windows for stacks of oversized and hardback books when shelving is limited.
5.Resist all attempts to line shelves with books of the same size and color. It will look like a presidential address backdrop.
6. Do group authors together but don’t waste time grouping by genre – most books fall into more than one category anyway.
7. Interrupt long lines of books with stacks in a pyramid-shaped or straight piles and put different sizes of books next to each other – it’s more visually interesting and makes it easier to find what you’re looking for.
8. Don’t try to hide any of your “trashy” books behind more respected tomes. A well-rounded bookshelf is a happy bookshelf.
9. Spice your shelves up. Add photos, tchotkes, plants - all look good on shelves and clear up space on your coffee and end tables for art/coffee table books.
10. Don’t over think it too much. If there is something, anything, you want to display, display it. It’s your personal tastes that make your house a home.