How To Create A Well Styled Bookcase

A bookcase, whether it be built in or freestanding, small or big, is a place for you to showcase your key interests and loves of your life. Books, art, photos of friends and family, album covers, memorabilia from trips and adventures…anything goes! It just comes to pulling it all together in a way that tells a story and is pleasing to the eye. You need highs and lows, color, texture, groupings, and life in a bookcase.

Every one of my clients think they have enough (or even too much) for a bookcase and feel that, no matter how they re-arrange, it looks cluttered and messy. When I come in, I bring even more items (often scrounging around the house for miscellaneous keepsakes  to add to the mix) and make it look airier, well thought, and cohesive.  Here are some great examples and some key tips to a great bookcase…

Thrift and antique stores are hidden gems to find old leather bound books and vintage encyclopedia sets that can fill in where your own book collection is lacking. Take cover jackets off hardcover books to keep the space looking too bright and graphic. Alternate book clusters right and left in a zig-zag pattern from shelf to shelf.

Use unexpected items as bookends. Heavy shells, obelisks (statue-like objects), old camera, or a vase can all serve as a bookend and still let you display your favorite treasures. If your room is very neutral, consider painting the back of the bookcase to let your items pop and bring in some color.

Fake It!!! Nobody has to know you’re not a well traveled soul. Even if you haven’t collected items or are newly starting out on your journeys, gather fun quirky items from estate sales and flea markets that make your bookcase appear like you have been everywhere and seen it all. You can even tell them you got that lovely little figure in a little shop on a trip to Europe instead of at Bert & Hazel’s garage sale last week!