UncategorizedFor the Books February 28, 2013I was planning to take our new house room-by-room in posts. I was going to do a kitchen series, then when that room was finished and the final photos posted, I’d move on to the next. Who was I kidding??? Creative types don’t work that way, nor will our home renovation. So, I’m afraid, dear readers, that I’ll be jumping around a bit with all of our design ideas. I promise it will make sense in the end when we have a bunch of hopefully beautiful, finished rooms. But having to plan an entire home renovation at once means that many different design ideas are jumping around in my head at the same time, so I’m going to share them as they appear 🙂 Onto today’s topic…bookshelves. *** I am a writer at heart. For me, that has meant different things at different stages of my life. At times, it’s meant that I was writing a novel and poured every ounce of myself and my time (even some I shouldn’t have) into it. Right now, it means I am a blogger and crave the time I spend writing my thoughts, home adventures, soul ponderings, and the like to all of you. But in every phase of my life, it has meant that I have a fierce love for books and the written word. I get lost in the stories that live within the covers of the novels I read and can’t hardly tear myself away until I know what has happened to my dear friends I met there. As you can imagine, with this love of books comes a love of collecting these stories that I spend time in. In our last home, we had not one bookshelf. Just piles and stacks of books in random areas. My husband and I both vowed to change that in the next house. My lovely book friends need a special, cozy home made especially for them. So, we decided we would build some bookshelves. Once we found this house, the small space was making it hard to fit bookshelves. And once we decided to take out most all of the walls in the main living areas, there was even less wall space to work with! It was looking like my dream bookshelves weren’t going to make it into our final design and I was pretty sad about that. Until we had a thought…what if our bookshelves also housed our TV in the living room?! That freed up an entire wall! And hence, the idea to have a TWELVE FOOT WALL of floor to ceiling built-in bookshelves was born. I’m about to swoon just typing these words…twelve walls of floor to ceiling bookshelves. Not just one little book shelf in a corner as I’d been imagining, but twelve feet! This is probably the thing I’m most excited about in this house. (I know I’ve said that something about the house is my favorite a lot and will probably continue to. Just pretend each time I say it, it’s the first, okay? My husband argues that you can’t have more than one favorite thing, but I always disagree. Twenty favorite foods? Check. Four favorite seasons? Check. A million favorite things about our new house? Check.) I digress… The bookshelves will go along the right wall of the living room (opposite of the kitchen). Now, onto some pretty pictures of what I’m picturing. They will be white and I want to use some library/museum style lights over each shelf. I love the ones in this picture: I also love the idea of organizing your books by color. I don’t know if I’ll do this or not because I really love some well-styled bookshelves with decorative items too, but isn’t this picture awesome? Now onto some serious bookshelf styling. I’m loving the styling in these images. Such an awesome mix of books, quirky decorate items, art, and maybe some keepsakes. I love all of the images I’ve seen of art hanging on the outside of the bookshelf. Here’s one of my favorite examples: Need me some more antlers! The styling on those shelves is pretty good too. I saw this image today and loved the idea of putting two poofs in front of the TV area. They’re pretty, but also functional because they add a bit more seating. If you notice, these are a bigger image of the styling one I showed above. How good is the mix of books and accessories? And last, but certainly not least, I’m on the lookout for an old ladder so that I can install it as a rolling library ladder like this image: How cool is that? I’ve wanted one of those forever. Is it necessary to reach the top of eight foot bookshelves? Maybe, maybe not – that’s not that high, after all. But oh, how I love it. You can find all of the images on my “For the Books” Pinterest Board.
Megan Shipman says February 28, 2013 at 3:00 pm Are y’all planning to build the bookshelves yourself? I have a dream of built-ins in our living room on either side of our fireplace under windows, but I am scared of tackling built-ins myself! Reply
Kristina says February 28, 2013 at 3:43 pm Oh, those book shelves sound heavenly! I love books too (of course!) and my goal (that is almost completed, just our room left) is to have a bookshelf, or at least some books in every room (except the bathroom, because why? And all that humidity would not be good for them). I currently have mine organized by color, but I’m getting tired of it since it’s been a while and I think I’ll rearrange them by genre. Once I figure out how to rearrange the living room (and paint various furniture). I’ve considered built-ins as well, but so far haven’t been able to get Kurt 100% on board. Reply
Kelly - Talk of the House says March 2, 2013 at 9:25 am Bookshelves are a NECESSITY of life around here, so I totally understand your joy in the plan for them. I was thinking the other day, how in the world would we ever move all the books in just our great room if we had to move…our shelves are 10 ft. tall and 12 ft. long and full of books – no accessories. And then there are the bookshelves where the tv is (haven’t even shown that on the blog)..I LOVE the lights you featured,a nd maybe one day we will put those in. We have always wanted to do the ladder since the shelves are so tall…another “down the road” project. Reply