new home designs: Bookshelves

Showing posts with label Bookshelves. Show all posts

Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Books, Books, and more Books

I love Books. They are such a source of inspiration. And I know there are a lot of you just like me who are very visual. The Peak of Chic did a great post on books yesterday and posed the question: "How best to display books". Let me know how you display your books. I display my books all over the house....in stacks, on tables, on chairs, countertops, bookshelves and even in the bathroom. I am not a fan of covering books in false jacket covers. There is so much beauty and inspiration in book covers. Having said that, for some books I take off the jacket covers because I find the original binding of the books more attractive, but I always keep the original jacket covers filed away. I also like to rotate books in stacks as decorative objects. I have stacks of books that are current around me and I put the books on top that I most want to look through first. My stacks of books are always changing depending on what I am reading or am inspired by. I do like to arrange books on shelves in subject matter as closely as possible, it makes finding them easier. Large books are better laid flat. Small books grouped together. Magazines filed in piles chronologically and by magazine. But having said all the above, I have no hard & fast rules as my book collection is constantly evolving and ever expanding. Sometimes I am very neat and sometimes books are everywhere in wild abandon.

Absolutely Beautiful Things

Unknown

David Kleinberg

Bunny Williams Home from New York Social Diary

Miles Redd

Photo New York Social Diary I love this library table with the lamps and chairs all around, just ready to sit down and devour the piles of books.

DreamHouse

David Duncan Livingston This is something how my office looks with stacks of magazines.

Cote de Texas I love the way that Cote has all her books stacked.

Bunny Williams Home from New York Social Diary

And this photo is for those of you who don't mind not being able to see the title of the books. I agree that it looks ever so Chic, but I wonder if the books become somewhat mysterious. Would you want to take each book of the shelf and see what was inside? I would!

"You are the same today that you are going to be five years from now except for two things: the people with whom you associate and the books you read." -- Charles Jones

If anyone knows the source of the above "unknown photo" please let me know.

Saturday, July 7, 2007

Chairs as Bookshelves

I love the casual elegance of stacking books on a chair. I can never have too many books around me. They usually land in stacks all over. I love to have them around for inspiration. I have never been in a home in Paris that didn't have a stack of books in the living room. When I go into people's homes I always look to see what books they have on their bookshelves and what they are reading beside their favourite chair or on the night table. I went to see a new client today and saw some familiar books there. My heart felt warm and I felt an immediate kinship with them as I imagined that we had shared some of the same reading. I also came away from that meeting with a new book to buy. It was lying on the coffee table and I loved the cover and was compelled to pick it up. I loved the feel of it in my hand. I wrote down the name and author and on the way back to the office I stopped at the bookstore and picked it up. The book is The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street by Helene Hanff. The previous book that she wrote was 84, Charing Cross Road which was made into a movie with Anthony Hopkins and Ann Bancroft 1987. So I picked up that book to read also. I don't know how I missed the movie with two stellar actors in it. So one thing does lead to another and another and another.......... Happy book stacking.

If anyone has read these books
please let me know how you liked them.

Thursday, June 28, 2007

Bookshelves

Books are such a wonderful way of personalizing your space. Who doesn't love to be surrounded with all this wonderful inspiration. I think rooms with bookshelves are some of my most memorable spaces. Everyone feels comfortable in these rooms and they are rooms where you want to linger. I have a girlfriend who has a monumental bookshelf in her dining room. I always love to sit at the table across from the bookshelf so I can peruse the shelves between the dinner conversation. I have categorized the following pictures of bookshelves into 6 sections:

1. Bookshelves in Living Rooms