Re-organizing a bookshelf from chaos to harmony

”Find something your passionate about and keep tremendously interested in it” – Julia Child

Katherine is passionate about cooking for family and friends and loves her cookbook collection! But after years of collecting, she had outgrown her built-in book case. She felt overwhelmed every time she looked at the over-stuffed shelves and guilty at the thought of buying another cookbook; she was ready for a change. We eliminated her guilt, by creating a beautiful and organized bookcase with a little more room to grow. She happily reports she can find everything easily and has her eye on an intersting new book find!

Five simple steps to create a beautiful bookcase in any room:

1. Look at every single book and see if is still relevant to your current life. Is it useful? Does it make you happy? If the answer is Yes, it stays, if the answer is No, it goes!
2. Remove everything from the shelves and make categorized piles. (ie: Italian, French, fiction, non-fiction, travel…etc.)
3.  Place books back on the shelves by categories and in different directions, not all vertical.
4.  Use attractive baskets or boxes to store unattractive or odd shaped items. (We used baskets from Target to hide well-loved spiral bound cookbooks).
5.   Add a few objects to create visually interesting displays and make sure to leave empty space in the shelves. Odd number of items are best when creating displays.
   

   Mix it up with interesting art pieces and pottery