Beautiful and Useful: Bookshelves
Written by pfabgirl
Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful. ~William Morris.
The most useful thing in my house? Definitely not my kitchen (I’m not about that cooking life), most likely my bed.
The most beautiful thing in my home, by far, is my bookshelves. Like 100% of writers, I have a thing for books. An addiction. A tendré. Obsession might be too tame a descriptor for my relationship with the written word. I am an unrepentant bibliophile.
Sadly, I am also a nomadic bibliophile. I’ve moved 8 times in the last nine years and have carted my book collection with me each time, William Morris’ advice ringing soundly in my ears each time I unpack my life from cardboard boxes. Moving this frequently has made me more circumspect about not just the books, but the things that I keep. I still have far too many non-useful and unbeautiful items, but I am slowly getting rid of the Stuff.
Move 6 (Norfolk to Germany) saw the addition of my beautiful bookshelves (I bought them at GoodWood furniture in Norfolk and stained them myself). You probably even recognize them from my “what I’m wearing” posts. They’ve held up pretty well in the subsequent cross-continent moves and have served as a display case for my red shoes, closet shelving in my guest bedroom-turned- walk-in-closet, and, once the bottom doors were removed, perfect shelving for my winter boots. The shelves currently fit snugly in the nook in my bedroom and are being used for their intended purpose– book ogling!
As much as I love these shelves, they are just my starter bookshelves. One day (in the not too distant future) when I live in my forever home by the water with my handsome, God-loving Italian husband (who won’t stop calling me bella) and a couple of brown bambini running about then I will definitely be upgrading to something more permanent. Floor-to-ceiling built ins are what my dreams are made of:
I would only write Bestsellers if surrounded by this beauty:
Bookshelves shall abound in the Rossi/Bruno/De Luca/Giordana household
Perfect for the Bibliophilic Bambini’s rooms:
Sadly, this is NOT a built-in, and therefore an unlikely candidate for my forever home. It’s the Austrian National Library (Prunksaal) in Vienna. Hey, a girl can dream.
What’s beautiful in your home?
Those bookshelves are a dream! We haul around a ton of books too. Thankfully, like you, we don’t pay for it when we move:-) I’m trying to read all the ones we own (I married into quite a collection) before I buy more. Not working out so well – we can’t stop buying them. And your half Italian kids will be GORGEOUS!
ha ha! I know the feeling. Buying a kindle has helped with the sure tonnage of books but it’s still an ongoing battle:)
When I downsized to a smaller living space, I donated most of my books to the public Library in Norwich, CT. A piece of my heart went inside each and every box. I had no choice, but I knew the books would be well used and enjoyed. I kept only the ones I could really not live without. But they and all my belongings such as forty years worth of photos, my daughters first drawings, letters from my father, were detained by brazilian customs and subsequently lost. I have had to learn to detach from all that. At times something surfaces from my memory bank, and after I grieve a little, I let go…