Tips to Bookshelf Organisation

I got a new bookshelf for Christmas and I’ve put a bunch of stuff on it to make it look nice which includes all of my books. Because that would be a relatively short post I’ve decided to combine my photos with descriptions of how I order my bookshelf. Hopefully you enjoy and learn a lot about the best ways to order books.

 

This is what my bookshelf looks like, or at least this is  the bottom half of it because the rest has nothing on it and thus would be boring for you to look at.

Now a lot of people order their book alphabetically which is very practical or by colour which is very pretty, but neither of these work for me. Personally I have always grouped my books by topic, size and just whatever feels right.

At the bottom I have books I don’t necessarily read much but I still like to have such has fiction books like encyclopedias or autobiographies, I also have a large number of puzzle books and middle grade novels from my childhood here.

The next shelf up has my larger books purely for practical reasons. My bookshelf has adjustable shelves and putting heavier books at the bottom makes it less likely to tip over. Additionally grouping books of a taller height means that I can save space later on.

My Rick Riordan books all share a place on this shelf because they go from normal sized, to a bit bigger, to large sized which is quite infuriating. Especially when this change happens not at the beginning of a new series but after the first book in a new series. After that we have a few other books that are too large to fit on shelves put at the next level down.

The next shelf up is a smaller size and has most of my average sized books such as the much beloved Throne of Glass series.

Now you may be noticing a large number of sticky notes poking out from all over my bookshelf and wondering what exactly they are for. You might also be noticing the large gaps in the middle of shelves where there is nothing and wondering why I don’t fill them up. The answer to both of those questions is the next shelf up.

This shelf contains my TBR. And I don’t mean part of the shelf, I mean the whole shelf. There are around twenty books on that shelf ranging from Christmas presents I got less than a week ago to books I have to read for school to books that have been on my TBR for years.

Now I don’t know about you, but for me most of these books are from authors or topics that I already have book from which means they already have a place to go on the rest of my shelf. This is what has caused me to add sticky notes to places in my bookshelf and leave spaces. Those sticky notes are to remind me of where books are meant to go after I have read them and the spaces are to ensure I don’t have to move mountains of books to make them fit.

I’ll sat it again for the people at the back.

I put sticky notes where I plan for books to go after I have read them

I guess the alternative is to keep your unread books where you plan for them to go from the beginning, but then I would almost certainly forget how many of them there were and attempt to get more books. This way I don’t forget how many books I still have to read and that guilt constantly motivates me to keep reading.

The next shelf up and the last occupied one houses my Obernewtyn Chronicles by Isobelle Carmody because the books are so big that they wouldn’t fit side by side with my Rick Riordan collection on the shelf and there is no way they would fit with the averagely sized books.

The other side of that shelf has the books I am currently reading, although it is kind of inaccurate considering I am listening to an audio book and reading several books online at the moment. At least it means they’re easy to grab.

One of the last things that I want to speak about is all the ornaments scattered around my bookshelf. Bookshelves make the PERFECT place for putting all those things that you don’t now where to put anywhere else. They add a nice decorative touch and change up the look from just books, books, books. I also like to use my ornaments as spacers between sections of my bookshelf so the books don’t do that awkward thing where they fall over and scare me in the middle of the night.

 

In conclusion, the things I learnt from this process were:

• Do what works for you
• I like building flat pack furniture far too much
• I need to buy more books to fill all the empty spaces
• If books don’t fit vertically turn them on their side and stack horizontally

 

Now I’m off to keep reading before my TBR shelf swallows me alive. Are there any books on my TBR shelf that you think I should get into right away? Let me know down in the comments.