Book storage/organisation

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One thing led to another & I have amassed at least 100 (physical) books. A significant amount are university-related, and some are coffee table style books and fairly large.

I am now trying to figure out storage! I have cookbooks in one of my kitchen cupboards. Some nicer books on display. The rest are crammed into various cupboards/tables. How do you store yours? I’m looking for ideas/inspiration before I commit to new furniture, I’m toying with the idea of something custom.

I like a minimalist aesthetic so I don’t think I want a bookcase where everything is on display all of the time. I want something that has doors or something to slide to cover the books when needed. I’m not sure how to plan the right shelf heights though for bigger books. I also think I want to couple that with a more shallow bookcase that can just hold a few books per shelf for display purposes. Has anyone bought similar items?

We have ikea Billy bookcases all over the place in our house, there are books everywhere

Same, I have six Billy bookcases. I think you can get doors for them if the sight of your books really offends you!

100 books is not many though, one bookcase would be plenty (you can get doors if you don't want to look at them), and rotate out a couple of books for the coffee table/display shelf or whatever now and then.

I've given up buying books and just borrow from the library.

They don’t offend me but I have done a lot with the rest of my interior design that I think having all the books out all the time would look too busy for me. Whilst some of my books are aesthetically pleasing, most like the university textbooks aren’t really adding anything by being visible 24/7!

This sounds perfect! What do I search to find the doors, is there a specific term?

you’re right that 100 probably isn’t much, but a lot of mine are quite large/thick books so I imagine might take up more room.

A lot of books can be found online in pdf form (especially older books) if you don’t mind reading on your phone/tablet/pc

Also do you keep cookbooks in your bookcase (which might be in a separate room) or keep them in the kitchen?

In a bookcase. You can't have a home without books.

We also have cookbooks in kitchen cupboard(s) (and on other bookcases). We then have display bookcases (with more decorative/general interest books) downstairs and less visible bookcases upstairs with fiction and more specialist/academic non-fiction. Some of the display bookcase shelves also are used for display of artworks etc. collected on our travels.

You can definitely get doors for IKEA Billy bookcases - and that might be a good place to start while you figure out what you really want.

We have a mix of taller and shorter shelves, and some of our tallest books placed horizontally on the shortest shelves as that makes most efficient use of space (of which we have run out).

Between us we probably have ~2,500 books secreted around the house.

Also do you keep cookbooks in your bookcase (which might be in a separate room) or keep them in the kitchen?

The joiner who installed our kitchen also built me a kitchen bookcase at the end of the shelving wall. It's basically hidden unless you know it's there.

I use picture shelves to display "pretty" books which I rotate regularly (and Billy bookcases for everything else). We have children's non fiction and all craft books in the playroom. Hallways hold a lot of fiction as does the "library" cupboard (basically a giant cupboard with a window, a rocking chair and bookcases) and the sitting room is mostly non fiction. Poetry is in our bedroom. The kids have their general fiction in their rooms.

Built in is the way to go. Luckily my house came with a huge cupboard built into an Al ove next to a fireplace.
It's 5 shelves that can fit 2 rows of books on each, then I have a few special books out on display.

I have a custom bookcase from Tylko - a mixture of open shelves and doors

In our tiny box room we use picture shelves on one wall and have books by artists I like - it allows the nice covers to be displayed. May work for some coffee table books and allow you to rotate something like this: https://pin.it/4R50TZJwu

Alternatively, and I massively dislike when people do this some turn books around so you see pages not the spine to create a more consistent colouring - if it's the messy approach of lots of different colours of the uni books you could try this or even create covers for them in the colours that do match your decor

@ForestFlowerFairy I really like that idea. Thank you

I had the attached photos in mind, it’s just the bookstore in Harrods. I wanted something similar but with shallow shelves, so I can display a few coffee table-style books. Then have regular bookshelves in a matching wood on either side? Hopefully the pictures load.

Your house sounds dreamy!

I am definitely leaning towards built in, as I haven’t found anything I quite to buy yet. The Ikea bookcases are iconic but I really want something in that rich mahogany tone.

@macshoto wow - your set up sounds brilliant! thank you for all the advice, very helpful. Your collection sounds like it would put some libraries to shame!

You can get one of those coffee tables where the top lifts up - they are really handy for book storage, especially larger books.

We have 160cm of cook books (top half of Welsh dresser in the kitchen).

Living room has 5 billy book cases full of books. One has doors on the lower half. My plan is to paint them and make them look built in. It's a big project due to having over 10m of fiction, all in alphabetical order plus 8m non fiction books sorted by theme. I can't face boxing up, storing and then replacing that many books.

Study has 2 wall mounted shelves for academic books. Nobody else is interested.

I find homes without books a little odd, I have to confess.

My flat would appear to be without books but that’s because they’re all in the bedroom. Every time I run out of space I visit the local charity shop to buy another bookcase. They don’t match, obviously, but I like that.

Got a bad book problem in my house, most of the walls are covered in them. I moved mine out years ago to my work office (academic) but DH and the kids are all at it :-/. I’m knocking out the ceilings in the kids rooms so the book shelves can go up 3.5m.

I’m on the lookout for the perfect sized bookcase at the mo (not very wide and a certain height) as I have now reverted to having them stacked in the room. Enjoying the search😉 my sister has the Mecca- a giant one that fills her whole back wall but I’ve a phobia of giant bookcases in case they fall over. Hope you find what you’re looking for op!!

I’m looking for a bookcase at the moment and I really fancy something like this. I’ve just got to find it where we live! The shelves are pretty deep so it would hold those bigger books.

The link isn’t working….it’s a six tier revolving bookcase in walnut. I’ve seen versions on Amazon here in France and on a US site called Yowos.

Just whatever you do make sure that you don’t end up with a storage solution designed for your 100 books. Also think about where you’ll put the next 100!

We have purged our book collection got rid of six huge crates, sold two that were his science books and more obscure ones of mine. DH is cataloguing my large collection of 1,500 books Ladybird books to sell to a specialist dealer. We saw no reason to hold on to ones that we would never read again, it was long overdue, we had kept them in large cupboards and also in crates in the loft. We have always done a regular sorting out but this was the biggest by far.

We now have 2 shelves in the office and one large cupboard plus 4 crates in the
loft.