in thinking that a bookshelf on which the books are arranged by the colour of their spines

[Alliwantisaroomsomewhere]

...is one of the ponciest and twattiest things EVER?

I saw a pic of this in a magazine today - it looked lovely but WHY WHY WHY would you do that?

It screams pretentiousness and poncetwatickness. Or AIBU?

I had some Readers Digest arranged by colour, (packed away now for donation) but the rest are arranged first by topic, then author, then size.

SLINKY...WE NEED A PICTURE PLEASE

My very old leather bound books - greens, blues and reds - are colour arranged and look beautiful that way. They're in the sitting room because I like the open fire/old book pipe'n'slippers cosy feel to it all - open fires are for reading ancient copies of Walter Scott . My comfort repeat reading (Agatha Christie, Terry Pratchett, Daphne Du Maurier, Dorothy L Sayers) are all gathered on shelves in the bedroom for mindless bedtime reading. Everything else is alphabetical, fiction and factual together. Except for the heap in the car just in case (horror) I get stuck somewhere with nothing to read.

I arrange my books by size I think it looks better. Taller books on the edges going smaller towards the middle. The children's books are organised that way as well and they think it's funny to measure the books so that they are at the right place. It's my only ocd thing though, the rest of the house is a mess.

My first thought is that these people must be illiterate.

There is no one method in my house. Depends on the happenings and the books that are needed the most. I also regularly weed books out, can't be doing with having too many cluttering up the place. I used to have loads but am now very good at recycling those that won't be read again. Keep a high percentage of children's books, reference books that we need, and just plain favourites. Everything else goes.

I have two shelves in my study currently arranged by colour. It pleases me.

I am a professional librarian, btw.

Norks - I have absolutely no idea how to upload/download photos otherwise I would! Can I somehow get one from my iPhone onto Mumsnet??

blueshoes - not illiterate but perhaps a touch of OCD

Not much call for beautifully colour coded libraries in the homes of illiterates!

Maybe they could be rich illiterates who want to look clever and well read?

slinky can you email boot to yourself, then save, then upload onto your profile?

lonely and blue did you MEAN to be so rude?