{How To} Style a Bookcase

bookcase bookshelf bookshelves ikea billy paper source wrapping paper customize faux bois wallpaper. styling how to before and after makeover books living room bedroom white

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Since my brothers were coming to visit I thought I should do something about this:

Yikes.

Remember when I fancified my IKEA Billy bookcases? I used neato faux bois paper from Paper Source to make them a little more special. Here’s what they looked like before I filled them…

Mess of catastrophic proportions + Very poor photography skillz = Not cute

And here’s what they’re looking like now!

Please pardon the glare.
Please pardon the even worserer (new word) glare.

I’m not sold on the tops of the bookcases yet — just needed a place to throw stuff before the baby brothers arrived — but the INSIDE of the bookcases I LOVE. Tricky Trick: Do you see all my paperback books? They’re mostly ugly and we’ve mostly read them — meaning I almost never need to find any specific one and I don’t want to look at their yucky cover designs. (Recall, design is life and death.) So I turned them around! I think the look of the different papers is pretty cool. Then I added all the hardcover books The Scientist and I collected before our wedding to use as centerpieces (more on that later), some of our favorite tchotchkes from around the world, a few special wedding photos and — VOILA! A wedding shrine disguised as storage. My favorite magic trick!

Hooray! We don’t live in a pigsty anymore!

So what do you think of our new bookcases? Definitely an improvement over the previous storage solution, which was brown cardboard boxes. Do you think they fit in with my inspiration images? Do you have any pretty bookcase photos you want to share?

7 thoughts on “{How To} Style a Bookcase

  1. Danielle says:

    its a filter you would put on the front of your lens on your 60D and then you just twist it until you don’t see glare. We need to get together so we can have a camera lesson!

  2. Kristen says:

    Great bookcases- I got the same ones from Ikea, dressed mine up as well. Maybe their bookcase lights would work well for the tops? I got a couple of the Format (also Ikea) and they work great for the look and lighting up the corners

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