In my travels to auctions, estate sales, and the occasional garage sale, I come across old books of many varieties. The types of books I'm actively looking for are examples from the 1940's or earlier, with appealing covers. Embossed faux leather, real leather, or "pretty lady" graphics on the cover are my personal favorites. I also love the marbleized paper sometimes used on the covers, and sets of books, like "The Bobbsey Twins" or something similar.
To display a group of books, like the "Tom Swift" set below, I just pile them casually around a floral arrangement or other focal point.
Maybe this picture from Country Living magazine better illustrates how a stack of books can add color and vintage appeal to a space:
Touches of gold are always a nice addition to a colorful book cover. These German books are keepers:
Books that are plentiful and inexpensive include dictionaries, bibles, and sets of encyclopedias. They are often begging for a new home, and sometimes I decide to give them one. A bookshelf full of vintage books looks so much more attractive than a shelf full of newer books. I love the mellow colors all mixed together.
Here is another picture from Country Living, showing a nice looking set of books on a shelf in the reading nook. Maybe they aren't the focal point, but consider what the space would look like without the books. I kind of equate books in an interior to nice background music. You might not always be aware of it, but it definitely adds ambiance:
Have you ever wondered what happens to old books that haven't sold at the book store, at the library book sale or some other wholesale book outlet? Sadly, even newer books that don't sell on the retail market are often ground up and added to a landfill. Vintage books get shuffled around, sometimes for years, until they get wet in someone's basement and get tossed in the dumpster or meet some other undignified death.
To help save forlorn books that lack display-ability on their own and might otherwise meet an unpleasant demise, I think it is our duty as crafting "up-cyclers" to find new ways to appreciate old books. My favorite way to dress up a disressed book is to cover it with a jacket of sheet music. We all know how to do this, it's just a book jacket like the ones we had to make for our school textbooks years ago out of grocery bags.
I painted the top and bottom edges of the books off white, so they blended nicely with the sheet music. To embellish them, I tied a dupioni silk ribbon around the middle and added a vintage millinery blossom. Now these books are ready to dress up a shelf or become part of a table vignette. Obviously, you wouldn't want to stack them one atop the other, but you could stack several un-embellished sheet music covered books, then put the embellished book on the top of the stack.
When I find really decrepit books that have loose or missing covers, I like to stack three or so and tie some jute string around them. Just for fun, I spray some glimmer mist on them to add a touch of gold or silver.
Sometimes I tie a tag on top with an old-timey picture for some extra interest, or slip a cabinet card or postcard under the string. This stack got a granny cabinet card on top:
I love color, so the stack below really appeals to me. I didn't alter these books, because they were in good condition, but I like the look of them bundled into a little trio with Granny on the top:
How do you display books in your home? Do you use the traditional bookshelf method, or do you have a creative up-cycling strategy for them? I'd love to know!
Mitzi


