I had an inkling a few years ago, that I’d like to build a life around books. My first thought was to become an online bookseller, but I didn’t have stock to sell. I stumbled upon this bookshelf filled with books at a garage sale and offered them a price for the whole lot.
The handmade shelves were an ugly brown and filled with about 500 books from the fifties, mostly book club editions. Fortunately, I didn’t pay much for the books because, not only were they not valuable, but nobody online wanted to buy them. But that’s how you learn.
The best part of the experience was the bookshelf. I painted it red to fit the theme of the room and now a mishmash of my books sit on it. Not only my most valuable books, but the mystery paperbacks I read to escape, and my infant collection of Texana and books about books.
Enjoy,
JT
I am so excited to have found your lovely website! Thank you for posting such wonderful pictures. Books (especially old ones) are just so beautiful, aren’t they?
Trish, I’m so glad you found the site and that you’re booklover too. I admit to loving old books too, especially those in old Italian libraries:)
Oh, how I love bookshelves. I need more of them. I have a whole collection of vintage school textbooks that are sitting in boxes because I need both the right bookshelf and more space to set it up in. Thanks for sharing the story behind these shelves. Every bookshelf and book collection has a story, right? And, oh, those really old brown leather books in the lower-left corner of the photo have caught my eye.
Chris, Good eye. The old brown leather books are mostly history books printed in the mid 1700′s. I wrote about them here if you want to know more about where I found them. I like that they are narrow little books, only 4″ wide.