Rainbow
February 23, 2009
What I did this weekend. 
I jokingly said to Lee Sunday morning, “Let’s rearrange the books by colour.” When he agreed I jumped. It didn’t take as long as I thought it would. Lee wasn’t certain it was going to look ok…which he said after we had all the books spread out on the floor and I had half of the first shelf done. (Shall we say really not a good time to suggest this was perhaps not a good idea…) But we carried on and this was the result. We also have a black Billy bookcase in our dining room that has two shelves of black books, a library shelf and 3.5 shelves of cookbooks/food lit that is not arranged by colour. Even I can’t manage it with cookbooks. I need those grouped together. And on top of the white and black shelf we have the Harry Potters and the James Bond novel box set.
And yes, that stack of green books = Viragos.
I love it. And Lee had to admit that he finds the red and blues nestled up beside each other very soothing.
Please don’t ask what is going to happen when we buy more books. Especially if they are blue…or red…or orange or yellow…or more Viragos. We’re trying really hard not to think about it.
Now if only Lee would let me do this with his CDs… (I think that will fall under the “when pigs fly and whistle while dancing a jig” category).
February 23rd, 2009 at 7:39 pm
Wow, it looks awesome!
Lexi’s last blog post..A New Mailbox Monday!
[Reply]
February 23rd, 2009 at 7:54 pm
I really think you could do the cookbooks by color too. Give it a try… that might convince TW to try it too, heh.
Denise’s last blog post..Hahaha, I need to do some sidebar work…
[Reply]
February 23rd, 2009 at 9:08 pm
It’s very pretty, but it would still drive me crazy when I went to look for a book and it wasn’t in alphabetical order. Now all your series are OUT OF ORDER! Ahhh! *panic* I’d be in a padded room in no time.
kit-cat’s last blog post..Where my money is going in March
[Reply]
February 23rd, 2009 at 11:09 pm
Oh, I love those color coordinated shelves!! Very pretty. Do you think you’ll be able to find everything easily still?
Danielle’s last blog post..Reading Notes
[Reply]
February 24th, 2009 at 7:05 am
Thanks Lexi.
Denise – lol. Nice try.
Kit-Cat – I really don’t have that many series and among the ones I have there’s only a couple of series that actually aren’t the same colour. Also, you need to remember that I never did keep my books in alphabetically order in the first place.
Danielle – yes. I do.
[Reply]
February 24th, 2009 at 11:10 am
Ohh…. pretty. This would probably work for me, too, since I can “see” the cover of the book sometimes more than I can remember the actual title or author’s name.
TexasRed’s last blog post..Teaser Tuesday – The Secret Garden
[Reply]
February 24th, 2009 at 11:48 am
I’d never have thought of doing this, even in jest. But it does look appealing. (My current problem is a lack of available bookshelves–any creative ideas?)
Suko’s last blog post..The Reader
[Reply]
February 24th, 2009 at 12:34 pm
I love it!! I really really do. Way to be brave.
Jessica’s last blog post..American Rust, by Philipp Meyer
[Reply]
February 24th, 2009 at 12:42 pm
Texas Red – lol I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gone through my shelves thinking, “Where’s that book? You know, the one about x that is written by that person whose name I can’t remember. I think it has a red cover…”
Suko – I had to purge a few books to make things fit, I’ll admit it. I have a face the music exercise with my books every now and then where I must face that I’m just not ever going to read some of them. Aside from that – be creative with stacking and keep rearranging so that things fit. We have to move the height of a shelf to get things to work.
Jessica – I like it and now that I have it I think it makes just as much sense as any other system.
[Reply]
February 24th, 2009 at 3:47 pm
This is great!
I think there was a bookstore in California that did this with all of their stock. Can you imagine being a customer and looking for a book though? Well, I guess it’d be a fun time looking and maybe finding another gem.
iliana’s last blog post..Mysteries On My List
[Reply]
February 24th, 2009 at 7:34 pm
I can honestly say that is the first library I’ve ever seen arranged by color, and I love it! It looks like a rainbow;) I would smile everytime I walked past… I hope you do.
Jess’s last blog post..Cause you just never know where that dollar has been….
[Reply]
February 25th, 2009 at 8:04 pm
Awesomeness!
It’d drive me completely bonkers, but looks great!
Chava’s last blog post..Waltz with Bashir: A Lebanon War Story by Ari Folman (2009)
[Reply]
March 7th, 2009 at 11:49 am
That seriously looks amazing. I am so jealous. I wish I could do that – but my main bookshelf, which is great insofar as it’s floor-to-ceiling, has shelves that are very, very short. It’s hard to organize books on them.
…And still I am thinking of doing this. Even though it would mean that all the books by the same author wouldn’t be together. I could get used to that. Maybe.
[Reply]