Shelfie: Clutter-clearing ideas for stylish shelf art

by Martha Roberts

Award-winning journalist, color blogger and shelfie fanatic Martha Roberts shows you how to source, sort and arrange your belongings into stylish shelfies for home and workspace.

An interesting response to the clutter-clearing movement has been 'the shelfie' as a decorating trend and social media phenomenon. What started as a label for beautiful bookshelves is now applied to artfully stylish arrangements of collectables, flowers, photos, crafting ephemera, perfume bottles - and of course books. And shelfies don't just appear on shelves but also on tabletops, fireplaces and desks. At a time when we own six times more objects than our parents did, and move house more often, de-cluttering, and then curating our possessions stylishly, is an important way of having a dedicated space that is a 'little bit of us', injecting stylish personality into the home and workplace. In the first book on the subject, Martha Roberts explores the art of creating great shelfies, explaining color, scale and composition then showing inspiring shelfies in every room in the house, from the kitchen to the bedroom, the home office to a hallway, allowing you to declutter your surroundings without throwing away the things you love in the ultimate form of self-expression. The book's photographer, Nick Pope, took the photographs for At Home with Plants , also published by Mitchell Beazley.

Genres: Nonfiction, Design, Reference

144 pages, Hardcover

Published October 16, 2018

Reviews

[Marianna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Love all the color, but her arrangements are too cluttered for my taste.

[Laura · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to get some ideas for my shelves but all her pictures were a little overwhelming. I need something a little more sparse and not so cluttered. I did like her 6 C’s approach to a shelf. But overall not my kind of shelfie.

[Susannah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted to read this because I thought it might help me to create more interesting layouts for images for Instagram. Shelfie is particularly appropriate because I work in a library where we have lots of shelves of books. There are some useful tips here, especially in Part 1 of the book where Roberts outlines the 6 Cs: clear, commentary, cohesion, colour, curate and create. In Part 2 she applies the 6 Cs to different rooms in the house where shelfies can be made.
Although this book applies particularly to #shelfies, the layout and composition ideas encompassed by the 6 Cs can be applied to all kinds of photography.

[Angie · Rating 2 out of 5]

It wasn’t a bad book, but it definitely leads towards folks who like to see everything that they own. It’s for maximalists - for those who want to curate, collect, combine. I am not one of those people. I think at one point in my life I was, but as I entered into my 40s, I have leaned into minimalism. I did pull from the book though the idea of using crocs/pottery as part of decor, as well as other natural objects and items like plants.

[Dee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love this design book - a warning that every time you pick it up you'll then find yourself immersed in shelfie (and other spots) rearrangement - if you are interested in interior design and like me have many books and shelves, coffee tables, bedside and window areas - you'll be picking it up and going over it again and again. Great week design book. Great gift as well. Recommended.

[Christopher Shawn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful inspiration for how to style your shelves like an adult. No longer will you have overflowing shelves of god-knows-what. We all love books,so why do we treat them so poorly? Display them lovingly, with other objects that spark joy everyday.

[B · Rating 2 out of 5]

It was okay. Very short. The pictures were fun to look at but there wasn't much substance. Most of the "chapters" read like they were ripped from Real Simple magazine articles.

[Annette McIntyre · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some very interesting shelf arrangements here.

[Adrian · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 good information, but the author’s design aesthetic didn’t appeal to me.

[Deb · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some good ideas. I especially like the 6Cs, Clear, Commentary, Cohesion, Colour, Curate and Create.