Book-lovers, you are in the right place! Here is how to organize your books with five different methods within organizing solutions that will work for your spaces. And, did you know, you can also organize your spaces according to your organizing style? You can find out what your organizing style is here.
Before organizing your books, you must purge the books that you will not read and do not reference. Be ruthless and purge the excess so you can more easily store what you do need and use.
In my freebie library here, I include guides which help walk you through the organizing process and help you decide what to purge and keep. I also include my declutter and organizing challenge calendars and guides to help direct you through each area of your home. These guides ensure you get through every nook and cranny and finally get to the other side of clutter … an organized and functional space!
In this post, we focus on how to organize your books. Below, I share ideas on how to organize your books with different types of organizing solutions that will work for your organizing styles and spaces.
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Book Organization
Before you start organizing your books, I highly suggest editing your collection. You don’t want to purchase a bunch of organizing solutions to contain books you’re not going to use. During our declutter challenge, which you can find here, we pared down our books to the following categories:
- Ones you love
- Ones you reference frequently
- Ones you are reading now
- Ones you will read for sure
Here is how to properly organize your books depending on your organizing style.
The Five Ways to Organize Your Books
The Ever Popular Rainbow Order
Instagram and Pinterest are filled with beautiful bookcases full of books sorted in rainbow order. It’s only function? Beauty and fun! This can be done for any age group but very much appreciated by children. If you remember the color of a book you’re looking for, then, this organizing method might work for you for function as well. Both my daughter and I have our books sorted in rainbow order which I share in my office tour here and our living room tour here. Even if you don’t have a diverse range of book colors like us, this method of sorting your books by color is quite aesthetically-pleasing.
Alphabetically by Author
If you tend to collect books from your favorite authors, this organizing method might work best for you. You can sort by author and then sort by any of these other methods listed here.
Alphabetically by Title
Since reference books are typically remembered by title, it makes sense to sort your collection of reference books by title. You can sort your reference books by genre first and then title if you have multiple reference books in different genres. For example, you can sort all your cookbooks alphabetically together and your sewing books alphabetically together.
By Genre
Sorting by genre makes sense for your reference books, as noted above, and other books if you have a diverse interest in different book topics. Once sorted by genre, you can sort by title to make each book easy to find.
By Size
If you have a small area to store your books, sorting your books by size can help conserve space. Book shelves can be adjusted to store shorter books together and larger books together. If you don’t have a bookcase with adjustable shelves, you can turn shorter books on their side and stack them up to the height of taller books or vice versa.
Organizing Solutions
Now that we have determined what order to sort your books, here are ideas on how to store them in ways that work for you.
Functional Organizing Solutions for Your Spaces
Since our homes all have different configurations, here are book storage solutions to fit your spaces.
On most any flat surface, if your books aren’t completely filling a bookcase or shelf end to end, bookends are a must. But, so many fail to do their job to keep books upright! My favorite bookends are this style bookend below. I remember these being used in all my school libaries, and it’s no wonder why … they work! If you want to conceal the end of the bookend, you can stand a sturdy book upright just outside the end. Or, you can set a few books horizontally to hide the end (found here):
In small spaces, you can utilize small adjustable shelves like this one below. It can be set wider or narrower, depending on your needs, and it can also be turned and set into a corner in the tightest of spaces (found here) (i.e. cookbooks on the kitchen counter):
If the only space you have to spare is wall space, utilizing shelves with ends built-in can perfectly contain your books (found here):
With a shelf like this one below, you can utilize wall space next to stairs to store your books (found here):
The narrowest wall can contain this bookshelf below (found here). Bonus: you won’t need to use bookends:
If there is a location in your home where you always read, you can set this shelf right next to where you usually read (found here):
If you read in multiple locations in your home (i.e. you homeschool in your dining room but read in the living room before bed), you can set your books on a mobile cart (found here):
Organizing Solutions for Kids
When organizing books for the little ones, facing books forward is ideal, especially before they can read. They are able to recognize the pictures on the covers and select the ones they want you to read. Also, it’s fun to set their favorites at the forefront and bring them joy.
To store favorites or featured books near where you read to your little ones, simple shallow shelves like these are super helpful (found here):
A larger shelf like this can be stored in the kids’ rooms or play room and contain all their books (found here):
For households with children of varying ages, with both reading and non-reading age children, a shelf like this can store books behind with spines facing out for readers. The littler ones who aren’t reading yet can have their books stored facing forward in the shallow shelves in front (found here):
For homeschooling families, while the cart above can be excellent for homeschooling, bins like these can help store school books by grade, subject, or reading level (found here):
If you have books you want to reserve for your younger ones which are handed down from your older ones, these can contain the books by age until your younger ones are old enough to enjoy them (found here):
I hope you found some ideas for how to organize your books for your organizing style and/or the space that you have! In my next post, I share how to organize your paperwork. Don’t forget to grab my free resources from my freebie library here. Let’s get to the other side of clutter … an organized and functional space!
Happy Organizing!
Author of “How to Organize Any Space in 7 Simplified Steps“