How to Style Your Home With Books: 9 Unusual Ways

Home decoration suggestions for book lovers often tend toward library style, kitschy coffee mugs with clever pro-reader sayings, and just a bunch of bookshelves. Books are much more than reading material, and almost every room in your house can benefit from their inclusion.

Why not use them as artistic displays and decorator accents when not thumbing through their pages? You can even repurpose old, unwanted books as functional or purely aesthetic.

Since digital books are becoming very popular, you can not only buy ebooks to enjoy fiction but also benefit from ebook rental, especially for textbooks. Digital books are great because you can take them anywhere you go, but that doesn’t mean you want to completely get rid of your print versions.

Well, standard paperbacks may do little more than fill shelves. There are beautiful ways to use books as stylish home décor elements. This list can help.

1. Display Shelf – Front-facing Art

If you have a lot of coffee table books with large, beautiful, or exciting covers, you can do more than stack them on flat surfaces. Hang them on the wall directly as art or showcase their style on a flat rack. If you're lucky, you can source one from an old bookstore or library, but shallow-shelf units are pretty easy to find retail, too.

For houses that don't have room for another shelving unit, you can get the same decorative look by hanging large, artistic books on the wall directly as if they were paintings or prints. Consider using frames sourced from your favorite thrift shop for an extra splash of style.

2. Create Book Pillars and Pedestals

In unused corners or wherever you need extra support, stack books in colorful piles against the wall or a piece of furniture. You can elevate this option from a mess to intentional décor by topping it with a figurine, a potted plant (careful with water!), or even a small lamp.

Do this from the floor up or to give more height to a piece of furniture. If you make an extra tall pillar, you might want to take safety measures and attach the books to a base or backpiece to avoid them falling unexpectedly.

3. Use Books to Back Deep Shelves

Some shelving units have intense shelves, and the back could be more used for convenient storage. Fill them with colorful books to provide a backdrop design for whatever you put in front.

This is a good use for your less-than-stylish paperbacks. You store them neatly and get a vibrant addition of color in whatever room you choose.

4. Color Code Your Collection

Most home aesthetics focus on specific color schemes, so why not use your books to augment them? Go through your collection and separate the neutrals from the brights.

Use specific shades in different rooms or create an accent display somewhere prominently. If huge bookshelves are your thing, group different shades on other layers.

5. Fill Nooks with Books

Take the pile and pedestal idea one step further by filling unused nooks and crannies completely with your favorite things. Build a wall of books under the stairs or stack them tightly in an architectural alcove. You can use them to fill the space or create reading nooks with a few comfy cushions and a light source. This creates a genuinely welcoming and cozy feeling in any room.

6. Stairway to Reader's Heaven

Unless you have particularly narrow stairs in your home, most people use only a small portion of the center to go up and down.

• Decorate the unneeded edges with books.

• Stack ones of the same size along the wall or railing edges, or use them to line the baseplates for a truly unique look.

No matter what, think about safety at the same time you consider style. Secure the books carefully so they don't become a tripping hazard.

7. Build Furniture with Books

Booklovers often have trouble letting go of their favorite tomes, and while the above ideas work great for displaying ones in good condition, some books are beyond hope. You do not have to throw them away! Upcycle instead by transforming them into something new and stylish for your house.

Affix books to each other securely and use them to support occasional tables or to craft into bookcases themselves. A pillar of books glued or clamped together is strong enough to attach a smooth piece of wood or glass on top to hold knick-knacks, your coffee cup, or a lamp.

8. Plant a Reading Seed with Book Planters

Do you love houseplants as much as reading? Find your biggest, thickest books, carefully cut out the centers, stack them, and use them as an attention-getting planter or flowerpot.

Of course, you will need a plastic insert to hold the soil and water, but the books will create a wonderfully stylish and creative exterior.

If you do not want to cut the books or do not have the do-it-yourself abilities and tools on hand, you can also affix books vertically to the exterior of wooden planters for a literary flair.

9. Create a Book Lamp for Your Reading Nook

Proper lighting is important when you read, so crafting a lamp just might be the ideal project for repurposing old books. Any craft or home goods store undoubtedly sells the interior mechanism needed to create a lamp: the metal casing, light bulb socket, on/off switch, and wire.

All you have to do is stack books in a pleasing configuration, drill a big enough hole down through the center, and run the wire and support through it to have a lamp. Top things off with a shade of your choice, and you're ready to read.

Final thoughts

Even if you prefer to read ebooks mostly these days for convenience and accessibility, you may still love to have plenty of hardcover and paperback books around.

These nine unique ideas for using them as part of your home décor scheme can make that possible.

Elevate your ideas from basic bookshelves to museum-worthy displays, kitschy accents and furniture, and upcycling to give too-old books a new life.

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Jenny Kakoudakis likes to blog about interiors. She launched award-winning Seasons in Colour in 2014 and the luxury interior design blog All The Pretty Homes in 2024.

When she is not chasing criminals out of the financial system (her day job), she gets creative by redecorating her own home.