With a few simple tips, you can learn timeless shelf styling ideas how to style and decorate shelves like the pros to create beautiful little moments around your home!
Whether you have floating shelves, shelves flanking a fireplace, bookcases, or full custom built-ins like I do, styling shelves the right way can elevate your home in no time.
This is a simple, timeless process to follow to make it easier to decorate shelves around the home. With an additional two key interior designer rules, this should help you get it right every time you decorate your home.
This post may contain affiliate links which we may receive a small commission when some items are purchased at no additional cost to you. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates program. As an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases. Read our full disclosure.
I recently shared a post with all the details about our new Dream Home Office Built-ins—before and after. Now that the built-ins are complete, I wanted to share the simple process you can use to style shelves.
Once you are armed with a few quick interior designer tips, you will know how to style beautiful shelves, as well as decorate around your home, every time.
Preparing to Style Shelves
An often overlooked first step before you even begin to create the shelf styling of your dreams, is to completely empty the shelves and gather everything you have to style and decorate with in one place. This is one of the most useful pieces of advice I can provide to help you achieve that designer styled shelf look, so don’t skip this step!
Emptying the shelves gives you a blank canvas to start with, while having everything in one place allows you to see what colors, textures, and general styling pieces you are working with.
You can easily gauge the scale and size of items, as well as get a much better idea if you are missing anything.
Shop the photo: Small round white terracotta cachepot vase | Tall white medium cachepot vase | Tall white large cachepot vase | Faux hydrangea flowers, white and light green | Woven leather laptop case cover | Cordless tiny lamp (alternative) | Woven genuine leather ottoman (similar) | Alpaca plaid throw blanket (similar) | Plaid grid bone inlay box (small and large) | Rattan chain links | Large paper mache bowl (similar) | Bone inlay box large (similar) and bone inlay box small (similar)
Choose A Color Palette
Pick three colors that will serve as the primary color palette for your shelf styling.
You want some level of consistency to help the eye to more easily scan the shelves and give them a break at the same time. Too many colors can feel chaotic and messy. This will become more apparent when you actually begin styling your shelves.
Shop the photo: Plaid grid bone inlay box (small and large) | Gather at Home book | Kinfolk Home book | The Beauty of Home book (dustcover removed) | Decorating in Detail book (dustcover removed) | Paulownia round wood bowl with lid | Seagrass basket with lid set of 2 (similar)
A few color palette styling ideas include:
- Organic: light natural woods, creams and whites, greenery, metals in black or brass
- Boho: mixture of organic and coral colors, floral patterns, fringe
- Americana (think Ralph Lauren): dark rich woods, antique brass, colors of navy, crimson red, and hunter dark green, patterns of plaids and herringbone
I stayed within my signature color palette of blush pink, dusty blue/blue-grey-green, and cream/white tones. It is calm and sophisticated without being fussy or boring.
Shop Your Home First
Before you head out to the store to buy something new, shop your home first.
Look around at decor, books, or other objects you can use to style your shelves with. A nice bowl from your kitchen or your favorite piece of artwork that you want to experiment with for the shelves.
Whatever it is, look around your home first.
Find The Missing Piece
If you still think you are missing things to style with, I highly suggest taking a trip to your local thrift store, antique shop, or T.J.Maxx, HomeGoods or Marshall’s stores.
I wrote a whole post about tips to get home decor on a budget, especially how you can find designer items for a fraction of the price at other retailers across T.J.Maxx family of stores.
You can also hop on Amazon to find the missing decor piece that will set the tone for the whole shelf styling scheme. The gorgeous white vases in a photo I took below were such a find on Amazon and they come in three sizes! I have all three, as shown. The two in the left photo and a large white cachepot that I have sitting on the desk portion of the built-ins in the right photo.
Shop the photo: Small round white terracotta cachepot vase | Tall white medium cachepot vase | Tall white large cachepot vase | Faux hydrangea flowers, white and light green | Woven leather laptop case cover | Cordless tiny lamp (alternative) | Rattan chain links | Timeless book (dustcover removed) | AD at 100 book | The Art of Home book | Artful Home book | Woven genuine leather ottoman (similar) | Alpaca plaid throw blanket (similar)
Do not forget about thrifting and antiquing for home decor. You can usually find one-of-a-kind pieces to lend a collected over time look that reflects your own personal style.
Tip:
Design 101: Rule of Threes and Rule of Thirds
There are a couple quick go-to design rules you need to know that will make your shelf styling turn out beautifully every time.
When styling or decorating, remember to keep in mind the interior design rule of three when arranging items. With this rule, group items in odd numbers starting with three, while varying scale, height, texture, and shape. Groupings of odd numbers are more aesthetically pleasing to the eye.
At the same time, the rule of thirds comes into play as well. This is where visually dividing the space in thirds helps you achieve a more balanced design, while ensuring you leave some negative space for items to breathe.
In the case of shelf styling, and especially with longer shelves, think of a shelf in three equal sections and generally place objects into each section.
Using a combination of both techniques results in a more balanced display, and one where the eye can move through the entire space with ease.
Place Large Objects First
As you scan your collection of shelf decor, take note of the larger items—vases, artwork, decorative objects, and so on. You want to place large objects first since they are what grounds everything else on the shelf. Also, it’s much easier to place smaller items around larger items than the other way around.
Don’t put all of the large items on the same shelf, though. Distribute the larger objects on the shelves in a “zig-zag” manner.
For example, in the picture of our built-ins below, I placed three taupe blush pink toned vases distributed across three shelves at varying heights to create this effect.
Sticking with my established color palette, the taupe blush pink color repeats in other items, including the cream/taupe toned rechargeable lamp, gorgeous blush pink scissors, plaid throw blanket, woven leather laptop case cover, and a leather journal notebook, a HomeGoods find.
To keep the space feeling light, and because the very top shelves are slightly shorter than all the other shelves, I knew I only wanted to use a couple larger items on each side to lend balance horizontally across the shelves.
So I placed two large white terracotta cachepot vases on one side, balancing the other side with large stacked rattan decorative boxes (Note: these boxes are large in scale, which I think is a good thing).
I also brought in two taller pieces of artwork as well as my DIY Matchbox Tubes to fill some of the vertical shelf space while adding depth at the same time.
An oversized paper mache bowl on the bottom left side shelf brings everything back down to visually balance the entire display of shelving vertically.
Stack, Lean, or Group Books Together
Once you have the larger items distributed on the shelves, it’s time to bring in the books.
I place books as a second step (as opposed to third or last), because you can fill more space with books. It’s also generally easier to find a place for books at this stage so you can layer items in with them (more on this later in the post).
A few ways to decorate shelves with books include:
- Stack 2-3 books directly on the shelf
- Corral books together in a pretty tray
- Lean books against an object, the side of the shelf, or use book ends
As an interior design enthusiast I can’t get enough books on all things home. The books tend to be quite large, which fills space nicely. Without the dust cover, the books in this genre also tend to have beautiful covers and spines. Read my post on beautiful coffee table books for styling for all the details.
Not by accident, many of the books I own fit into my color palette of soft blue/blue-grey-green and creams/whites.
Shop the photo: The Beauty of Home book (dustcover removed) | Decorating in Detail book (dustcover removed) | Paulownia round wood bowl with lid
I absolutely love how blue looks against the white of the built-ins. It is so dreamy!
If you love to style your home with books too, you may enjoy my other posts on Pretty Coffee Table Books and Beautiful Books For Kitchen Styling.
Create Vignettes
The next step, and one of my favorite shelf styling tips, is to create vignettes using smaller items. What you are ultimately trying to do is to create a moment. Something that, when viewed in isolation, can stand on its own.
Rattan chain links draped over the side of a stack of books
A set of textured bone inlay grid boxes
Artwork leaned behind an interesting blue soapstone object next to a large vase
A brass laurel wreath placed atop books
Ribbons around candle stick holders
Each grouping evokes a feeling that can be enjoyed on its own. I love to create such little groupings when styling (and restyling) areas all around our home.
This is your time to be creative! Incorporate a mix of high- and low-budget and vintage and new decor. Add visual interest through texture.
Leave Some Negative Space
Negative space is empty space, and it is a key element of great design.
As you place the smaller items in and around other items you’ve already placed on the shelves, make sure to leave negative (empty) space. Don’t fill each shelf side to side, front to back. Too many things can look cluttered and chaotic. A little empty space is as calming as it is necessary.
With practice, over time you will get better at knowing when more is more and when less is more.
Use Trays to Group Items
When styling the smaller items, such as vases, decorative objects, and books, use trays to group items. Just like leaving some negative space, another way to avoid a cluttered look is to use trays to group items together.
Trays organize an otherwise seemingly mishmash of items, as trays have edges or boundaries.
Add a Small Lamp for Ambiance
Get the Nancy Meyers aesthetic feel by adding a little lamp. You can find a cordless tiny lamp that is battery operated.
I styled our desktop with this cute-as-a-button creamy taupe-pink toned rechargeable led lamp. This off-white set of two rechargeable lamps are similar, though a little taller.
Bring in Greenery
Bring in plants (real or faux) to breathe life into your shelf styling. I can’t keep plants alive, so I use faux flowers. Above, big, fluffy white hydrangeas mixed with light green hydrangeas definitely creates a moment!
You can easily change out the greenery seasonally, which keeps your space feeling fresh.
Don’t Forget Bows and Ribbons (Oh, my!)
Sometimes the finishing touch is a simple bow made out of your favorite ribbon. If you’ve been a reader for a while, you know I love ribbon. I have an ever-growing collection that I use in everything from my charming gift wrapping ideas to decorating a vase.
I used ribbon on two different vases, as well as with a set of marble candlesticks, when I styled our built-in shelves.
A lovely tan-white stripe grosgrain ribbon feels coastal inspired, and the dusty blue velvet ribbon is striking against the white glazed terracotta vase.
The thing about decorating shelves is you can decorate for holidays, seasons, or to refresh your space. Nothing is set in stone. In fact, changing up your shelf styling may just be the creative outlet you need.
How do you style your shelves? Drop a comment below!
Leave a Reply