Decorating with Vintage Books

Hey there! Hope you all had a good weekend, and enjoyed the day off if you had it! I spent part of the weekend browsing through Craigslist and thrift stores looking for some reasonably priced vintage pieces to paint for Lucketts. I did find a couple of dressers, so I'm happy about that. I also found some "smalls" that may go to Lucketts but will probably end up on Etsy.

One of the things I found today was this book for 25 cents.

The cover is missing an inset illustration or something, but there are some wonderful old wildflower illustrations inside.

I'm a sucker for old books--I have been since I was a kid. Someone gave me an old copy of Little Women printed around 1900, and I was hooked. I love the history of an old book.  I like to hold it and think of all the people who read it before me, and how it may have touched their lives.

Personally I think books make a house a home, and I love to use vintage books in creating vignettes around the living room and family room.

There's been a trend lately to take the covers off the books and tie them with ribbon or twine.  I think Restoration Hardware started this--at least that's the first I saw it.

Restoration Hardware

I'm not a big fan of this.  It's not that I don't like how it looks--I think the neutral tone-on-tone is lovely.  I just think it's wrong to tear off the binding of an old book.  It should be left intact for future generations to read and share. 

Plus I think the covers of vintage books are beautiful.

Even when they are worn and showing their age--actually more so then!

I have no problem tearing off the covers of paperbacks though, so I guess if I ever want to get the Restoration Hardware look I can do it with paperbacks and age them with tea. 

But I think I'd rather just keep looking for beautiful old books to add to my collection!

Have a great week!

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