I’ve been meaning to write this post for a while after seeing other illustrators post their own bookcases. I think you can learn a lot about people by what they have on these shelves- or if they even have any shelves at all!
This is my messy bookcase. Its mainly full of artbooks, but it also holds a variety of other random objects that don’t have their own homes, such as a long armed stapler, a purple monkey and a hamster named Alan (or is it Steve?)
I have a huge pile of used postcards that I bought from the local market. The guy has thousands of them and I’ve spent many an hour browsing them to find the ones that appeal to me. The messages on the back are always quite interesting- when the handwriting is legible!
I have quite a variety of different books, there are fashion illustration ones, graphic design ones, comic books, HTML help books, teach yourself Japanese books etc etc.
I love art books. A lot of my normal books are on my Kindle now but nothing beats the different sizes, shapes and textures of art books. There’s also a few on here which are left over from my dissertation- books on Japanese street fashion.
I have a bit of a love-hate relationship with magazines at the moment. I sort of wish I didn’t get a Creative Review subscription. In all honesty I don’t understand the hype with it. Its extremely expensive for a magazine that has so many adverts in it that double page spreads seem to be an increasing rarity. And as for Computer Arts magazine, half of the issues pictured arrived 6 months late after I pestered and pestered and pestered to have them redelivered. They’re the only parcels I’ve ever had that have gone walkies so many times! I now have to get them delivered to my parents address.
Apologies for the blurry photo but this is the top of my second bookcase. This bookcase satisfies my OCDs. All the books and the games are the same height. They’re also doubled up (there’s a whole extra level behind the ones you can see) because the bookcase is so deep. The fiction books here are all ones that I either don’t have as an ebook version or that I love so much that I can’t imagine not having the paperback.
If asked I could tell you where I bought pretty much every one of my books. I have a bit of a strange love for them.