PERSONAL: ordering book displays

[feather_ghyll]

I'm volunteering at a charity shop for a few days. I started today. The books were on offer because a lot had been donated. The most striking thing for me was that they were displayed according to colour. Part of me was horrified (they aren't clothes!), but at least there was some order. I've been to shops where books of all shapes and all sizes have been lumped together. It's annoying because it looks like a mess and if you're dedicated/obsessed enough to go through them all or if you're deluded by the chaos to think that there's the possibility of finding treasure, you have to go through them all with nothing to guide the eye. Usually, it's a long and frustrating process. I don't love alphabetic systems in shops however, it takes the romance out for me as a book searcher. And it makes for odd companions. I suppose my preferred method - in shops - is themed books: literary, murder mysteries, adventure, westerns, romance, children with books perhaps ordered according to size.

Let's not discuss my personal system, which is a work in process, dictated by shelving space and half my books not being to hand or unpacked. But then, I'm not trying to sell them.

Comments

[rosathome.livejournal.com]

http://www.flickr.com/groups/96822943@N00/

I've done this before at home and I love it. In a bookshop I'm not sure it would work quite so well. Though, maybe. The QI bookshop is shelved strictly in alphabetical order which makes for some very fun browsing in its circular space. You have to have an open mind, which in a charity shop is the rule anyway.

[feather-ghyll.livejournal.com]

Wow, some of those pictures are really striking. Personal shelving orders ought to be what work for the individual, both aesthetically and in terms of being able to find books quickly. I would expect the latter to be more important than the first, and I have too many series in different coverings to order books like that!

Arranging books by spine colour is pretty, but surely still a bit too haphazard if charity shops are trying to become more 'professional'. I think the attitude is somewhat 'works for clothes so...'.