"But how do they look in real life?"

1/16/2020

You might have noticed that many of our product photos look as if an interior designer has been there. Which is often the case, like with this fireplace which we built for Leslie Huntley of Roost Interior Designs. (Leslie is great at filling in a room with all of the right touches.)

Pretty pictures like this are nice, but maybe you're wondering how a custom bookcase would look in an ordinary home, with "too many books" and "too many plants." (As if you can ever have too many books or plants... but I digress.)

So this post is for those of you who wonder how our shelves look in "real life."

If you've been following along for awhile, you probably remember how we fixed an ugly fireplace mantel to make a classic white hearth. Here's a before-and-after to refresh your memory:

Before, there was a weird mantel-shelf thing that jutted out about a foot into the room, and it just didn't look right. We took it down and replaced it with a new fireplace surround and a pair of bookcases, working around the existing tile:

Looks great, doesn't it?

Now, as you've probably guessed, there is a little bit of staging in this photo. Since we don't usually get to come back and see our bookshelves in use, we added a few props so you could see the shelves as they might look with books in them.

But staged photos aren't as interesting as the real thing, which is why we were thrilled when our customer sent us a photo of the shelves after she had filled them up with books.

You can see that they've also painted or replaced the old brown tile with a dark black color to make a more modern look. And added plants galore! These are my kind of people.

The customer's boyfriend is an English teacher, so of course they have a large collection of books. They actually had us build an extra shelf for each bookcase so they could take advantage of every inch of space. We left that out of our original photo because we couldn't imagine how they would use it... but as a matter of fact it looks really cool with the extra books laying on it.

Our customer left us a very kind review as well:

"My boyfriend and I had just purchased a home where a wall in the living room was lacking a lot of character. We had an idea for bookcases and a new mantle that we wanted to execute, and luckily found the best people for the job!

Arthur and Faith were not only extremely responsive and professional, they were also kind and excited about the project. They completed the entire project within 2 weeks and it looks like an absolute dream. We are so grateful for their hard work and would definitely recommend them to anyone seeking a local and lovely couple to handle their next project!"

- Rebecca Hill

Thank you, Rebecca! We feel lucky to have such generous clients.

If you wondering how bookshelves would look in your home, get in touch with us. Our cabinet designer Faith will help you preview your project with a custom 3D model...