 Too Neat for Their Own Good? Architectural Digest is one of my favorite magazines. I love going through it page by page almost as much as I enjoy cringing at the overkill I find on many of those same pages. It’s not that I have the level of money those whose homes are featured do. Far from it. But what I look for are not specific items but ideas for arranging, shapes, textures, color combinations, furniture and accessories, and more. Ridiculousness often seems present too. Not a light switch or lamp cord to be seen. There are no computers, newspapers, toothpaste tubes, or bathrobes tossed over a chair. It’s as if a nuclear bomb went off killing off all humans and animals and leaving structures and their interiors perfect. That makes me a bit uncomfortable. I find it odd to look at homes that aren’t, well, lived in. I find it odder to look at homes with “libraries” that are so neat it’s obvious the books are simply there for decoration even when AD isn’t around. Why am I sure they aren’t? Even given the AD penchant for making things perfect, it’s clear to me that in most of the homes the books fall into one of two categories: books by the foot or books so esoteric that décor is the only thing they are good for. Take the first option. Google Books by the Foot and you’ll get numerous companies that offer to supply them and often in various choices. One company, for instance, features various styles: Color, Vintage, Subject, Wrapped, Uniform Sets, Modern Books, Accent Pieces, Bulk Books, and Specials. Within each of those categories are a number of sub-categories so if you prefer “golden tones” or “distressed vintage cloth sets” or “cars” or “stained cloth wrapped” or “chop props” or “antiqued parchment accent” or even “Reader’s Digest Condensed Books” they’ve got them. You can even choose them by height to ensure that your bookcases don’t have that raggedy look. The homes that amuse me the most are those that have older (seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth century) leather book sets by the yard in handmade and exceedingly handsome built-in bookshelves. I am envious of the exquisite workmanship on both shelves and books, yet there is something that makes me uneasy. They are too perfect. The books are lined up exactly to the same line. None of them have “used” spines. They positively gleam. But the truth is they do nothing but sit there looking pretty, something I feel is akin to having good legs and never walking. It’s not really normal. The esoteric books tend to be what are termed “coffee table” books, oversized, overweight, gloriously jacketed and bound, and obviously expensive. I know. I have a lot of these, but I have them on my shelves where I can pry them out which I do with regularity because they fall into one of several categories I love to read and browse. By contrast, in AD homes, these books, while not always obscure, tend in that direction. I have yet to see one labeled “Famous Yemen Gardens of the XIII Century,” but some day I expect to. Like their counterparts on the shelves they always arranged in the most meticulous manner Sometimes that is neat piles of three to five of them on fireplace mantels, coffee tables, side tables, dining tables, library tables, sofas, chairs, and lately ottomans. Sometimes the top book is turned just so like an ankle on a posed model, other times the pile show a military-straight line of spines. It just all looks so fake. I think that’s what annoys me the most. Because it’s not the books lying on various surfaces—all readers’ homes have that—but the fact that they appear to have been chosen for their ability to impress. “Look at us!” they shout, “I’m big, I’m impressive, I’m old, I’m expensive!” To the contrary, in my house, the books hanging about in various locations look almost apologetic. “I’m sorry to be taking up the entire coffee table, end table, corner of the dining table this sofa cushion,” they mumble with an embarrassed look at unexpected guests. Books have found places in those same non-book places because I put them down there after I finished reading and they no longer have their former places on the bookshelves. (Other books took their places in the meantime.) They’re relatively neat—I don’t have knickknacks or coffee mugs keeping them company—but there is nothing artistic about them. They are simply there because they can’t, at the moment, be anywhere else. It doesn’t matter, of course. AD is not going to photograph my home. And I’m glad about that. I can imagine that if they wanted to they would also want to move my books, replacing a pile that includes The Jungle, Murder in the Bastille, Whose Names Are Unknown, Nothing to Envy, and The Bookshop at 10 Curzon Street with “Famous Yemen Gardens of the XIII Century.” And that just wouldn’t be right in a home where the toothpaste sits out. Upcoming Book Festivals and Fairs: The Pub House: Imaging Books & Reading: Of Interest: The bookshop’s selection comprises both new and used fiction that “tries to reflect the very best of contemporary, classic and children’s literature” and to “offer a quality alternative to high street bestseller lists including, among others, specialist sections exploring topical issues, titular oddities and travel ephemera.” They pride themselves on 24-hour orders, bicycle delivery, and even dinghy delivery service for waterside residents. Those further out can, they note, “sometimes entice a scooter courier in return for a compensatory cuppa when we arrive.” Until next week, read well, read often and read on!
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