How I Refreshed My Big Sister’s Shelfie Style
My big sister texted me asking for a recommendation on one small thing for her shelves (she was concerned her floral selection on the top left shelf might look cheugy).
Rather than respect her request and her assurance that she was happy with everything else, I ended up thinking up a total refresh of her shelves.
I was a little concerned she might take offense at my recommending an overall refresh, but fortunately she loved it (Big deal for this little sis!!) and said it gave her tons of ideas.
Now, let’s talk about how I got here. To move toward a more cohesive look, I started from the piece that I thought she would most want to stay: the teapot she inherited from our grandmother. I figured all of the other decorative elements, like frames and vases, could be switched out. I think the paint works well with the rest of her home, so I also worked with that color in mind.
The teapot is an special piece because it’s belleek (our grandmother and her sisters had HUGE belleek collections), so it has a gorgeous pearlescent sheen and a creamy color that meant some things were out from the start, like decorative objects with smooth textures in pure white or anything with too much of a rustic or modern look to it.
I started by looking through Anthropologie’s home section for items that had textures and colors that I thought would pair nicely without being too “matchy-matchy.” The gold vase felt right on the money because it can bring both some warmth and some excitement to her shelves.
When I found the green vases on Anthro’s site, I wasn’t sure they would work at first but I thought they went so well with the rest of her home and the colors on the shelves that I had to bring them in.
Next I needed to bring in some natural textures to contrast against the shine of the belleek teapot and gold vase. Since I had already pulled from Anthro and didn’t want this refresh to get too expensive, I switched over to Target’s Threshold collaboration with Studio McGee. The stone links and wood bowl bring those natural textures without calling too much attention to themselves.
Now, the original reason my sister reached out to me was to ask about some greenery she saw in a photo from our home that she thought might be a good substitute for her colorful floral arrangement on the top left. She liked the silver dollar eucalyptus in one of my vases, and wanted to know if I thought that would work. Normally, I would have said yes, but these stems tend to be pretty long and there’s not a lot of height to each of her shelf cubbies. Yes, she could trim them or bend them to be shorter, but I also wanted to explore if something else could work better. Here’s that mood board again so you don’t have to scroll up.
I know from experience that drape-y succulents look amazing almost anywhere, so I threw that in for some low greenery that would be visible from a lower height (as opposed to a non-drapey succulent which could either be too small to see or too angular) and then focused on an idea I had about possibly using creamier colors for the florals in the vases.
Rather than assume I knew the right style or selection for her, I wanted to share some ideas that felt more updated but also timeless, so I didn’t worry TOO much about stem height.
This photo with multiple vases and creamy stems has some options that were exactly what I had in mind when I started my search, so I was excited to find it. Unfortunately, the store seemed to be out of the shortest option, but I went ahead and put the picture in along with a probably too tall stem option that had some of the texture I was thinking of.
I really like how casual the lone eucalyptus stem is in the green vase, so I found a similar one here though I think probably just one branch of the stem would suffice in this vase. Why is this different than the silver dollar eucalyptus she originally asked about? Silver dollar eucalyptus stems tend to stand upright much more but this kind feels much flowy-er, which I think again brings in some nice contrast to the fanciness of the teapot and the grid structure of the shelves.
And because I wasn’t sure if she would still want flowers, I pulled a nice dried arrangement which felt totally on brand for my sister (her high school bedroom featured one or two dried bouquets hanging on her walls).
The silver frames felt very much like my sister (she definitely prefers silver to gold when it comes to jewelry), but I also felt like they could use a refresh. My first thought was bone-inlay, which is gorgeous and I thought could fit right in with the other items, especially the teapot.
Now, I was definitely the kind of little sister who would count how many pictures there were of my big sister around the house and how many there were of me and complain to our mom that I had fewer pictures [NOTES: 1) Sorry, Mom. (2. She usually only had one or two more, and she’s also almost five years older than me, so that does kind of make sense].
With these memories in mind, I wanted the frames to be more similar than I usually would so that her three kids feel equally loved/don’t complain to her about them. And just in case they needed to be exactly the same, I also pulled some frames I thought would work well in multiples.
Next up: the practical stuff:
Since she has three kids, I figured that the three organizers in the bottom left were color-coded for her kids. My first thought was the Marie Kondo collection at The Container Store, and of the two I pulled I think either would have looked marvelous. However, when I showed her what I was thinking she told me that the color-coding for her kids extends beyond these organizers, so I didn’t push my idea. What I didn’t mention to her—again, I didn’t want to be pushy—was that she could swap out the white label in each of the water color organizers to fit into the color-coding system (though to be honest, I’m not positive that would work visually).
For the bottom right cubby, I think a tray or a wooden bowl could be great to corral things. It’s amazing what a tray can do. With a tray, all of a sudden, a space that looks like it was cluttered with a bunch of stuff transforms into a contained and intentional space. When I was browsing through Anthropologie’s home decor section, I found this tray and immediately thought she would love it. But I also recognized that perhaps a delicate tray would not be the best option for something her kids used frequently, so I also offered the paulownia bowl, which can stand up to a lot more.
Because she has three kids and is super busy, I figured she hasn’t spent as much time on Pinterest and Instagram saving shelfie pictures as I have, so I wanted to break down for her how I would style her shelves.
Right now, she has like items grouped together, but good shelfie style dictates that things feel a bit more integrated with objects of different heights and textures intermingling to create a layered look.
I shared a picture of a styled shelf to give her an idea of what I was going for and then offered specific instructions.
Part of my styling recommendation was to spread out the books, though I figured the center bottom cubby was exempt from that since those are all library books. She explained that yes, it’s where the kids pull their bedtime stories from and I’m guessing it’s also how her kids don’t lose nearly as many books as I did when we were growing up.
Rather than make you all wait for my sister’s shelfie update, I decided to mock-up what I thought it could look like here:
