Today's Tip
The French treat books as furniture. A well-stacked shelf is decoration. Stacked horizontally, interspersed with a small object or two, never alphabetized — that is an office, not a home. Books in a French home are arranged by aesthetic intuition, not system.
Try This
Rearrange your bookshelf without using the alphabet. Group by color, by size, by mood, or by nothing at all. Stack some horizontally. Leave one or two face-out. The result should look considered but not curated. If it looks like a library, you have done it wrong.
The French bookseller tradition — the bouquinistes along the Seine — has operated continuously since the 16th century. These open-air vendors sell used books, prints, and postcards. The French cultural relationship with books as physical objects is encoded in law: France caps e-book discounting to protect physical books. The home bookshelf in France is considered a biographical document — what someone keeps reveals who they are. Hiding books or packing them in boxes is culturally equivalent to hiding your personality.
One French lifestyle tip, every morning at 7am. Free — always.