What your shelf says about you
A snapshot of a person’s life
Shelves invite conversation and contemplations.
Shelves are collections and arrangement of your things, sometimes carefully crafted, other times accidentally revealing. They may hold treasures and photographs collected from adventures. And books suggesting the contents of a mind or at least a desire.
A shelf can inform a whole nights dinner conversation.
Each item on your shelf reveals something about you as does the arrangement of the shelf.
Some people organise their shelves by colour.
Others by category.
I like to organise them by project or purpose. For example I have a section of my shelf devoted to prompt books of every kind to inspire my own personal 10 minute artist practice.
I have another section that’s reference for the project I’m currently working on.
And another for books I’m encouraging my kid to read.
These kind of arrangement activates the shelves and their contents. Sometimes just looking at a shelf is enough to spark ideas. This is true both at home and in the bookshop.
Then Minute Artist Prompt
Draw a Shelfie
Pick a Shelf and use it as an inspiration for a sketch or mini essay. Draw it as it is, create iconography, make a sketchnote or let the contents inspire you.
Repeat this prompt anytime with different shelves or different interpretations of your shelves. Consider your phone home screen with all the icons, your music playlists and your audiobook collections as kinds of shelves too
Share your shelfie and look for inspirations in this chat gallery:
PS: Get Community, all 365 New Prompts in 2025 & The Illustrator Career Growth Roadmap plus other bonuses at a festive price by clicking the tree 🎄
Thank you for sharing my art on your post, Adam! I feel humbled and honored🥹
The shelfies prompt was one of my favorites. It’s fun to see how your contents of shelves have changed over the course of years (or haven’t changed!)
I have bookshelves in my living room, office, and spare room. Big ones. And they are crammed with books, often two deep. Some of them I've had for 50 years and can't bear to part with. I tried making my shelves look neat and artistic like yours, but it's a losing battle. A lot of them are art books, a lot are science or history. Not many novels, as I tend to let those go after I've read them, unless they're really special to me. Anyone looking at my shelves would think I'm disorganized or a hoarder. Your prompt made me chuckle, because just last night, when I was looking for a particular book, I ran across a perennial favourite (quite old) and thought "I should read that again." I wish I'd read it before my kids were born. I recommend it to you, Adam. Evolutions's End by Joseph Chilton Pearce. Also Magical Child by the same author.