Retro Rainbow Bookshelf Reveal

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I’m so excited to share my completed rainbow shelf! Putting it all together required a lot of patience but it was so worth it. Every time I look at it, it sparks joy in my heart, and who doesn’t want that in their home?

I bought the big green bookcase during a New Years Day sale at the West Michigan Antique Mall in Grand Haven, MI. I almost didn’t buy it because I was very intimidated by the thought of having to find decorations for all of it! But I knew I could make a curtain for the bottom shelves so I wouldn’t have to decorate the whole thing and it would be some added storage space. I had visions of the green shelf being filled with tons of books in rainbow order, like a mini library wall. Plus, it was only $25 so we took it home.

We put it in our living room in the spring of 2020 and it almost didn’t fit! The bookcase was about an inch away from hitting the ceiling but, thankfully, it fit. I immediately had another problem when I tried to put books on it. All the shelves are too short for regular books and the shelves aren’t movable. But when life gives you a giant bookcase with small shelves… you make lemonade! Or something like that. So the bookcase sat empty while I ruminated on what I would do with it.

I still loved the rainbow idea but couldn’t use books to make that happen. When I brought out my spring decor for the rest of the house I started placing items on the shelf to see how I felt. Inspiration struck and I started sorting my vintage items by color. If I wanted to make the rainbow decor shelf happen, all my regular decorative displays would have to be rearranged because I took pieces away from the other displays in my house. It ended up being a very good exercise for me on reimaging how I style my space.

I quickly realized that I didn’t have enough purple. Purple is hard to find in the vintage world so I wasn’t surprised. I decided to use less pink on the top level to balance out the bottom shelf. I sewed a curtain from a vintage sheet to cover up the bottom four shelves. I was SO much happier with my retro display shelf instead of filling it with books. Here was what my first attempt at my rainbow shelf looked like in 2020.

Searching for Colorful Vintage Pieces at Thrift Stores

For the next year, I kept my rainbow shelf in the back of my mind whenever I went thrift shopping. I was patient and slowly collected pieces that I knew I could use next year. I found blue and orange ticket rolls at thrift stores for $2 each, little red Pyrex dishes for $.50 each and vintage decks of cards for $.50. I found a listing on Facebook Marketplace selling vintage greeting cards by the lot. I purchased around 400 of them for really cheap and I used some in my rainbow display. You can read more about how I find my decor pieces in my blog post The 10 Best Place to Find Vintage Items for Cheap (Or Free!).

If you don’t want to look through thrift stores you can find adorable vintage items directly on Etsy.

Upcycle Items into Vintage Decor

I was still struggling with finding purple items. I knew I wanted another purple bowl to balance out the one I already had but wasn’t having any luck. I ended up buying a round, bowl-shaped purple candle for $1 at a thrift store and I flipped it upside down. It’s meant to float in a pool and it was from the ’90s… but I don’t care. It looks cute! Since that was all I could find I decided to make my own purple items. I made two “tins” by covering up cheese puff canisters with vintage inspired fabric. They were exactly what I needed to fill up the purple shelf.

In the 2020 rainbow shelf, I did pink instead of orange on the bookcase. Orange is my least favorite color and I don’t have a lot of decor in orange. Well, I was pulling out my Halloween items last year and realized that I have tons of orange! Just not in my regular rotation for spring and summer. I searched through my Halloween bins and pulled out what could be used for my 2021 shelf. Creating an orange shelf gave me an excuse to display my Chitty Chitty Bang Bang book, which is one of my favorite movies.

Slow Decorating

This look is totally achievable. I didn’t pay more than $5 for any item on my bookcase and most were $1 or less. It does take a lot of patience to find the super cute pieces. I was lucky enough to find the Enesco winking kitty salt and pepper shakers at a flea market for $5. The purple elephants and poodles were also found at a flea market for $5 per set. If you find a few retro pieces that really make you happy that makes a big difference. Then you can just use filler, like books and bowls, to make your special pieces stick out. Check out my blog post on 10 Cheap and Common Thrift Store Items to Add Personality to your Home for what to look out for while thrifting.

The bookcase took a lot of patience to create but it really transformed how I look at interior styling. It was a challenging exercise about how to think outside of the box and not be disappointed when your original idea can’t be executed. A much better idea might just come out of it. Let me know what you think on my Instagram @emily.retro or here in the comments!

My rainbow shelf was featured in Country Living Magazine. If you’d like to learn about how YOU can be featured in a magazine, I made a video of how the whole process works.

If you’d like personalized help decorating your home you can book a virtual interior design call with me. I’d love to work on your home design issues and help make your dream home a reality!