How to Style a Shelf for under £100 with Photobox

There are two main things I love about decorating my home. Firstly, I always want to bring something personal and unique to my designs, and secondly, I like to follow trends. I know there are lots of designers that will tell you not to be a slave to fashion, but I think if you’re doing it in small ways, and maybe on a lower budget then why not just go for it.

In today’s post, the first in a series of two, I’ve been working with the wonderful people over at Photobox, a brand that I love and use regularly for my own personal projects. Using their products in quirky and innovative ways, I’m showing you how you can style up a shelf for under £40 and also for £100.

I’ll be looking at how you can use your own photographs for home interior styling, and how you can create something special and bespoke for any shelf in your home.

Style Your Shelf for Under £40 with Photobox:

Let’s take 3 of the Photobox Simple Bone China Mugs from this page. Next add our own photos, but think about how you want to style them. Consider the colours and find photos that you’ve taken where the shades coordinate, as well as the style of photos. For my set, I’ve decided on a theme of pink and green, a colour combination which is very on-trend at the moment, and coming through very strongly in interior design in general.

My chosen images are rather abstract but I love them, and know they’ll all work together, as well as look great with existing accessories, and the other pieces I’m designing for the bigger shelfie project.

Creating the products is simple and easy and took a matter of minutes. You can even connect to your social channels and upload photos direct from there.

Now, once the mugs arrived a few days later, I immediately planted them up with my new succulents.

YES. I’m using these mugs as planters! It’s an idea we do see in interiors now, and something I’ve been wanting to do for a while.

I’m loving the look, and think the greenery works beautifully with the light pink.

Costing just £12 per mug, plus the extra money for plants (if you have a few already you can use those), this shelfie styling has come in at under £40. A bargain for something so different, personal and on trend. It’s a great way to liven up a dull shelf and bring some of the current Spring trends into your home.

Top Tips for a £40 Shelfie Styling with Photobox:

#1 Do think about how you can use products in unusual or quirky ways to give your shelfie a personal touch.

#2 When you’re taking your pictures, think about how they will look together, or how you could crop something bigger into a more abstract shot.

#3 Arrange your final pieces in 3’s for a real interior designer look. Styling in odd numbers always creates more impact and looks easier on the eye.

Check out my dancing mugs!

Style Your Shelf for £100 with Photobox:

Ok so if we have a slightly bigger budget, what can we do?

Well let me introduce you to these beauties, the Photobox Pantone Photo Book. Oh my!

As soon as I saw these, I knew I had to try them out for my shelf styling. They would, of course, look stunning as coffee table books too, and great for coffee table styling, but here I’ve paired them with my mugs to create a much more detailed set up.

Focusing on my colour theme of pink and green, I’ve used the books here as backdrops, almost like art, to create more of a scene, allowing the paler mugs to ‘pop’ out from the walls.

The crucial design point here is to choose images for the fronts of the book that will coordinate with your theme. Think about this in advance and choose your images wisely. Crop them accordingly if you need to.

You should have no trouble working the book colours into your scheme as there are 8 available, with 3 of them being guest colours just for this season.

For the pink book I’ve used a photo of a postcard I took for Instagram at one point, and this book contains images from my travels and key moments in 2016. On the green book I’ve chosen sunny, coloured filled shots of a family trip to Italy last year which work well with the theme, and then filled this book with our holiday snaps.

Let’s have some dancing books too!

Even though I’ve worked in some design features to help the products coordinate with the interior, the books are still practical, useful and special to us as a family.

Top Tips for a £100 Shelfie Styling with Photobox:

#1 Try different layouts, intermingling the photo products with pieces you already own. Play with them until you find a layout you like.

#2 Bring in more accessories that coordinate with your colour scheme. Pick out those colours, even small amounts of them in your pieces and your look will easily hang together.

#3 If you are using photobooks, experiment with their styling, opening them up to create a backdrop using the different internal images.

So, what do you think of my two Shelfie looks?

I hope you can see it’s really easy to use your own photos to make stylish and creative home accessories that reflect both your  personal tastes and current trends.

I’m thrilled with my new shelf look and can’t stop looking at it!

In collaboration with Photobox. Thank you for supporting the brands that make the blog possible.