Help with my out of hand collecting!

dandy-candy

I am running out of space in my house and don't know what to do! I love collecting antiquarian books and magazines. At the moment I have 37 A4 box files of magazines and 2000 books. I don't look at each one very often at all, but whenever I pick one up I love it all over again - they are my absolute passion.
I don't know what to do because I am finding the house too cluttered and short of moving home, I can't think of a way to make my house nice again. I have had a clear out of the ones I could bear to part with, and took 13 carrier bags to a charity shop. The thing that makes me hang on to them is that they are so old and out of print, if I got rid of any, then it is very unlikely I will ever find another copy.
Is there a way of coping with a collection?

MessyTessie

My OH collects American comics and has over 20 years of them, when we moved to our present house we boarded the loft and they're all up there in boxes. He knows (or claims he knows) what is in each box so he get can get them back down if he wants to but I don't see that very often (mmmmm). The last time I looked I think the boxes are breeding as there are so many of them now but as they're out of my sight and not cluttering the house it doens't bug me.

In fact I think my craft stuff is more in his way than his comics are in mine so I just keep quiet lol

Cat501

oh wow, what a fantastic collection dandy! I think you've done amazingly well to get rid of what you have! I don't collect old or rare books, just books lol - I have about the same amount as you and have got rid of about 30 max in the last 5 years. I can't give you any advice except - keep them. Find somewhere, anywhere, if you can give them priority over something else, I would! And try really really hard not to add to it unless it's something you really, REALLY want.
Now if only I could take my own advice...:D

eta this is probably a very unhelpful post!

lovethymini

Can you afford more storage?

Austin_Allegro

I tend to have a one in, one out policy for books, though I don't always keep to it! The Kindle helps, as it means I don't clutter up the flat with mouldy second hand paperbacks. I do love antiquarian books though. One thing I did when moving to a smaller flat was to divide my books into three categories. Definitely keep, maybe keep and get rid. I could hardly bear to part with any of them, but actually once I did, I didn't regret it as I hardly ever looked at them. I used William Morris's 'beautiful and useful' rule and kept the books that looked nice or that were genuinely useful.

BitterAndTwisted

Hang on to the books and mags for dear life! Your collecting is not out of hand, it's a very specialised and valuable archive. Your problem is not too much clutter, it's not enough useful storage space. Have a think about where you could erect shelving. Depending on how high your ceilings are, there is an awful lot if unused space up there. Shelves going all the way round one room or even only two walls might be a wonderful home for them and you could still access them very easily. Heck, I could get 37 A4 box-files on one long shelf above the sofa

rinabean

Scan them! There are services that will do it for you. They aren't a useful archive if they are unprotected. You can keep your very favourites and still have room in your house for you, and their contents will be beautifully preserved for you and for future generations. Selling the more valuable books would recoup some of the cost of scanning them.

I love books, but unless kept very carefully they are little mould farms (and obviously this ruins the books). They are also a fire hazard. Of course, in smaller amounts they can serve as extra room insulation, haha!