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Styling shelves is a perilous balancing act, and it can quickly get out of hand. One minute you’re adding a cute piece of decor, and the next thing you know, the shelf is overcrowded with what ends up looking like a mess.

If your shelves are starting to feel more cluttered than curated, there are a number of items that might be the cause. Sometimes, it’s a tealight holder, a half-burned candle, or an unruly stack of books that looks out of place despite being, in theory, at home on a shelf. In other cases, shelves turn into additional storage when appliances and pens start to accumulate on them. Whatever the cause, there is always a simple solution, and it usually starts with removing a few awkward items and storing them in cupboards and drawers instead.

Cleaning up the clutter on your shelves will make your space look better, and it will make cleaning and dusting a whole lot easier. With that in mind, here are 10 decor pieces that are likely making your shelves look cluttered.

Family photos are lovely mementos. However, crowding too many small standing picture frames on a shelf can easily make it look messy. Before you know it, picture frames are standing in front of one another, and you’re never even looking at them anymore. Instead of crowding a shelf with these frames, place one larger framed photo as a centerpiece on your shelf, and use smaller ones to create the perfect gallery wall. By hanging photos on a wall, you’re giving them a chance to shine rather than letting them blend into the clutter.

Tealight holders are cute and small. They can help turn a tealight into a nice decor piece by amplifying their glow and diffusing a soft, tinted light around them. While they’re beautiful when the tealight they hold is lit, they don’t have a lot of aesthetic appeal on their own. Instead of adding them to your shelves, where they’ll spend the majority of the time on display but unlit, store them away in a drawer. Just pull them out and light them up when you need some mood lighting instead. 

There are beautiful ways to decorate your home with candles. Yet some candles don’t look quite as nice once you’ve started to use them. Half-burnt candles can easily look messy with their burnt wick, uneven sides, and melted wax. Using candle jars can help mitigate this issue, as long as you make sure to keep them dust-free and remove any black residue that might accumulate while the candle burns. To make sure your shelves look clutter-free, avoid leaving half-used candles on display.

Shelves are a wonderful place to display your personal library. Books are pretty and add personality to your space. In the bedroom, they’re a daily reminder of the magical lands you’ve traveled to through the pages, and in the living room, they can be a conversation starter with your guests. But to perfectly decorate the shelves of your bookcase, it’s best not to overcrowd them with endless and disorganized stacks of books. Instead, create small stacks in a triangle shape (with smaller books on top). Alternate these with vertical books held together by bookends.

Speakers, especially the wireless, travel-friendly kind, are a bit awkward to style. Much like TVs, they’re not the most aesthetically pleasing. An awkward speaker can make your shelf look cluttered because it doesn’t look intentional. This is especially true with brightly colored, plastic, or rubber speakers. If your wireless speaker still has marks from your last camping trip, or if it looks like it was designed for frat parties, you’ll be better off keeping it away from your shelves. Instead, look for more muted and neutral colors, or models with modern and sleek designs.

Whether it’s a small antique doll or a collectible figurine, toyish decor items tend to make shelves look cluttered. When they’re not properly ordered and displayed in a container specifically designed for that purpose, toys often look messy and out of place on shelves. But don’t worry — if you have a collection of toys that you want to showcase, you can get a multi-tier clear display case from Bohoidee and prop it on a shelf instead. That way, there won’t be any confusion between clutter and your beloved collectibles. 

If you want your home to look straight out of an interior design magazine, then you might have to compromise convenience a little bit. Using a shelf as an extension of your desk is understandable, but things like office supplies and cans of pens will always make it look cluttered. Like their name indicates, display shelves are meant to showcase things you love and are proud of; they’re not storage. Try to keep notebooks, pens, and other office supplies in closed cupboards and drawers instead. 

We get it — sometimes you do need to use your shelves as storage because you live in a small place or are running out of cupboard space. If that’s your case, you’ve probably opted for some baskets and bins to try to keep the mess organized and contained. There are some wonderful options, including beautiful wooden boxes, fabric bins, and rattan baskets. But one type of organizer you should stay away from is metal wire baskets. These are see-through and amplify the look of clutter rather than hiding it. 

If you do decide to use baskets and bins to organize clutter on your shelves, it’s best to stick to one style and color. Instead of buying separate bins every time you run out of space, plan ahead and get a set. For example, a pack of three rattan storage baskets from Lavntm allows you to mix and match based on your needs. That way, even this clutter storage will look intentional and blend into your home decor. 

In the kitchen, shelves are often used to store more than decor. You might even have appliances so pretty that they could be used as decor, like beautiful vintage kettles, copper pots, and unique toasters. But there are a few issues with storing appliances on shelves. First, they need to be used often. That means taking the item off the shelf repeatedly and not always remembering to put it back correctly. Second, appliances sometimes have wires. Even with your best attempt to conceal them, these end up poking through, making the shelf look like a mess.