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Saturday 21 January 2012

Indecisive


I'm intrigued. What do you do with your magazines when you've read them? I read mainly interiors ones, and textile/craft ones too, but I am a hoarder. I can't bear to throw them out. Or even rip the occasional page. I feel like one day I will need a library of inspiration, and that will come from these magazines.

Since I came to college I have had subscriptions to/bought religiously: crafts/vogue/Elle decoration/selvedge/country living/Mollie makes (the last 3 I still get) and I occasionally buy homes and gardens or another interiors magazine that takes my eye.


But I can't bear to throw them away, so they all still sit on shelves around the house, taking up irritating amounts of room.
I've been debating the idea of scrapbooks? Normally I'm precious about cutting them up too, but im starting to think that keeping the pictures and articles which I find inspiring in one place might be better than a stack of old magazines, in which I have no hope of finding that amazing picture I know one contains.


I kept a scrapbook when we were planning this house, to save samples and swatches, and pictures I loved, but I was a bit precious about how the pages look. I sectioned it off by room, so I could show James my ideas. But I think I need to try very pointedly do the opposite now, not consciously choose images to sit together, but see what combinations come up from sticking images in as I find them.

Any ideas? What do you do, do your magazines go in recycling when you're finished, or do you have a library of past editions hidden away somewhere?!


All images from lobster and swan - links under images - who is excellent at scrapbooking. she also has cute cats.

9 comments:

  1. I am quite ruthless - I kep three months worth of all magazines and anything prior (unless it has something permanently useful - i keep all my Mollie Makes, Christmas editions, and good Country Livings, and have a box for magazine recipes) is either taken to work for use for art, given to the local doctors surgery, or give to teacher friends for them to use them for craft. We just don't have the space for me to keep them!

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    1. LM you are so ruthless (in a good way) come and be ruthless here?

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  2. I think scrap-booking sounds like a very good idea. I plan to start keeping recipes as what happens at the moment is that I hang on to them far too long and then check them all in the recycling when the house feels too crowded - worst of both worlds right now.

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    1. I have a notebook for recipes, Im just not good at using it! I had a rule when I started it that a recipe didnt go in there unless i had tried and liked it, so there are hundreds of cuttings Ive never got round to sticking in!

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  3. Mine are in huge piles round the flat... I like the idea of scrapbooking but I'm not good at cutting things up! Most of my magazines have post stick notes sticking out of them from when we were doing certain projects, like the kitchen and the bathroom. Not exactly glam huh? ;)

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    1. at least the post its prove they are used!!

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  4. like you i have a number of magazines i subscribe to - vogue, living etc, elle decoration, mollie makes and delicious (gift from my mum) - and in theory i keep a magazine file's worth of magazines per title, which works out to be around 10-12 months for most but only about 4-5 for vogue (you know how thick they can be) so i should work on a one in one out basis...with the one out being flicked through for must-read articles, inspiring images and yummy recipes that are then torn out and carefully filed for future reference. that's the theory.

    in reality, i have full magazine files, a pile of magazines in the living room plus the saturday guardian i've not read all the way through yet and will find time one day just in case there's something really interesting plus a huge pile hidden behind the curtain in my bedroom plus another reasonably large pile in the room that's full of stuff we don't really go in plus at least three boxes of cuttings i've never looked at again since carefully filing them. it's clear that i have a problem and just need to careful file most of it in the recycling bin!

    a job for the weekend?!

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    1. Stephanie, this sounds like me!!! I have a pile under the coffee table, a pile on the cofee table a pile in the bookshelf, and a pile in my workroom! a job for this year :)

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  5. I am the same. I had a subscription to Living Etc for a few years, and I still go back and read them. They're like comfort food.

    I have them all on a shelving thing, which houses mine and husbands obsessions - my magazines, his vinyl.

    KEEP!

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