Design
This Modern Furniture Trend Could Be The Answer To Your Awkward Floorplan (& Storage Woes)
For anyone who has ever found themselves with mountains of books and nowhere to put them, the obvious answer is “get a bookshelf.” But what is one to do when they don’t really want to commit to a giant bookshelf because they only plan on living in their rental home for a year or two before buying, and aren’t sure what the storage situation in their next residence will be? Plus, that same person has a sofa floating in a room that feels a little untethered (and a little unbalanced with the width of the fireplace in front of it). Well, there’s a new furniture trend popping up on the living room scene that may just be the solution to both of these problems (they’re my problems, if you haven’t gathered thus far).
Let me introduce you all to the idea of the modular sofa bookcase. Rather than go the route of a low sofa table, the modular sofa bookcase essentially wraps around the sofa or sectional to create both an area in the back for storage or displaying beautiful things, as well as acts as a continuous side table. While it definitely leans more toward the modern side of design since they work best with low-slung and blocky upholstery pieces, I can still see them pairing well with a traditional couch in some cases (keep reading).
Before we look at some examples, I want to remind you of what my sofa looks like (or, more accurately, show you what my sofa looks like from behind, because I haven’t exactly shown it properly here yet):
Here’s my sofa as it currently stands. There are, of course, things this room needs that would help ground the floating sofa better, such as a larger area rug, shifting it over a bit to be better aligned with the fireplace in front of it, and adding a larger table to the right of it to extend it further. But mostly, it could benefit from something behind it, both for aesthetics and function.
Here’s what I’m thinking:
This photo of a living room by Zoe Feldman instantly stopped me in my tracks as the solution for my space issues. The shelving unit we see here is custom, but the role it plays can be adopted by anyone willing to do a little math. Here’s a quote from the designer about it to better explain its purpose: “Sometimes it’s one piece doing three things at once. This custom sofa-shelf divider crafted by @cabriolestudio defines the living room and adds storage while letting the space breathe.”
I find that often, by trying to fix one issue (like adding more storage), we create another one (like having a room that feels as if it’s caving in on you because every wall has something on it). That’s why I love this trend. Not to mention, it’s a fantastic way to divide a room in an open floor plan. The bookcase acts as a room divider in a way that the plain back of a sofa never could.
Remember how we pondered for a moment if this contemporary style could work with more traditional design or furniture? Well, here’s a classic Parisian space sporting a corner sofa bookcase, so the answer is yes, it can be used in a space that isn’t totally modern.
The IKEA Holmerud side table is everywhere right now, with people “hacking” it (which in this case really just means putting a few of them together in ways other than being simply a side table) to create long and low sofa tables and sofa wraparounds. At just $50 a pop, it’s one of the most affordable ways to pull this off.
I’m going to go into sofa bookcase FAQs later on in this post, but I did want to bring up one point right now: You don’t have to go all the way across or around. It still looks good and interesting if you’re just adding something like this to one corner, like in the above room.
Something like this would be great around a corner sectional or a U-shaped sectional, too. I probably wouldn’t light candles on the bottom shelf, considering the whole thing is wood right above it, but well, to each their own.
Now that we know what we’re talking about and have seen it in action, it’s time to go shopping. It’s important to note that the price range on the modular sofa bookcase ranges widely, from $50 IKEA options to custom all-wood designs in the thousands.
Which Sofa Bookcases We’re Eyeing Right Now
1. Holmerud Side Table | 2. Stockholm 2025 Shelving Unit-Bench | 3. Eliza Mood Modular Corner Console Table Left/Right Configurable | 4. Nixon Light Tone Left Set Of 2 Corner Console | 5. Cello Shelf | 6. Lafora 72″ Bookcase, Short | 7. Nest Shelving 2×3 | 8. Wallace Modular Corner Console 86″ | 9. Kaye Modular End Table | 10. Custom Made Corner Sofa Bookcase in Walnut | 11. Modular Record Player Stand | 12. Renata Wood Console
I took a few liberties here if you haven’t noticed. I’ll go ahead and call myself out on it. But I did it because #1: Furniture is SO FREAKING EXPENSIVE, and sometimes you just need to get close enough to a trend or concept. Case in point: The Stockholm bench at #2. It’s a bench. It’s not a modular bookcase. But I could see two of them butting against each other on a corner sectional similar to mine. Granted, at about $400 a piece, that’s still an $800 investment, which is not nothing by any stretch of the imagination (also, when did even IKEA get so pricey?!?). Emily used it in her brother’s river house!
For a bigger spend, you could go the custom route offered on Etsy (#10) or a hefty solid wood variety from Halo Loom (I’m showing it in a black-stained wood, but there are a handful of other wood options that are gorgeous). The Renata Wood Console from Anthropologie is, again, not modular, but if you have the budget for two, they would be beautiful behind a sectional. Don’t forget to get creative, either! I found these modular record player stands on Etsy (#11) that are $125 each. You could put a few together to get the look, for sure!
The key to nailing this look is getting the measurements right, which might be the trickiest part if you want a full side-to-side wrap. You’ll have to find a piece that, when combined in multiples, equals the near-exact width of your sofa. A few inches off should be okay, but what you want to avoid is big gaps, especially when you add in the piece that would act as a side table.
Speaking of how to get it right, time for some frequently asked questions (a.k.a. the questions I imagine someone might have who is interested in this style and wants to accomplish it in their home):
Modular Sofa Bookcase FAQs
- What kinds of sofas do these work with? As we’ve mentioned in the past, a blockier contemporary silhouette matches best (especially when it’s low to the ground with no real visible legs). But as we saw earlier, as long as the sofa is the right size and doesn’t have a curved back, it can still work great.
- What should I know about any height rules? Given that the height of a sofa from the floor to the top of its back is typically anywhere from 30 inches on the low end and 36 inches on the tall end, you’ll want to be sure that whatever bookcase you choose is at least a couple of inches shorter than your sofa. Ideally, to avoid knocking over anything on top anytime you swing your arm around, go about 6 inches shorter.
- What can they be used for? Like any open storage, you can use it to put away basically anything, just be mindful of how cluttered it might start looking. Don’t forget that you can use smaller baskets to stash away anything that might end up looking messy (think: your kids’ stuff or blankets).
- What if my sofa has legs? To keep a clean look, opt for a closed-back sofa bookcase rather than something open to avoid too many lines everywhere.
- What phrases do I use to search for them? These aren’t super common (yet), but some terms I’ve seen them listed as are as follows: Sofa bookcase, modular sofa table, low bookcase, sofa corner table
- Does it have to wrap all the way around? That’s a big no! It’s totally okay to not go all the way from one side to the other on a sofa or sectional. It all depends on what look you like. Sometimes, a room needs a little tension and asymmetry, if you ask me.
A Few Mock Ups of My Sofa
Because I couldn’t help myself, I did some rough mock-ups in Photoshop of how this would work in my home. I liked some that I put together, others not so much, and another that has potential and is probably the most functional for my family’s needs (including a proper space for my daughter). Here’s what I have so far:
The Thuma Nest shelving system. This is probably closest to my style, and four of them together are nearly exactly the size of my 99-inch sofa. Not to mention that they are endlessly functional, so when we move, if they don’t work anymore behind a sofa, we can stack each individual unit tall to create a totally different shape. Smart. I love it, but I’m not sure we can swing the expense of it right now, sadly.
I wouldn’t get anything in this color, but I got a touch lazy and didn’t want to go hunt down the lighter wood tones of this bookcase from Halo Loom. It’s also the most expensive, so it was more of a “let’s just see for fun” experiment than anything.
My Photoshop job here isn’t doing this any options, and honestly, I’m not sure this would even work in the way that I combined them, but the Etsy listing said custom, so I’m guessing they could extend the size of one of the arms to fully wrap my sofa.
Designing a home with young children who absolutely have needs as well as deserve appropriate spaces of their own means you don’t always get the fully aesthetic option. My kid desperately needs a landing spot downstairs that offers her a surface to color and draw on, build, smash Play-Doh, etc., and this might be a good spot for it (no paint would be allowed here, though, with its proximity to actual fabric). There may be another wall I could use to accommodate a pint-sized play area for her, but I could also see a world where a bookcase wraps around one side of my sofa, and a cute little wood toddler table and chairs balance the other side. I’m not saying this is the table and chairs, I just pulled a cheap set off Wayfair, tbh.
So, this is where I leave you for today. Part furniture trend post, part “here’s something I’m considering doing in my own home to solve a problem.” I’d really love to find a way to bring more visible books into my living space because few things feel as comforting to me as pages and spines on display. Plus, between the glam-leaning qualities of my sofa fabric pick and my shiny wood armoire, I need to balance it with something a bit more down-to-earth.
Stay tuned. Until next time, friends…
We used to call them console tables. I’ve used them in my home for years and love them. Good luck in your quest!