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Good Questions: Best Bookcase?

2008-10-22-westelm.jpg

Reef posed a good question: I'm looking for a bookcase for my son's room. I was debating between Oeuf's mini library, Argington's Eiffel bookcase and West Elm's 2 shelf stacked modular bookcase in white. I've read poor reviews on the Oeuf library on Ohdeedoh but was wondering if anyone has the Argington Eiffel bookcase and what you think of it. The West Elm bookcase is by far the cheapest of the three but a bit of closed storage may come in handy.

 
 

Dear Reef:

Thanks for your question! We think all of your options look great so you really can't go wrong. But we do like the idea of looking outside the baby furniture world for options (like the West Elm shelf you mentioned). Not only do you have more options, but prices seem to be better as well. Consider the IKEA Expedit (which comes in white) - it seems to be a favorite amongst many of our readers.

Anyone else have a review of the bookcases Reef has mentioned or another suggestion?

(Thanks, Reef!)

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Comments (9)

I have the oeuf and i really like it. I like that it has a few cubbies where you can hide stuff. why does everyone dislike it?

posted by Hamro on October 23rd 2008 at 8:57am
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i should clarify that i got my crib and dresser from wal mart- looks just like the oeuf and is great quality. i have heard people had problems with the quality of the dresser from oeuf, but we did not have any problems with the library.

posted by Hamro on October 23rd 2008 at 8:59am
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Can't comment on the specific piece but we've good luck with Argington in general. We have their high chair and it stands but to a lot of abuse. We'll probably buy their twin bed for our son in the future.

posted by JudiAU on October 23rd 2008 at 9:04am
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i have another option to add to the mix - we bought the cubitec shelving from dwr (during one of its sales) in translucent white for our son's room and love it:

http://www.dwr.com/product/furniture/workspace/storage/cubitec-shelving.do?sortby=ourPicks

posted by andrist on October 23rd 2008 at 9:20am
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we also use the cubitec and love it's simple clean look. we bought doors to hide legos, puzzles, and such and organize our books by color (it makes it that much easier for our daughter to put away her books).

posted by tmeltzer on October 23rd 2008 at 9:23am
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to add to my comment above-

this isn't the best pic of it, but you can see our cubitec shelving in the background here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/9438031@N04/2836430833/

posted by andrist on October 23rd 2008 at 9:24am
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I have been not been happy with our Argington Eiffel. Some of the planks were slightly shorter or longer than others -- not grossly off, but just enough to notice certain shelves and edges don't quite meet up. And there are a lot of imperfections in the wood that were "masked" by the stain. Beyond that, the bookshelf has been off-gassing for months. I was told there are no toxins, but I'm still suspicious. It used to smell up the whole room. Now it's not as bad but anything that I put inside the cabinets gets infused with the smell of the furniture. For what I paid, I expected better quality.

posted by bhu4 on October 23rd 2008 at 6:31pm
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Thanks everyone. I'd heard about the off gassing and inferior quality of the Oeuf bookcase but not the Argington one. I think I'll go with the cheaper West Elm one. Thanks!

posted by reef1 on October 24th 2008 at 10:17am
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A pretty nice list of bookcases for kids rooms...
http://homepage.mac.com/rosenfeldesther/buymodernbaby/buymodernbookcases.html

posted by rehtse534 on December 29th 2009 at 12:26am
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