Catalogs to Inspire

Right now, money's tight and a subscription to a magazine seems to be both wasteful of money and of paper. However, I LOVE having something in my hands to flip through and get ideas versus searching online.

I've found a way to supplement my lack of magazines without having to pay for subscriptions: catalogs. When I'm in the mood for decor inspiration I'll visit westelm.com or potterybarn.com and request a catalog. If it's fashion I'm itching for I head to bodenusa.com or jcrew.com. I realize I'm still creating paper waste, but it's not nearly the magnitude of my favorite InStyle.

The downside is that often if you're not ordering, you don't continue to receive the catalog. I'm okay with this since I don't need eight J. Crew catalogs with the same photos in them, and I can always reorder one when I'm feeling the flip-through need.

I've also commandeered an old sketch book to keep my ideas in. I cut out what I LOVE from the catalogs and paste them in the book. This way I can always find what I'm looking for without searching through or having to keep loads of back catalogs.

Does anyone else do this sort of thing?

Photo - bodenusa.com