My bookmark collection! (100+)

So when I was younger I loved collecting things. I had a phase where I’d collect keychains, or hair ties, or pins, or stickers. Later on as I was growing up I realised that these things I collect were essentially useless and gave me no happiness because they only serve to be looked at prettily and not to be used for something. Therefore I decided to start collecting bookmarks, because I love reading, I love collecting things, and I can use these bookmarks anytime!

I realised as well that wherever I travel, other than keychains and jewelry and postcards, almost all souvenir shops sell at least one kind of bookmark. It made me easier to find myself bookmarks from all over the world, wherever I travel, and it is luckily not too expensive. I feel very lucky to be able to travel across Europe and across The Netherlands to various museums and bookshops and from these places I get to bring home a little memento that I can use and remember by when I’m reading.

I put all my bookmarks in a small box in my drawers and after almost four years of collecting I’ve finally decided to go through them all, count them and share to you my favourite ones. I counted that I had over 120 bookmarks!! In this post I’ll only show you a few of them, cause some of them are quite repetitive, but I hope you enjoy this post.

Let’s start off with the ones everyone probably has as well: Book Depository free bookmarks! This really shows how often I buy books from the site. I keep them all because I really like their artwork!

I love collecting bookmarks from various places, as you might be able to tell later on in this post. These ones were (from left to right) bought in Prague, Vatican City, Lisbon, Greece, and the bottom one is also from Italy while the fish-shaped one (made of leather!) is also the classic fish shape from Lisbon.

I also enjoy buying bookmarks from museums and of animals I love. From left to right, these bookmarks were bought in Florence (the famous statue of David by Michaelangelo), Paris (the Dali museum), a cute cat, a yellow woven one from Latvia, a cat one from a bookstore, a pink dog one from a bookstore in Rotterdam, a lovely mosaic metal one from Barcelona (of the Gaudi cathedral), a fabric one from Budapest (since they are famous of placemats from these types of embroidery), and the bottom one is the classic one from Paris’s Shakespeare and Company bookstore.

These are a collection of bookmarks I got in the Netherlands: a random cactus illustration I found in a secondhand bookstore in Utrecht, the classic red blue and yellow colors of Mondriaan from the Gemeente Museum in The Hague, a painting of The Girl with the Pearl Earrings from the Mauritshuis Museum in The Hague I bought three years ago, a cute magnetic bookmark I bought in a bookstore, the classic almond blossom painting from Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, a painting from the Maritime Museum in Groningen, a Japanese painting I bought from the Rijks Museum in Amsterdam, and the last two are random ones I bought across the country.

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Processed with VSCO with m5 preset

This selection shows cute but not very convenient bookmarks: the first one I bought for a bargain in Amazon that is basically a “lamp light” bookmark but I honestly never use because it’s quite floppy. The second one is an adorable doll bookmark I bought in a Christmas market in Koln that was the most expensive bookmark I have here (€8!), and honestly I also never use because I’m afraid of losing it and also because it’s quite bulky.

These are also another cluster of bookmarks I got randomly from places I visited. From left to right, they were gotten from the Arc de Triomph in Paris, the tall church in Florence, a Monet painting from the Louvre in Paris, a wooden one from Lithuania, a cat illustration from the Picasso Museum in Barcelona, and a gorgeous wooden tiny painting of koi fishes that my boyfriend bought for me in Japan.

These bookmarks have some special places in my heart: the first one was a birthday gift from my boyfriend with a picture of us, then an illustration & quote of Jon Snow I bought at the Dutch Comic Con not too long ago, next is a bundle of magnetic bookmarks I bought while I was in Disneyland Paris, and a beautiful painting I bought in Milan, an Indonesian wayang bookmark, and the bottom one is from a tile museum that I visited with my mom in Lisbon.

So of course there are still a lot of bookmarks I didn’t showcase here, but these are basically the most memorable and beautiful ones. Despite my over 100 bookmarks, sometimes I still use tissue or paper bills as a bookmark anyway, but I love my collection and I adore finding new types and drawings of bookmarks in the future.

Which ones are your favourite bookmarks? And do you collect bookmarks yourself?