I like the shelves posted but that is definitely not a project for a beginner. You can make a shelf easily though. I figure my measurements and have Lowes cut the wood for me. as for face frame I do not do that. I am no expert but my stuff looks good. I use the thin ridged trim and edge the shelves with that. I do like to use crown trim but I need dh to help me with that. I have also done what others suggested by cutting shelves to meet my needs and also trimed out the store brought shelves but it never beats starting from scratch and having everything just the size you want. I tried building a shelf myself because the ones you buy in the store are basically straight pieces of wood. I thought what a rip off. So I tried it myself. I do use shelf ledges and I have painted my shelf. I started with something small. I removed all those horrid wire shelves out of my closet and replaced with wood shelves. My closte was testing ground for a lot of stuff including laying a wood floor. Anyway I like to caulk anywhere wood meets wall and wood meets wood so there is not even a hairline gap. You make a very small slanted hole in the caulk and smooth with a wet finger. Have to be neat with this or it looks like crap. The most fun of the whole thing is using a nail gun (one with a compressor). Man I love it. I will post a photo tomorrow of some of my shelves if I can remember.

loribee and Connie, thank you for the kind words. Connie, I just spent some lovely time on your blog, totally captivated by your new kittens and your roses. (I'm a new native gardening.) I love seeing what people have done with customizing other pieces but we're just not DIY folks at all. Hubby has ZERO interest and my abilities are limited. So mostly we either have to buy ready to go or pay someone to do things. One other reason to replace these is that I can then move some of them into my office which has shorter shelves and into hubby's office which also has shorter shelves. We need a lot of bookspace. les - no, the store won't come out here and it's not custom as in them building various sizes. Plus the store is an hour away. The fitting is pretty basic - I have 67" on one side of the fireplace and 73" on the other. All bookcases are 12" deep and there is 33" and 46" wide one to be used. So 12" + 46" = 58 with 9" left on one side and 15" left on the other because of course the fireplace isn't in the middle of the wall. :) Those gaps are too wide on either side of the fireplace to look decent and if I use these cases, I can't really make something to fit the small space and match. If I use the pine ones I have more widths to choose from, 24, 30, 36, 48 so I could do a 24 and 30 on one side and 30 and 30 on the other side which, when I add in the 12" depth for the cases from the other wall, gives me an inch to spare. But I need to figure out the heat registers and look at the case bottoms better today to see if we can cut the fronts for registers or mount them on bases of some kind. I tell you, I'm exhausted by all of this. Watching them demo the ceramic tile for the wood floor is going to be a piece of cake after this. :) The other think you might consider, and I dont know for sure what would be cheaper, would be to have the bookcases made of stain-grade plywood, or paint grade that you do in a deep black brown, or a white to match the fireplace. I spent another couple of hours looking at the various manufacturers on the stores website and found a couple of entertainment units that should work. I'll ask about them when we go today. Hubby is picky. We need something for the TV, no problem, but then the 4 components (DVD, TiVo, subwoofer and CD player) need a space that is open on both the front and the back. He won't use glass or cloth doors and wants an open back. (We'll just cut what we need from the back if it doesn't come open.) But like I said, I think there are a few pieces that would work and the handyman came by last night and said that he could do the bridge stuff I wanted. It's the heat registers to solve now. And can I just say again, thank you to all of you who read and comment and hold hands through this process? I don't have anyone local here to bounce this stuff around with so I really, really appreciate it.

sueb20, here are some pictures of the room - they're from a few years ago because the room is pretty dismantled to get ready for painting. (We're changing the white walls to a light mocha color.) The first is from the entry (at Christmas time), the next from the dining room. The curtains will most likely be replaced, not sure with what yet. Overall, I think we like a light feel, but with a lot of warmth. Does that make sense? We're also pretty casual people. I'm somewhat willing to experiment with these bookcases. They were inexpensive when we got them almost 20 years ago from an oak/office furniture store (think 80's waterbed!). Thanks again!

Probably not the answer you're wanting, but I think a large bookcase in this space would compete with and thus detract from your beautiful woodwork. Would you fill the bookcase with books? If so, seems like an awkward location for them. Have you considered a low etagere? A piece such as this with a special painting hung above would be gorgeous, IMO. You don't need lamps (since you have the sconces), so could display objects on the shelves as you would in a bookcase.