15 best Montessori shelves to encourage play and discourage clutter–a winning combo!

This Baltic birch shelf has it all – a clean, sleek appearance, a low profile for your child’s easy access, and even a hidden storage cubby in the back where you can easily store materials not currently displayed. Parents love this shelf for rotating their child’s toys to keep them engaged and learning. Of all Montessori shelves, this Lovevery play shelf comes highly recommended by parents.

The Luce shelf is a lovely, modern option for your home environment. Its name comes from the Italian word for light, referencing the unique design that allows for plenty of natural light to illuminate the objects on the shelves. This Montessori toy shelf comes in a variety of sizes and configurations, offering maximum flexibility to adapt the design to your child’s needs.

For the youngest toddler, this Montessori toy shelf is the perfect little space for their toys to live in easy reach. Young toddlers only need a few activities to work with at a time, as their play sessions, or work cycles as Maria Montessori would call them, are much shorter at this age, between naps, snacks and snuggles.

The Guidecraft EDQ Essentials collection offers many great Montessori shelves, including this white five-compartment shelf with natural birch trim. This shelf is perfect for elementary-aged children, and comes with three fabric storage bins that you can use for building blocks, magnetic tiles or other open-ended materials.

This simple, birch two-shelf option is perfect for the older toddler or preschooler to display their activities. Without any dividers, these open shelves offer maximum flexibility for you to rotate toys in any shape or size. This Montessori toy shelf grows with your child, and can be used in countless ways in your home as your little one grows up.

A Montessori toy shelf for an infant is truly a one-of-a-kind furniture piece that offers an environment of respect and independence from the start. Even before your child is mobile, they will enjoy laying on a mat on the floor and looking at the lovely toys displayed on the shelf, which often motivates them to begin rolling and crawling toward the shelf when they are able to finally access it independently. Montessori shelves like this one are perfect for crawling babies and the youngest toddlers.

If you’re looking for the best Montessori toy shelf for an older child, this is it. The Jonti-Craft four-shelf unit offers plenty of space for your elementary student’s activities. Two of the shelves are adjustable, allowing you to make space to fit any of your child’s favorite materials. This classroom-style shelf is also a good choice for a homeschool environment, where activities can be accessed from either side if placed away from the wall.

For families on a budget, you can pick up this six-cube shelf at your local Target and transform it into a Montessori toy shelf with trays of activities displayed in each cube for your child to enjoy. This shelf comes in a variety of colors, allowing you to match your child’s playroom or bedroom decor.

If you’re looking for a Montessori shelf hack, look no further. This IKEA LACK TV Unit gets the job done, offering a very affordable, low shelf option to display a few of your toddler’s activities. This is lightweight and is safest when anchored to the wall, especially for toddlers who might pull up to standing. Take advantage of the open space below for baskets of wooden blocks or toy cars. Montessori shelves don’t have to be expensive to be effective in increasing your child’s independence, concentration and sense of order!

This natural wood Montessori bookshelf beautifully displays your child’s favorite books. This shelf offers plenty of space to house a larger number of books, perfect for emerging readers.

If your child’s playroom or bedroom has limited space for a Montessori bookshelf, these floating shelves are a great alternative, allowing you to display a selection of your child’s books without taking up precious floor space. The best thing about these floating shelves is that you can tailor their height to your child, anchoring them in easy reach for your independent little one to easily access.

For the youngest toddlers, this low bookshelf is perfect for easily viewing and accessing a small selection of favorite books. Little ones love hearing the same stories again and again, so leaving a few options on the shelf for them to explore and enjoy for a week or two before rotating the selection offers an engaging reading experience at this developmental stage.

This lightweight, affordable bookshelf with fabric sleeves offers plenty of space with child-height accessibility. While book covers may not be as clearly visible in the opaque sleeves, this economical option fits the Montessori ideal of increasing independence, concentration and order.

For older children, this unique two-in-one wooden bookshelf and book display combination offers space for your child to store their growing book collection on the classic bookshelf, while displaying current favorites. This also offers the flexibility for parents to use the open shelving as a Montessori toy shelf, perfect for small spaces.

This book rack with three open cubbies underneath is a great option for older children to not only have access to their books, but also open space below for storing early readers or chapter books, or even bins of legos, blocks or art materials.