Secrets of a Stylish Home

Lots of interior design books are full of pretty pictures but don't really help mere mortals to design their own homes. This book is full of good, sensible advice, as well as beautiful photos. The photos are of real, achievable, results not grand designs. The advice is genuinely useful: how to develop your own style and apply it to the whole house; how not to be pushed into styles that aren't really you by the architecture of your house; how to accommodate children in a stylish home so that their childhood is not constrained by style.... I wish I'd had this book years ago, I could have avoided an awful lot of false starts, the hassle of re-working rooms, and a great deal of cost.

I got lots of inspiration from this book. Beautifully photographed design ideas. I will be browsing through this book for many years.

Very nice photographed book. Hope I end up with such a nice home at the end of reading it

Not the worst, but definitely not the best book of this type I've encountered. The nicest picture is that one on the cover; the rest of the images/ideas completely lack the wow factor. I didn't find a single interior which I could call inspiring, but that might be just my taste. What I particularly dislike is that lots of photos in here are of exactly the same interior, only the angle is varied or a detail is magnified. I call this a rip-off. Furthermore, this is a heavily self-promotional book -- the author is laying self-praise almost as thickly as Kit Kemp (and that is saying something!) "I did this great thing to that interior, and aren't I simply wonderful", Cate Burren implies on almost every page. So for me, a boring book and an expensive purchase I very much regret. Not a patch on, for example, The Home Style Sourcebook . Also, there are no actual 'secrets' to be found. On the contrary, this book is full of useless assertion such as: Determining your own style is hard! Choosing your favourite colour is difficult! And the worst, for me: do not let the style of your house dictate your style! There is far more advice in the less jazzy but far more useful Kevin McCloud's Principles of Home: Making a Place to Live . On the other hand, if you are looking for beginner's instructions on how to plan and manage an interior decorating project, you might find this book useful.

This book has many 'know how' tips about not only interior design but also planning your home's layout. It is so informative.

I read this book from cover to cover and now keep going back and dipping in to specific chapters.Packed full of sound common sense it guides you progressively through planning,implementing and managing your home make over.Compared to other home planning books I have bought this has been the most practical yet!

Ever redecorated and realised you hate the final result? Yeah me too. It may seem obvious but sometimes it's difficult to work out what you like, sure I've seem rooms and known I loved them but haven't been able to translate that into my own home - everything is safe and, dare I say it normal. Enter "Secrets of a Stylish Home"! This book is really helping me get an idea of what I want from my house, without needing to update it the following year. Taking you through step by step it's about finding what you like rather than following the latest trends. I highly recommend this book.

I am reading and re-reading this book - good ideas quite expensive

Ho regalato questo libro per Natale a dei giovani sposi che stanno alla ricerca della prima case. Lo hanno molto apprezzato.

I picked up this book for the wrong reason at first, namely due to it's mouth-watering cover photo. I was assuming it was a book of lovely homes instead of the extremely practical how-to guide that it actually is. It's a testament to how much I liked the book that I kept reading even though I'm quite comfortable with decorating. Burren writes well and she beautifully captures why we decorate, "Our home is our cave, our nest, our retreat, our theatre, and even our confidant. It...protects us from the rest of the world (and) if we respect it, it will be a happy home in which to live."

Rather bland