Buying a house might be out of reach for many of us, but that doesn’t mean your rental can’t be stylish. Read Emily Hutchinson’s book “Shared Living” for tips on curating a space with merged styles. (Pablo Veiga)

Buying a house might be out of reach for many of us, but that doesn’t mean your rental can’t be stylish. Read Emily Hutchinson’s book “Shared Living” for tips on curating a space with merged styles. (Pablo Veiga)

Read on: Seven books to help you shake up your home decor

Furnish your home with found objects. Invest in storage cubbies to be clutter free. Keep your house plants alive.

  • By Laurie Hertzel Star Tribune (Minneapolis) (TNS)
  • Saturday, January 11, 2020 1:30am
  • Life

Here are seven books to shake up your home decor, whether that be furnishing your home with found objects, investing in adorable storage cubbies to keep your nest clutter free, or learning how to keep your house plants alive.

“The Foraged Home,” by Joanna Maclennan and Oliver Maclennan. (Thames & Hudson, 253 pages, $40.) Forget those manufactured “tiny houses.” Try living inside an overturned boat. Don’t shore up that collapsing wall with an expensive metal beam — use a shark’s bone. And while plaster is nice, walls built of whitewashed horse dung and local grasses are nice, too, though they do have a tendency to crumble.

Reduce, reuse, recycle has become our mantra, and that makes this lovely book more than a curiosity — it’s an inspiration.

The homes pictured here — ranging from the U.S. to the U.K. to Norway, Bulgaria and beyond — are furnished with found objects: shells, twigs, seedpods, distressed armoires, broken chairs, chipped crockery, antique rugs, fishing nets and rusty lanterns, arranged to make these homes look cozy and timeless. And where did the owners find such wonderful objects? Washed up on beaches, tossed into dumpsters, set out on tables at flea markets or left behind in abandoned buildings. It takes an eye to spot the potential in what most of us would consider trash.

“Shared Living,” by Emily Hutchinson. (Thames & Hudson, 175 pages, $29.95.) Sure, you might be married to each other. But you might not be — maybe you’re siblings. Or college roomies. Or you met on Craigslist when you were looking for a place to rent. Sharing living quarters is less expensive, more collegial and definitely more green than living alone. But how to agree on decor? And how to carve out areas that are yours alone — particularly in the bathroom and the kitchen?

This book brings readers inside shared houses and apartments from Tokyo to Australia to New York, showing how various groupings of people have made cohabitation work. There are commonalities in these homes: lots of potted plants, lots of light, exposed brick, curious things hanging from the ceiling and walls (vintage chairs, crystals, tennis racquets, a collection of unusual hats). Make a statement, the author suggests. Take your time. Invest in adorable storage cubbies to keep your nest clutter-free. And it always helps to designate one person the chief decorator.

“Decorating With Plants,” by Baylor Chapman. (Artisan Books, 271 pages, $24.95.) Someone gives you a plant. You put it in the window. You water it — maybe too much, maybe not enough. It dies. Someone gives you a plant. You turn to this book. The plant lives. Your house looks great!

“Decorating With Plants” gives you the most basic of information, plant by plant: How much light do they need? How much fertilizer? What about water? What about bugs?

And once you get past the primer, the good stuff starts: where and how to hang them; which groupings look best; where to find lovely containers; how to keep your herbs thriving all year round. (And, gosh, they look pretty, drying.)

Healthy plants add color, life and a whiff of outdoors to a room. Dead plants, not so much. This book will help you keep your plants healthy.

“Bedtime: Inspirational Beds, Bedrooms & Boudoirs,” by Celia Forner. (Vendome, 287 pages, $60.) The bedrooms in this book cannot possibly be for sleeping. The chandeliers, four-poster beds with heavy canopies, leopard-print wallpaper, clamshell bed frames that look like they are about to devour you and busily patterned carpeting — wouldn’t all of this keep you awake?

Still, for sleeping or not, these bedrooms — depicted here in 250 photographs and illustrations — are fascinating to look at.

There’s a 14th-century Italian bedroom with thick walls and heavy, dark carved furniture; a 19th-century bedroom designed to look like a Roman emperor’s tent; a black velvet bedroom that belonged to Mary Queen of Scots; a stripped-down bamboo and sliding-screen Japanese bedroom. These rooms, you think, are far too interesting to sleep in, which is why the middle of the book is so important. Here you’ll find proof that these rooms were actually used — dozens of black-and-white photos of Truman Capote, Elizabeth Taylor, Hugh Hefner and others, all lounging in these impossible beds.

“Down to Earth: Laid-Back Interiors for Modern Living,” by Lauren Liess. (Abrams, 255 pages, $40.) Bare wooden floors, scattered with a couple of hand-woven kilim rugs; whitewashed barn-wood walls; wicker hanging lamps; soapstone kitchen sinks; open shelves made of old beams, holding simple white cups and saucers. These austere yet warm rooms are what author and designer Lauren Liess calls “easy” — “relaxed, casual and cozy.” There’s nothing here that you need to worry your child might break; very little that is going to be smudged or marred. (If the walls are reclaimed wood, they’re already marred.)

Liess’ rooms are white, primarily (except when they’re black), filled with items from the natural world — wood, stone, leather. Color comes in bursts, in the form of rugs, throw pillows and potted plants. In these 150 photographs you’ll find inspiration and ideas. (And envy — oh, the big windows of these houses. It’s less scary to paint your walls black if the room is flooded with light.)

“Inside Outside: A Sourcebook of Inspired Garden Rooms,” by Linda O’Keeffe. (Timber Press, 252 pages, $35.) It’s best, when paging through this lovely book, to turn off the realist in your brain. It’s unlikely that you have a yard big enough for a table that seats 90 people. It’s unlikely that you have a pool, not to mention one with dyed-black water (the better for reflection). And it’s unlikely that your living room floor extends seamlessly out into the garden, inside and out divided only by a sliding-glass door.

But put “likely” out of your head, and instead look for ideas that you can adapt to your own humble, northern space. And there are plenty of ideas here: rusty, rustic gates; ornate wooden sheds; a topiary arch trained over a small garden table; a dappled patio made of both flagstones and cobblestones.

This book is filled with ideas for garden rooms, patios, topiary designs, elaborate plantings and the most adorable chicken coop you have ever seen. (Page 116.) No, you can’t do it all. But you can do some.

“Urban Garden Design,” by Kate Gould. (Kyle Books, 176 pages, $27.99.) For the practical homeowner, Kate Gould’s book of smart suggestions and lovely examples hits just the right tone. For small gardens, for overly sunny patios, for gardeners trying to camouflage unsightly air-conditioning units, for container gardeners, for folks hoping to illuminate their night gardens — she’s got the answers, stated forthrightly. She has lists of do’s and don’ts; helpful information on various kinds of plants, fences, deckings, pavers and grasses; and checklists for complicated projects. Dig in, and then begin.

Talk to us

> Give us your news tips.

> Send us a letter to the editor.

> More Herald contact information.

More in Life

Brandon Hailey of Cytrus, center, plays the saxophone during a headlining show at Madam Lou’s on Friday, Dec. 29, 2023 in Seattle, Washington. (Olivia Vanni / The Herald)
Lynnwood-based funk octet Cytrus has the juice

Resilience and brotherhood take center stage with ‘friends-first’ band.

FILE - In this April 11, 2014 file photo, Neko Case performs at the Coachella Music and Arts Festival in Indio, Calif. Fire investigators are looking for the cause of a fire on Monday, Sept. 18, 2017, that heavily damaged Case’s 225-year-old Vermont home. There were no injuries, though a barn was destroyed. It took firefighters two hours to extinguish the blaze. (Photo by Scott Roth/Invision/AP, File)
Music, theater and more: What’s happening in Snohomish County

Singer-songwriter Neko Case, an indie music icon from Tacoma, performs Sunday in Edmonds.

Dominic Arizona Bonuccelli
Tangier’s market boasts piles of fruits, veggies, and olives, countless varieties of bread, and nonperishables, like clothing and electronics.
Rick Steves on the cultural kaleidoscope of Tangier in Morocco

Walking through the city, I think to myself, “How could anyone be in southern Spain — so close — and not hop over to experience this wonderland?”

chris elliott.
Vrbo promised to cover her rental bill in Hawaii, so why won’t it?

When Cheryl Mander’s Vrbo rental in Hawaii is uninhabitable, the rental platform agrees to cover her new accommodations. But then it backs out. What happened?

The Moonlight Swing Orchestra will play classic sounds of the Big Band Era on April 21 in Everett. (submitted photo)
Music, theater and more: What’s happening in Snohomish County

Relive the Big Band Era at the Port Gardner Music Society’s final concert of the season in Everett.

2024 Honda Ridgeline TrailSport AWD (Honda)
2024 Honda Ridgeline TrailSport AWD

Honda cedes big boy pickup trucks to the likes of Ford, Dodge… Continue reading

Would you want to give something as elaborate as this a name as mundane as “bread box”? A French Provincial piece practically demands the French name panetiere.
A panetiere isn’t your modern bread box. It’s a treasure of French culture

This elaborately carved French antique may be old, but it’s still capable of keeping its leavened contents perfectly fresh.

(Judy Newton / Great Plant Picks)
Great Plant Pick: Mouse plant

What: Arisarum proboscideum, also known as mouse plant, is an herbaceous woodland… Continue reading

Bright green Japanese maple leaves are illuminated by spring sunlight. (Getty Images)
Confessions of a ‘plantophile’: I’m a bit of a junky for Japanese maples

In fact, my addiction to these glorious, all-season specimens seems to be contagious. Fortunately, there’s no known cure.

2024 Hyundai IONIQ 6 Limited (Hyundai)
2024 Hyundai IONIQ 6 Limited

The 2024 Hyundai IONIQ 6 Limited is a sporty, all-electric, all-wheel drive sedan that will quickly win your heart.

The 2024 Dodge Hornet R/T hybrid’s face has the twin red lines signifying the brand’s focus on performance. (Dodge)
2024 Hornet R/T is first electrified performance vehicle from Dodge

The all-new compact SUV travels 32 miles on pure electric power, and up to 360 miles in hybrid mode.

Don’t blow a bundle on glass supposedly made by the Henry William Stiegel

Why? Faked signatures, reused molds and imitated styles can make it unclear who actually made any given piece of glass.

Support local journalism

If you value local news, make a gift now to support the trusted journalism you get in The Daily Herald. Donations processed in this system are not tax deductible.