No one will ever accuse Sera Hersham-Loftus of being tasteful. Still, her over-the-top decorating is a lot of fun. Her style could be described as somewhere between early brothel and late bordello. According to the dust jacket from her new book, Seductive Interiors, she is an “innovator of the seductive and boudoir trend”.

Lush rooms are richly layered with brocades and satin. Lampshades and tablecloths drip with heavy fringe. Sofas and alcoves are cushioned with velvet pillows and leopard print. Dramatic lighting in dusky interiors creates sultry ambience.

Some of the spaces have the quality of childhood fantasy where you might dress up in unlikely costumes and act out stories; others are like stage sets. Many of the rooms have the hallmarks often associated with romantic interiors: candles, polished silver, lace and flowers.

My favourite is a barge that travels the waterways in London. It has the appeal of a gypsy caravan and offers a cozy, built-in day bed where you could curl up with a good book – or friend.

Maybe tasteful is overrated.

- Jane

Shabby Chic Interiors: My Rooms, Treasures, and Trinkets is a new edition of a title published first in 2009 by Rachel Ashwell, a designer with all the moves. She is a serial home dweller whose philosophy is “wherever I am, I make my nest, even in a rented home or hotel.” And of course, each move provides fodder for a new book. I have the theory that, when it comes to home decorating, doing it is more fun than having it. (I could certainly be accused of this myself.) And it’s easy to see that Ashwell loves the process.

The book takes you to her latest house purchase that occurred when her nest emptied. You have to get past the line that says, “So I then I began the curious mission of “unrestoring”; heaving out brand-new cabinets and deluxe whirlpool baths until I got back to the authentic and real.”

You got it. She ripped out all the improvements recently made by the previous owner who also wasn’t happy with them and so moved along. The sleek new kitchen cabinets made way for ones that are wonky and worn. And she tells you that her construction team cheered her on.

Don’t get me wrong. I like the pretty rooms she creates and the homes of others that she takes you to. Some of them, like the Milches’ house in the chapter “Dogs, Art & Literature”, might be properly labeled authentic.

This is one very stylish woman who has made a career out of being a very stylish woman. I’m just hoping that her style inspires you to live and work well with the comfortable old things you already own or discover.

On the other hand, you could just enjoy the pictures without reading the text and then you won’t have to think of it all as cultural commentary.

- Jane

If you get a weekly fix of inspiration from TV makeover shows, you will enjoy a new addition to the collection.

Home By Novogratz showcases the work of husband-and-wife design team, Robert and Cortney Novogratz who have their own show on HGTV. Not surprisingly, the makeover formula is applied to the book. You see before-and-after shots, a list of steps, expert tips and a budget summary for each of the profiled spaces.

Their signature style is vintage modern. The rooms are colourful, family friendly and unpretentious. Of course, a lot of their clients have big bucks to drop on the process, like $35,000 for a tree house. No matter, there is much to be gleaned for the avid DIYer and a lot of fun in the decorating.

A long narrow attic storage space is transformed for two young girls. Beds are hung from sloped ceilings with heavy chains to maintain an airy feel. Floors are covered with bright, striped rugs. A long desk, shelving, and storage cubbies painted purple maximize the use of space. Pretty fabrics add a soft girlie touch.

Paint and stencils create a bold graphic for a living room wall in a “hipster haven”. For a singer-songwriter friend, they created a reader’s refuge, reorganizing hundreds of books into existing shelving and building a custom L-shaped sofa with additional library space in the base.

In a suburban basement, play space is created for both children and adults. Bold checkered carpet tiles brighten the area. Wallpaper is a collage of enlarged family photos.

It’s the kind of book where many high-cost (let’s-pay-a-contractor-to-do-it) ideas can be adapted for low-budget living.

- Jane

Flea Market Finds with Matthew Mead is a new title that revels in the glories of a day spent sifting through vintage cast-offs. It proves once again that trash becomes treasure in the hands of those with fertile imagination, a sack full of DIY tricks and a gift for arrangement.

Mead is a style guru who applies his talents to rehabbing a multitude of unlikely finds into attractive home furnishings. For example, a coil of baling wire found at a farm sale is snipped and twisted into whimsical picture frames.

Unbreakable vintage melamine, enamelware dishes and a daisy-covered teapot create a play set for little girls. The lively colours make a pretty mix with the sugar cookies and candy of the tea party.

Inspired by an art book of black-and-white doodles, he applies marker pen to a spool of craft paper hung high on the wall and unrolled to the floor. This quick-change art installation is surprisingly chic and who woulda thunk it? Well, apparently, Matthew Mead.

He does some clever things with mid-century modern finds to create a stylish room setting.

In a section titled, Frond Moments, he makes a case for the friendly fern found on collectibles or plucked from the garden to decorate walls and table settings. With a stencil he applies a fern design to an old chest of drawers with a drop-down desk.

The book is a fun browse just for the level of ingenuity invested into reclaiming these old objects of his affection.

- Jane

If you have a weakness for the English country style of decorating you will enjoy the newest book from veteran design writer, Ros Byam Shaw: Perfect English Farmhouse.

The homes presented are labours of love. She tells the stories of how they were acquired and the work that went into making them places fit for the glossy pages of a design book.

Often, they begin like the tale of a love story. The house is glimpsed and the person smitten. A house is pursued, or even “stalked”, until the buyer possesses the object of desire.

The houses presented are no longer part of working farms but have been separated from properties that are now consolidated into larger holdings to make them economically viable. The owners tend to be writers and artists, shop owners and antique dealers.

These homes have the character and patina that comes with age and feature many of the characteristics associated with the genre. There are mellow bricks and beams, tiled floors, enameled Aga cookers and faded chintz. Buildings are nestled into charming gardens where hybrid chickens scratch at the bricks in the sun-dappled courtyard.

For those who are fans of country-modern style, the section, No Frills Farmhouse, shows fabulous old houses with interior furnishings that are spare and contemporary.

I want Becca and Bill to invite me for tea in their lovely long kitchen/sitting room. Sigh. It’s all a fantasy world of idyllic English country living.

- Jane

Creative Display, by Geraldine James, makes a virtue out of clutter. In this inspiring book, objects are imaginatively displayed on every possible surface and every homemaker is an interior stylist. Layered surfaces include artwork, memorabilia and found objects.

Some displays are carefully organized by colour, theme or size and righteously balanced. Other arrangements appear organic and spontaneous, however carefully assembled.

There are displays that feature clever juxtapositions or “unlikely alliances”. On a long table covered by a paint-spattered drop cloth, a collection of expressionist paintings is paired with a loose arrangement of wild flowers.

Books may be the main event or used as props to stage other items.

If you have ever considered cobbling together a house from reclaimed materials, check out Handmade Houses by Richard Olsen. The book is billed the “first comprehensive consideration of the residential design of the back-to-the-land movement.”

It traces the history and origins of the movement and shows houses built by homeowners without architects and well as those designed by the pros.

Fleamarket Chic is another design book that works with vintage furnishings from humble sources integrated into contemporary interiors.

Unlike Homespun Style, which I reviewed last blog, many of the interiors are put together with subtlety and restraint because crafting is not the point of the exercise. Rather, collecting or rehabbing a worthy item that fits well into the decorating scheme is the name of the game.

- Jane

If you love colour and craft and reclaiming vintage furniture, you will enjoy the rooms created by interior stylist Selina Lake. In her new book, Homespun Style, she celebrates the power of hand-made furnishings to create homes that are personal and distinctive as well as welcoming.

She takes “a modern approach to craft” favouring simple creations over tricky techniques. The contemporary shape of a swivel chair is transformed by a funky, over-sized granny square afghan that is casually wrapped around it. Colourful textiles are made into easy cushion covers or simply draped.

The look is light-hearted and casual. In a cheerful dining area, candy-hued finishes are painted onto mismatched chairs. The walls are decorated with pop art trimmed with swags of pin lights and coloured beads. Above the arrangement hangs a bunting of pretty handkerchiefs knotted together at the corners.

Old light fixtures are redeemed with a splash of flowers painted on a lampshade or ribbon streamers fluttering from a chandelier. A modern chest of drawers was customized by refinishing the drawer fronts with pastel paint and vintage wallpaper.

She also demonstrates how to make eye-catching, still-life arrangements from favourite objects.

Lake insists that applying your passion for handiwork to your home does not mean that you need to be handy. She advocates support of your local artist and craftsperson. And good on her.

I’m thinking that if you admire their artistic ablility or tricky techniques mastered, you should be happy to pay for them.

- Jane

Today's blog comes from Deitra Kalyn, Central Library staff:

Have you ever wanted something so badly for your home that you were willing to travel 1000’s of miles to get it? Well I did and I did!

I’ve always wanted a beautiful carpet that I could love and cherish for years to come. As a result of coveting something for a very long time, I became quite picky about the characteristics of this yet-to-be-found treasure. In my mind it needed to be

-Something vintage

-Something soft

-Something that matched my couch, and

-Something unusual

So with this seemingly impossible set of criteria, my boyfriend and I planned a trip to Morocco where I was convinced that my dream treasure would be found. (Okay, we didn’t ONLY go for the carpet.)

Knowing very little about carpets and even less about how to find one once we got there, I found two books that I studied extensively. The Rough Guide to Morocco and Moroccan Carpets by Brooke Pickering helped me learn the differences in quality, fiber, how to spot fakes and, most importantly, how to buy one.

This was the most intimidating aspect to me. Being a ‘nice’ Canadian, the idea of ‘arguing’ or ‘haggling’ a price seemed very stressful. But after reading the tips and tricks, I felt somewhat confident that I could at least try the renowned mint tea and bargain for what I wanted.

So, after many hours, planes and trains, we found ourselves in Fez, Morocco. Luckily for us, the Moroccan husband of a friend of a friend graciously showed us around the maze streets and took us to the best shops.

One was this little hole-in-the-wall place which sold antiques and was packed floor to ceiling with some of the most beautiful treasures that I’ve ever seen. Ironically, we popped in only because the owner was a friend of our guide.

It wasn’t until AFTER the mint tea and wonderful visit that it occurred to me that my treasure might be there. I asked if he had carpets – and he did.

He pulled out several and then I spotted the mystic impossible thing – on the floor – of this filled-to-the-gills shop. It was vintage, soft and matched my sofa (YES!) And, by virtue of it being predominantly purple, I knew that I had found a special piece.

The bartering began. We both wrote our ideal amounts on a tiny note pad that he pulled out and exchanged prices back and forth until we came to agreement. It was $20 CAD less than my max price and he certainly had a big grin on his face.

Together with a few other gifts, we shipped the carpet home from a local post office. My treasure arrived three weeks after we returned home.

I loved it even more when I saw it again – a very happy ending to a wonderful vacation.

-Deitra

Shabby Chic is the well-known brand of Rachel Ashwell who opened her first shop in Santa Monica in 1989. Now, two decades on, there are stores in Los Angeles, New York, Texas, and London.

This well-known label describes a “look” that incorporates vintage and battered furnishings with lots of white paint and pastel colours. There are floral fabrics, frills and a touch of glitz in crystal and silver. Romantic rooms are styled like stage sets where it looks like the wistfully lovely heroine has left a trail of petals or a book of poetry.

Ashwell’s latest book in the franchise, called Shabby Chic Inspirations and Beautiful Spaces, shows her homes in Texas, Malibu and Knotting Hill, as well as the homes of friends and business associates.

The most bizarre (but fascinating) arrangement is the “shabby shack” created from a hunter’s cabin in the Catskill Mountains. Entirely white, it is draped with volumes of lace and accessorized with white china, books and elaborate chandeliers.

This girlish confection is the retreat of a young woman who lives with a burly husband in a trailer on the other side of the stream. The trailer is not bohemian edgy. We’re talking 70’s-style avocado and gold, plaid sofa, dark wood paneling with an American flag draped between the propane tanks.

Don’t believe me? Check it out.

Romantic cottage style is a perennial favourite that is most often featured in the shelter magazines in the spring and summer. If you like it, have a look at several other new titles in the collection.

Romantic prairie style: homes inspired by traditional Country Life by Fifi O’Neill prospects the same vein. No sod huts on this prairie; but it’s all quite charming.

New Cottage Style: a Sunset design guide is another one that features rehabbed vintage furnishings set in pale and pretty rooms.

For those who enjoy design books about vintage style, a slick new title has just arrived: Patina Style by Brooke and Steve Giannetti. She is an interior designer and the creator of a popular blog called Velvet and Linen. He is an architect, artist and furniture designer.

The authors love patinaed finishes that result from weathering and years of use; they celebrate the beauty of the old and imperfect. The design aesthetic features vintage and antique furnishings and natural materials that age with grace.

A calm palette of warm neutrals - creams, gray-greens, and blues - provide a soothing background. Velvet fabrics and worn rugs with mellowed hues add texture and softness to the mix.

Think wabi-sabi design with a luxurious edge.

Most of the photos come from their homes or projects. The text is peppered with phrases like, “At our house in Santa Monica...” “At our beach house...” “Our house in Oxnard...”

My favourite photos feature a room that displays Steve’s water paintings. In this comfortable space, the art work is accentuated by the aqua velvet of cushions and sea-green glass of insulator caps.

The Gianettis exhibit considerable flair with collections and offer advice about displaying them. For example:

• 
  Amethyst bottles and old-fashioned top hats stand atop vintage metal cabinet drawers.
• 
  Pocket watches and clock faces combine with bound leather books.
• 
  Vintage globes are surrounded by architectural remnants and carved wood blocks.

Patina style goes into the garden as well with weathered furniture and plants that have soft pastel flowers and grey-green foliage. Very pretty.

It's eye-candy design at its best.