Product Description

750 of the best decorating ideas from House Beautiful magazine Tips and hints from professional decorators From paint colour to furnishings, accessories and fabrics Lavishly illustrated with colour photographs throughout It's huge, oversized, filled with colour, and packed with 750 unique, innovative ideas from House Beautiful. The magazine's experts show how to turn ordinary interiors into breathtaking, livable homes: they go through every room offering suggestions for window treatments, lighting, and storage and exploiting even the smallest spaces. Discover how to use colours and patterns, personalize and accessorize a space, and make room for a growing family. House Beautiful combines every theme and style to compliment your home.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1084311 in Books
• Published on: 2003-08-28
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 448 pages

From Publishers Weekly
The editors of House Beautiful magazine have pulled together this large, inexpensive, though ultimately simplistic book. Arranged by chapter headings such as "Colors & Patterns," "Walls, Windows & Floors," and "Space & Storage," the book does offer a bounty of decorating ideas with hundreds of beautiful photos in an attractive layout. With only one to three photos per double-page spread, this book is candy for the eye. Written in the margin are ideas addressing each photos-some helpful, but most obvious or silly. In the chapter "Personalize & Accessorize," one caption reads: "An object by itself is only and object. Juxtapose it with something else and it becomes a composition." "Recite a poem at your next dinner party" is another suggestion. Though the book is quite beautiful, it's not very helpful; home decorators looking for solid ideas or step-by-step instructions for decorating should look elsewhere.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Customer Reviews

Great photos, lousy advice
This is a gorgeous coffee-table style books overflowing with fabulous photos of interiors. I say interiors rather than homes because it clear that no one could actually survive in any of these ornate, pristine, elegant, and rather stuffy rooms.

The "750 tips" are given in sidebars, and poor production has allowed that some of the tips are not on the same page as the photo to which they refer. This book also contradicts its own advice - frequently - as when it says to "always hang pictures 10" above seating" accompanied by a lovely photo of a sofa that is backed up directly against framed pictures. Or when they advise not using scatter pillows on chairs or stools, yet this is done throughout the text.

750 is a bit of an exageration - they break down "how to build a fire" into many small tips, counting each one.

Overall, a fairly useless book, but the photos are pretty. A nice gift for the billionaire on your list.

Beautiful book...
I had to double check that I had the same book as some of the other reviewers. In my edition, the photographs are quite lovely, with a couple of exceptions now that I've given it a much closer look. A couple reviewers comment about the overdone style of the rooms, but there are so many rooms, in so many different styles, it is hard to say something like that. There are definitely some floral-frilly rooms, and some rooms that are certainly not for those who harbor disgust for toile (I'm rather indifferent to it) . . . but there are just as many very sophisticated, simple, elegant, subdued rooms pictured as well. Perhaps that is what I like about the book-- there are so many different styles, that almost anyone could find something inspirational in it. French country is overrepresented, I admit, and from someone who is not too excited about shabby chic either, there are too many pictures of that for me. Some photographs reek of nouveau riche. But there are also colonial, modern country, modern eclectic and other styles well represented in some very pretty pictures. I agree strongly with the editorial review's point that someone looking for a "how-to" book will be disappointed. This book is all about the pictures (which I love), with tips spread throughout on sidebars. The entertaining or efficiency tips I could do without ("give old clothes to an organization"), but a lot of the decorating tips are interesting. As a serious Type A personality, I "flag" things of interest in books-- this book has so many flags I had to stop! From lovely little ideas like storing makeup in darling old silver cups to helpful advice like how to choose a frame for a period piece of art, I would describe this book in relation to a decorating "library," as the frosting on the cake . . . beautiful, and full of neat pieces of advice that don't make it into the substantive "how-to" decorating books. This book would not be the basis of your interior decorating library-- but is full of sweet solutions on the back end. **I am editing my review to add that, if I could I would change my review to 2 stars because I've only had the book a short time and the spine is falling apart-- cheap construction for a nice, expensive book that should be coffee table quality!**

This book is for those interested in a certain decor style
Unfortunately, it's not my style. This book has NO tips about decorating within a budget or exactly "how-to" decorate. The photos are of over-filled rooms with over-patterned furniture and (in my humble opinion) hideos "knick-knacks." I don't know what this style is, but I don't think most people would find this book inspirational.