Customer Reviews

How to Decorate: The Best of Martha Stewart Living

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

The introductory chapter on choosing paint colours is particularly excellent. Martha explains when to use dark colours and when to use light colours, how changing light throughout the day should impact your choice of paint colour, and gives ideas on how to coordinate colours for walls and ceilings of adjoining rooms. While some of the projects, such as the outdoor shower, are fanciful, most of the ideas presented are very solid, and the book does a good job of explaining basic principles. Martha's choices are offered as ideas to get you thinking about how you can apply those principles to your own living space.

Other reviewers get hung up on the fact that Martha has expensive furniture. But the most expensive furniture will look sad and out -of-place without attractive surroundings; fabulous Wedgwood china will look really out of place in a poorly decorated dining room, and modest everyday dishes can look perfect if they're displayed properly in a tasteful room. That's what this book helps you to do: make your living space look as tasteful as you can.

This was Martha's first work, and explores places and settings. The rustic bench in the middle of the trees is a great idea, ditto the outside shower, but only if you live where there will be no peeping Toms. While you may not be able to duplicate her ideas exactly, these should give you inspiration to work with what you have at home, wherever that may be.

If you want something really good try the HGTV Before or After. The best is really the Home Decorators Bible. Martha's books are often cut & paste jobs.

I couldn't wait to get my copy of this book, but was very disappointed to find how few ideas in here applied to me. We live in an apartment in NYC, and I was looking forward to ideas on how to make the most of a small space, how to brighten up a dark, windowless foyer, etc. None of these concerns are mentioned here. Instead Martha's "how tos" focus on spacious houses, with tons of natural lighting. Doesn't anything look good when you've got a huge light-filled house to work with?

Another disappointing thing about the book is its lack of practicality. The author often refers us to "Martha's collection of antique Wedgewood crystal vases", or "Martha's Louis XVI chairs" or something of the sort. Most people I know don't own priceless antiques. It's obvious that if we did it would be that much easier to make any room look spectacular.

Bottom line: many of the how-tos in here are no-brainers if you've got unlimited space, fantastic natural lighting, and a deep pocketbook. For the rest of us, keep searching for truly useful decorating pointers.

It's time to retire this old book which is amazingly rigid in its decorating ideas and its school-marmish, rules-oriented approach to design. Decorating today is so personal, yet Martha (or this old book, anyway) seems to think that there is only one way to do things. It reminds me of a 1950s book filled with rules for the little housewife to follow, but it certainly doesn't fit the world of today's educated, style-conscious, and confident consumer. Bleah!

I finally figured out what bothers me about this book. I want more options from which I can choose, yet Martha's approach suggests that there is only one way to do things. Wrong! I need a book that takes a broader view of decorating options.

This does not necessarily feature a selection of expensive furnishings. On the Cover, for instance, the second vase from the left (catalog #837) and the fourth vase from the right (catalog #37) are period pieces ('20s to '30s) by the Zanesville Stoneware Company pottery. They can sometimes be found at flea markets for $30 to $80. Unlike Martha though, you won't have to favor celadon green.

I picked up this book because although I'm not stricly speaking a "fan" of Stewart's, I admire the way she combines elegant colors in ways no one else seems to think of. I was not disappointed - Martha clearly explains principles of color in ways the average person can understand, and the colors were every bit as rich and beautiful as I expected. In fact, reading this book made me investigate her line of paint for K-Mart (developed after publication of this book), and in my opinion that collection contains by far the most beautiful interior colors I have found anywhere, including those $40.00 per gallon specialty stores. The colors are in many cases very close to the palettes in the book. However, before I knew about the K-Mart paint, I eagerly turned to the "Guide" section of this book for information on Stewart's paint source because I immediately wanted to buy some ...only to find that the paint she used in her various homes starts at $24 for 750 milliliters and goes up to $75 for 2.5 liters (slightly more than a plastic soda bottle). Further investigation revealed a $14,000 table, a stainless steel sponge holder for $326, and an $1800 telephone stand. Martha gets such fabulous results in her homes because she has unlimited means. Everything looks expensive because it IS expensive. If you're looking for an educational book about color, by all means buy this one (and check out the K-Mart paint), but if your combined household income is less than seven figures and you want to get the Martha Stewart look, you'd better look elsewhere. The true Martha Stewart look has a very high price tag.

Austere, simple design combined with unique color treatments characterize this Martha product. Despite the incredibly elegant chandeliers, this book focuses on the use of many furniture and accessory times that could be acquired and used by non-Hamptonites, i.e., real people. For example,this book shows a highly industrial and modern kitchen with her Fire King dishes, an unexpected combination. Painted furniture, graphically framed photographs, battered painted bookcases, beautiful lamps, old wicker, simple molding framed mirrors, lovely dishes and window treatments all play together in a uniquely modern way. The book's strongest point is its colors, an unusual pallete used throughout the book. I'm not a purely bred fan of Martha's but she and her stylists are very affective in awakening one's decorating sensibilities and drawing one's eye to the less obvious, but beautiful possibilities. Glad I bought it.

Martha Stewart may be the biggest snob in the Hamptons, but this is basically a very useful book. The strongest section is the one which deals with color; it's a great introduction that makes a complicated and confusing subject entirely understandable. You don't have to agree with Stewart's somewhat strange sense of interior decoration in order to gain a real understanding of what makes a room look good. On the negative side, the inclusion of a few silly, time-consuming, and ultimately pointless projects (such as combing a floor with paint to make it look like gingham fabric, or making a bed with hospital corners) will undoubtedly inspire a whole new batch of Martha Stewart jokes. That's a shame, because this is one of the more worthwhile interior decorating books currently available.