№ 2 reading list: bookshelf styling

I have a bookshelf crush. Not my first. The July issue of Elle Decoration UK has a feature that has had me swooning just a little with my coffee, a home in LA that has so many right touches ('House on the Hills', photographed by Stephanie Bjelkstam). The open shelves in the living room display an uncluttered mix of books and decorative objects; books arranged both vertically and horizontally, adding visual interest. The shelves seem to breathe and echo the rug on the floor. Beautifully done. These days I'm reading a few books and soon I will be reviewing one of them on the blog: Decorative Textiles from Arab and Islamic Cultures: Selections from the Al Lulwa Collection. That Egyptian cotton appliqué to the left is a little preview.

My summer reading list is ready (I should probably call it my early summer reading list) and consists of plays and autobiographical writing. Recently I returned playwright Arthur Miller's memoir Timebends (wonderfully written, highly recommend it) to the library and picked up two of his plays. On the same day I was browsing online for works by Virginia Woolf and was lucky to find two used copies (vol. 3 of her diary has arrived and looks like new - love it). Here is my list:

1  All My Sons  by Arthur Miller
2  Death of a Salesman  by Arthur Miller
3  Off the Road: Twenty Years with Cassady, Kerouac and Ginsberg  by

Carolyn Cassady

4  The Diary of Virginia Woolf - Volume 3: 1925-1930  edited by Anne

Olivier Bell

5  The Letters of Virginia Woolf - Volume II: 1912-1922  edited by Nigel

Nicolson and Joanne Trautmann)

6  Testament of Youth: An Autobiographical Study of the Years 1900-1925 

by Vera Brittain

Some people would perhaps call this a bit heavy reading in summertime but I'm just not one of those readers who pick up a stack of quick-reads at the local bookshop. My children were making fun of me recently, saying that I read weird books. I'm trying to remember the exact phrase one of them used, 'English upper-class snob literature' or something like that. It cracked me up.

On a more personal note: It's the National Day of Iceland and my husband and I celebrate our 18th wedding anniversary. It's also Friday pizza day but he's abroad for work. The children and I are going for French cheese, baguette and grapes ... and chocolate. Have a wonderful weekend!

images by me | credit - top photo: Elle Decoration UK, July 2016, p. 116 · Stephanie Bjelkstam

A natural kitchen with texture

Texture done right is what comes to mind when I view the image above. Kitchens with open shelving usually have that element of lightness that I like and the decorative scheme in this one, the natural and warm look with earthy ceramics and kitchenware, is ideal. Apart from the moss green units the palette is neutral, meaning that texture is the key to an eye-catching look. Everything works here and the cover of the Chesterfield sofa, hand-woven Hungarian linen, adds that extra textural touch. The shelves and other kitchen units are carved from untreated oak, and wooden crates are used for storage instead of closing the units with doors.

About three months ago I pinned two images of this same kitchen. They looked familiar but I just couldn't place them until recently when I leafed through a stack of magazines to look for a particular house tour. In the February 2015 issue of Elle Decoration UK, there it was, another angle of this kitchen I thought I must have seen before, part of a feature called Revival of a Classic (photographed by Michael Paul). Initially I thought it was perhaps Scandinavian but it belongs to a renovated Edwardian style house by the coast in West Sussex. If you like natural and rustic style this house tour won't disappoint you. The house owner is Alex Legendre, who owns the I Gigi boutique in Brighton.

[Want to see more? The images I pinned show the 'Butler' sink, a vintage find, and the use of wooden crates as storage. For those of you who don't use Pinterest, you can view these images on the website of the Norwegian interior magazine Vakre Hjem & Interiør.]

image by me | credit: Elle Decoration UK, February 2015, p. 88 · Michael Paul