Perfect English Cottage

One thing I love about this book is that most of these artistic homeowners seem to have a similar design philosophy: see something wonderful, bring it home, make a place for it. There's no overall plan, just life as it happens. The style is personal, comfortable, but not boring (after all, you have created it by yourself, for yourself), eclectic, but tidy (or at least tidied: everything seems somehow to have found its place). It's, in a word, English.Another thing I love is that everything these people have brought home is interesting. It has a history, or it's beautiful, or it's something they needed, or it's something they didn't need, but couldn't resist bringing home.The third thing I love is that all the homes into which these things are brought are architecturally significant. The floors, especially, are amazing, wide planks of old pine, antique tiles, stone flags, bricks. Not to mention the deep-set windows, paneled doors, beamed ceilings, commodious fireplaces, cupboards, cellars, attics. These are the features for which you might have to sacrifice space and certain modern conveniences, but in certain cases, for certain people, it's surely worth it. Only one quibble: I'd like to see more exterior pictures. I think it's important to know how the insides relate to the outsides. There's usually one exterior picture, but sometimes just showing a detail, not the whole façade.It's not all just higglety-pigglety (my own default decorating style). Here and there you'll see an austere/minimalist or elegant/curated cottage, everything symmetrical and matching. Those are just as wonderful, all perfectly perfect, not just imperfectly perfect. Because still, you can tell that every item has been chosen because it pleased, and had a story to tell.The moral of this story: find the right house, and everything you bring into it will be perfect. And, of course, it helps to be in England. Twenty-four cottages are shown, with several pages of pictures and text for each, divided into five categories: Romance, Character, Holiday, Simplicity, Elegance.

Americans have renewed their love of English country homes partly due to the impact of "Downton Abbey," but this book is obviously not about the oversized manor home. Instead, it's a delightfully written and photographed account of English style as interpreted in the iconic cottage. Shaw regards that word in loose terms -- some cottages aren't cottages at all but still reflect the casual style.Shaw is a glorious writer and the copy is just as good as the photos. What she conveys is that cottage style items are not necessarily expensive -- they're actually earned as hand-me downs from family, picked up at boot sales and flea markets, and accepted in trade.What the book does that shelter magazines don't do is this: it gives us permission to live with things that are imperfect and worn at the edges. The homes are both inviting and enticing. There are no showplaces in the sense of balanced perfection; instead there are rooms in which their owners make do and do so with elegance and grace.So many pages feature "design" choices owners have made that are much freer than American design tastes. I feel more able to express myself -- and allow myself the joys of artfully arranged odd objects and even clutter -- because of this book.

This book is not so much a decorating book as a tour of English cottages! I bought it because I though it was a decorating book. But, I enjoyed it as a delightful tour of cottages from humble to country-house chic. I liked how each cottage owner was introduced. And, I liked how the author explained the decorating reasoning and processes of the home owners. Some of these cottages were vacation homes and were decorated with second-hand and flea market finds, as well as inherited and re-purposed items. I was intrigued by the inventiveness of the owners in making the cottages livable and comfortable homes. Each cottage reflected the cottagers creative style whether put together on a dime, or by more expensive renovations. I liked the often eclectic mix of decorating styles assembled within a cottage by the homeowner. While I'm more of a "shabby-chic" kinda gal, I heartily enjoyed reading about how the English decorate their cottages. I have to say that Americans have a very different idea of English cottages than do the English themselves!

This is a nice book. Not exactly what I was looking for. The cottages in this volume are a little too rustic for me, but I can see the English desire to maintain these quaint structures and keep them alive by actually dwelling in them probably has saved many from demolition and that is always a good thing when it comes to living history.

Another book of lots of nice pictures, brought to printing by the fashion for cottages and nesting. Admittedly, the pictures don't look as staged as most books on the subject. It actually looks like someone lives in most of them, and that the houses were not all done by a decorator or owned by Yuppies.In it there is the traditional cottage as home, not always a carefully edited display. Some of the homes appear very comfortable and refreshingly worn around the edges, homes where you could put your [stocking] feet up on the furniture and leave a newspaper on the floor while you took a nap. Still very nicely done, though.This would be a fine book for someone just starting out on the English Cottage path. Yet I have to admit that, after reading eight or ten books on the same theme, this book represented no new territory. Perhaps the best thing to do would be to buy just this book, and maybe one more, so that its appeal remains fresh for the reader.

I already had a copy of this book and loved It so I decided to purchase it for my friend for her birthday as she is also 'home interior' mad. She too loves it. Lots of pictures and information and a really enjoyable book to browse through giving you hundreds of ideas. This was a second hand book but it was like brand new, thank you. Great purchase and seller.

If you want ideas for your country home, this is the book to buy. It replaces months worth of Country Living magazines all in one binding. Photographs are clear, colourful and plenty. Country homes aren't always conventional in that they often have quirky corners and wonky walls, this book visits these types of homes and shows what other people have done with such spaces. If you have a room that you're struggling to arrange, the book will give you some inspiration as to how to arrange your collections and decide upon your interior decorating.It will remain my coffee table book for a long time to come!

This book is beautiful - the photography excellent and some of the settings were lovely - the only downside for me is that these were cottages bought and 'done up' by people with lots of money (not necessarily taste!) and I wanted to see 'proper' cottages - those that are truly 'lived in' and not used as holiday or show homes!Good inspiration though

I think the rule with Ros Byam Shaw is to buy two books on the trot and not three. Most people loved this book, but were perhaps just a little less appreciative of her fairly recent Farmhouse publication. For me it was the other way round. I absolutely adored the Perfect English and the Farmhouses, but found this one just a little less to my taste. Lovely, but didn't quite hit the same spot as the other two. Perhaps I overdosed.

I have several of Ros Byam Shaw's books. Always a bit worried that the photos might overlap, but the books are distinctively different enough to lust after the next set of beautiful imagery.Good quality and timeless, classy yet unpretentious style that is imaginative, liveable in, and very British.