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Good morning (or afternoon, or evening, according to time zone!). This is an equally surreal as it is exciting week for me because, something I’ve been working on behind the scenes, an interiors book, is published tomorrow. So, today I thought I would take the opportunity to show you a preview and tell you a little of what you can expect to find within ‘Own Your Zone: Maximising Style & Space to Work & Live in the Modern Home‘. As the title suggests, it is a book about using zoning to build multifunctional purpose into your home, but I hope you will take a lot more away from it than a manual packed with design rules. Own Your Zone is an in-depth consideration of the way we live, what the home means, and how we can incorporate its modern functions whilst also expressing our style and enhancing well-being.
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Image: Own Your Zone: Maximising Style & Space to Work & Live in the Modern Home, published by Hardie Grant.
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Our homes fulfill so many functions in modern times. If you live in a modestly sized home it is likely you spend far more time in it than your predecessors when they were built, and many of our homes struggle to accommodate functionality that feels intuitive to our needs. Perhaps you work from home, as I have part-time for the last eight years, or you want to plan in leisure spaces that allow you to unwind and recharge but which don’t interrupt the flow of your space. If you live in a small space that needs to pack a lot in, or a bigger one that doesn’t quite make sense, this book is about creating a space that is full of your natural style without making accommodations to standard decisions that feel sterile, who said have your cake and eat it too?!?
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Images: Design Soda home photographed by Sarah Hogan for Own Your Zone: Maximising Style & Space to Work & Live in the Modern Home, published by Hardie Grant.
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Own Your Zone is also a coffee table book, full of beautiful and inspiring homes. I have been enormously lucky to have selected every image for the book and my guiding principle was that I wanted a book which would contain lots of different styles from a diverse collection of homeowners. All of them absolutely beautiful but none in the absolutely unattainable realm that many coffee table books provide. They are not all cut from the same style school either, whether you aspire to a Scandi-minimal space, or a bohemian maximalist one, you should find lots of beautiful ideas for how to translate these styles into your own home.
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Image: Own Your Zone: Maximising Style & Space to Work & Live in the Modern Home, published by Hardie Grant.
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I have also picked the brains of inspiring professionals to contribute expert tips within the book. You will find Joa Studholme, Farrow & Ball’s Colour Curator, providing expert knowledge on how to use colour in smaller homes, surface pattern designer Lizzie Evans, creator of Lizzie for SMUG, offering tips on working and living well from home, and architect Lizzie Ruinard, who heads neighbourhood studio, on how to build sustainability into our thinking when planning a space.
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Images: Design Soda home photographed by Sarah Hogan for Own Your Zone: Maximising Style & Space to Work & Live in the Modern Home, published by Hardie Grant.
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Those who have read my blog for a while will know that I have always been interested in the ways people interpret design to really work for their lifestyles and taste, often on a budget and unafraid to try the basics of diy. The book contains much practical knowledge you may expect on how to zone, how to interrogate your use of space, how to work with your architecture and how to maximise perception of space alongside maintaining flow, but it cuts deeper too. It is a conversation between you and I, which I hope will help you to find the styles and colours which make a home feel joyful to you. After all, whilst we may ask far more from modern hard-working homes, they still need to feel like our homes, our havens of sanctuary from the outside world, and they need to spark joy. I hope this book helps you decide how you can make your home-work-life-balance simpler, more enjoyable, and more beautiful.
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Image: Design Soda home photographed by Sarah Hogan for Own Your Zone: Maximising Style & Space to Work & Live in the Modern Home, published by Hardie Grant.
Image: Own Your Zone: Maximising Style & Space to Work & Live in the Modern Home, published by Hardie Grant.
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And, just like a book, what is a blog without a reader?! Whilst I don’t want to indulge in an Oscars-style acceptance speech it would be remiss not to mention my appreciation to you, this book would not have existed without you accompanying me and engaging with me along the way. Whether you have been reading my blog since we started decorating our flat in Tooting in 2013, or are a recent reader (welcome!), thank you. I am thrilled to say, that thanks to pre-orders, Own Your Zone made it to No.2 on Amazon’s ‘Hot New Releases’ in Interiors & Architecture last week. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it (although as my family may attest, as I approached the 40,000 word mark at New Year, I may be stressful to live with whilst perusing a passion, thank you for your patience Dan and Ted!).
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‘Own Your Zone Maximising Style & Space to Work & Live in the Modern Home’ is published on Thursday September 29th by Hardie Grant books, RRP £18.00. You can pre-order a copy on Amazon here, or a signed edition from Foyles here.
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Images: Design Soda home photographed by Sarah Hogan for Own Your Zone: Maximising Style & Space to Work & Live in the Modern Home, published by Hardie Grant.
