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First look at my new book: Home The Way We Live Now

I’m excited to share with you a little preview of my new book that comes out at the end of April. I will be showing you more of the inside at a later day but for now I thought you might like to see how it works as it’s a bit different from the usual interiors book.

Home: The Way We Live Now small home, work from home, rented home by Kate Watson-Smyth
Home: The Way We Live Now small home, work from home, rented home by Kate Watson-Smyth

I was, as some of the older readers among you may  have realised, inspired by a cookery book from the 1970s by Arabella Boxer, who divided her pages into starters, mains and puddings. When discussing the content for this – way back in the depths of the first lockdown, I realised that the three subjects that affect most of us in some way or another are: Small Homes, Rented Homes and Working from Home. But it’s also true that those things overlap and in publishing a book that dealt with each element separately there would need to be a lot of flipping backwards and forwards. Instead, I proposed this format to my publisher Pavilion.

Because not all rented homes are small. And even large houses have small rooms. And while some of us have returned to the office, some of us never will and others have children who need space for studying.

I am eternally grateful to Lucy Smith, my editor, who rang me from her bus journey home the other day and said: “It’s been fun creating something so new and exciting but please let’s not do it again.”

And I agreed. For now.

As I said, I will share more details nearer publication but if you want to pre-order a copy then you can do so on Amazon here (I know many of you hate Amazon but that’s the one that counts towards bestseller lists – the dream – and rankings) and on Waterstones or in bookshops of your choice.

 

 

Kate Watson-Smyth

The author Kate Watson-Smyth

I’m a journalist who writes about interiors mainly for The Financial Times but I have also written regularly for The Independent and The Daily Mail. My house has been in Living Etc, HeartHome and featured in The Wall Street Journal & Corriere della Sera. I also run an interior styling consultancy Mad About Your House. Welcome to my Mad House.

7 Comments

  1. So exciting Kate! Congratulations – can’t wait to see it in the flesh (so to speak).

    Forgive my being the pedant here but it’s not only Amazon that counts towards the bestseller lists – they have their own lists of course, but the Big Bestseller Lists are drawn from Waterstones, independent bookshops and sites like bookshop.org or hive.co.uk – anywhere you can buy books in fact (except not gift shops, for some reason, so Oliver Bonas or Anthropologie don’t count towards the rankings).

    Anyway as I said apologies for the pedantry and bring on the book!! I have all your others so looking forward to adding this one to the collection.

  2. Congratulations on this milestone and accomplishment! Your insights are valuable and I am confident your book will be a success. Eager to read and absorb.

  3. I’ve pre-ordered it Kate. From Amazon!!! Can’t wait to read more of your great practical tips and ideas. Well done on the format… Great practical idea. Much luck to you, you deserve it after what must have been a Trojan effort!!

  4. Huge congratulations for doing something difficult, pushing the boundaries with the format to make it something truly useful and different from other interiors books. It looks great and I can’t wait to see it.

  5. I’ve pre-ordered it – I saw you flicking through it on Instagram and was smitten! What a brilliant idea… it’ll look pretty and be so so useful. Well done Kate. You rock. I’ve learned so much from you (and Sophie too on the podcast) but especially you. I’m much more confident in my choices. Thank you!

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