The Natural Home: Living the Simple Life [Hardcover]

Tricia Foley (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 16, 1995

Known for her romantic yet simple style, Tricia Foley presents a guide to decorating with natural fibers and materials, neutral colors, and an eye toward the environment. The definitive guide to creating a fresh, uncluttered natural atmosphere in four areas of the home: the bed and bath, the kitchen, the living room, and the outdoors.Full-color photographs.

Editorial Reviews

From the Inside Flap

Known for her romantic yet simple style, Tricia Foley presents a guide to decorating with natural fibers and materials, neutral colors, and an eye toward the environment. The definitive guide to creating a fresh, uncluttered natural atmosphere in four areas of the home: the bed and bath, the kitchen, the living room, and the outdoors.Full-color photographs.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 96 pages
• Publisher: Clarkson Potter; 1 edition (May 16, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0517596687
• ISBN-13: 978-0517596685
• Product Dimensions: 10 x 7.6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #304,071 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

21 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars a plea for tranquility in a caffeinated world, April 6, 1998

By 

[e-mail] (Salt Lake City, Utah) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Natural Home: Living the Simple Life (Hardcover)

As someone who has moved 20 times in the last 16 years (due to job relocation, divorce, and the ever-increasing costs of apartments), the trappings of a settled life have rarely been obtainable. As is too well known to many of us, apartment life does not lend itself to creativity manifesting itself in the removal of carpet or the ragging of walls in the newest shades of peridot and cranberry. And the homes displayed in many inspiring magazines are a cause for scorn to many struggling to simply keep the home one has. Ms. Foley's excellent work not only encourages thriftiness by advocating the use of furnishings already in one's possession, but demonstrates that the color schemes so often inflicted by rental managers can be soothing rather than monotonous. I have finally purchased a home after too many years of wandering, and have used many of the techniques she describes to make that home a place of comfort and calm rather than a collection of oversized boxes for the storage of "things". Her enthusiasm for the reuse of furniture, the salvaging of discards and those pieces abandoned in attics not only aids the environment but can help to preserve a sense of family continuity in a world where parent and child are often divided by thousands of miles after graduation. After the death of my grandmother, I willingly accepted the dusty contents of her basement; chairs and chests and other things that had been brought to this country by my Hungarian and Irish ancestors 120 years ago. No Christie's find could match the feeling of history stirred in me by those things, and Ms. Foley's book encourages such reclamation.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Required read for anyone who has ever wanted to start over, July 11, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: The Natural Home: Living the Simple Life (Hardcover)

Three cheers for Tricia Foley's new book "The Natural Home," a guide for anyone who has every wanted to tear up carpeting and start all over again crating a living space that is truely his or her own in tune with nature and brimming with cottage appeal. Within its pages, Foley preaches a wholistic approach to creating a gentler lifestyle using Mother Nature as interior designer.

Georgeously photographed by Michael Skott with text by Jill Kirchner, Foley has laid out a "how to" guide for living well. Her's is a kind of recipe book for a beautiful life.

Here we find how tos of using natural fibers and objecs that hold meaning not those which can be simply purchased.

Instead of investing in yards of brocase drapery fabrice of ankle thick carpeting, Foley's approach is clean, spare and almost Shakeresque in simplisity and functionality. A place for everything and everything perfectly placed as she shows us the way of sisal underfoot, cotton curtains fluttering at widowsills, pitchers of wildflower, coverlets of lace, hand made soaps and thick terry toweling.

Foley has produced the kind of book so pleasant, peaceful and welcoming that you'll want to take out a mortgage and move right in.

Here is Fung Shuie for Western sensibilities.

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Serenity Now!, March 27, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: The Natural Home: Living the Simple Life (Hardcover)

I too have moved often (26 times in 25 years). I am also a collector of old things, so I have accumulated a lot. I am also a Virgo which means I must have a connection with organic things. I am also originally from New Orleans which means I have a passion for the old, patinated, historical and verdant. Therefore, I loved Tricia Foley's philosophies. I have always loved color, but now I find myself wanting to unclutter and live simply. I've begun with my bed linens and clothing. Soon, my husband and I are relocating (another move!) and I want to incorporate much of the Natural Home in my new environment. While I will be unable to live with quite the sparcity of the homes pictured, the concept can certainly be modified to fit anyone's lifestyle. More? Less?, it's up to you. The book is a great starting place. Now I'm ordering Linens and Lace because I have chests full of antique linens,(my passion!), acquired thru family or collecting.