Sabrina Soto Home Design: A Layer-by-Layer Approach to Turning Your Ideas into the Home of Your Dreams [Paperback]

Sabrina Soto (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 24, 2012

A simple, step-by-step design process from popular HGTV personality and Target style expert Sabrina Soto

People want their homes to look the way they do in their imaginations—beautiful colors, stylish furniture, and attractive lighting, with ample storage for all their stuff. The thing that stands between most homeowners and the home design they dream of is the lack of a simple, effective decorating process. They have the ideas, but they're hungry for the "how." In this accessible design manual, Sabrina Soto helps you realize your design visions one step at a time.

In Sabrina Soto Home Design, each chapter represents one decorating "layer," such as color or furnishings. Following along with the chapters , you'll build a design component by component. Packed with useful and time-tested tips and shortcuts like those Sabrina features on her TV shows and website, the book also shows you how to save money, time, and effort without sacrificing style.

• The process works for any room, or for a whole house, and applies to any decorating style
• Sabrina's high-energy approach and let's-make-this-fun attitude make the book both informative and entertaining
• Sabrina is one of TV's most popular celebrity designers, appearing on Extreme Makeover Home Edition, The High-Low Project, Get It Sold!, Bang for Your Buck, Real Estate Intervention, and HGTV'd.

Sabrina Soto Home Design gives you an easy-to-follow process that brings your own decorating ideas to life to create a stunning, personalized home design.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

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Exclusive Home Decoration Tips from author Sabrina Soto

Choosing artwork for your home can be tricky and tiresome! But here are some simple suggestions to help relieve the pressure.

• Keep the style of your décor in mind when making your selection. You don't want your artwork to clash with existing items in your room; so, if your room is traditional, stick with traditional artwork. The same applies for modern, rustic or contemporary rooms.
  
  
• Buy artwork that is proportional to other pieces in your room. You want to create a sense of visual balance. Be careful not to choose pieces that are too large or too small for your space. A good rule of thumb is that your art work should be 60% to 75% the width of what you are hanging it over. So if your sofa is 80" wide then your art work should be no more than 60" wide.
  
  
• If you cannot afford large pieces of art, choose a series of smaller pieces that you can hang together in rows or collages.
  
  
• Avoid problems with glare by skipping the fancy frames and glass; unframed art is really popular right now and will add more depth to your space. Look for canvases stretched on frames, or prints on wood or metal backings. This will making shopping a little easier and often reduces the price of the piece.
  
  
• Always hang your art at eye level, no matter how tall your walls are. This will ensure the artwork will draw just the right amount of attention.
  
  
• Most importantly, buy what makes you happy; buy what you love!
  

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From the Inside Flap

Sabrina Soto's simple, step-by-step process for creating the home of your dreams

You want your home to look the way it does in your imagination—beautiful colors, stylish furniture, attractive lighting, and ample storage for all of your stuff. Whether you can see bits and pieces of it in your mind, or you are just inspired by a color or a texture and aren't sure how to turn it into an effective design, the thing that stands between most people and the home design they dream of is the lack of a simple, effective decorating process. If you have the ideas but are hungry for the "how," Sabrina Soto can help you realize your design visions one step at a time.

In this book, Sabrina shares with you her process of design, beginning with a cold, hard look at the space—an honest evaluation of who lives there, how you want to use the room, and your personal tastes and preferences. Once you've identified your design goals, she shows you how to tackle each "layer," such as color or furnishings. Following along with the chapters, you'll build a cohesive home design layer by layer.

Packed with useful and time-tested tips and shortcuts like those Sabrina features on her TV shows and website, as well as visual guides to different styles of furniture, fixtures, and other design elements, the book also shows you how to save money, time, and effort—without sacrificing style.

There's no time like the present, and no method like layering, to unleash your creativity and create a stunning home.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: Wiley; 1 edition (April 24, 2012)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1118100786
• ISBN-13: 978-1118100783
• Product Dimensions: 10 x 8 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (53 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #24,031 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #26 in Books > Professional & Technical > Architecture > Interior Design
  • #51 in Books > Crafts, Hobbies & Home > Home Improvement & Design > Home Decorating & Design > Interior Design > Decorating

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Great "Go-To" Book April 16, 2012

By Weezer

Format:Paperback

I have her book on my living room table just as i have my favorite cookbook in my kitchen. Yes, I have an imagination of my own but it's nice to just flip a page and WaLa!! Sabrina has a certain spunk to her (like on her shows) that almost comes alive through the pages. The images in the book are just lovely, vibrant and inspirational. More often than not decorating books are just eye candy. Once I read them, i'm either satisfied, dissapointed or just DONE. Like i said in my title, this is an everyday "Go-To" book. Enjoy!!

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Good book, but missing some key info July 15, 2012

By E!

Format:Paperback

I love Sabrina Soto and have watched her on HGTV's "Get It Sold", "Real Estate Intervention", and "Hi Low Project", so I am surprised about some if the information she left out of this book.

First the good part: She does a good job of giving very broad concepts such as define what you want to feel in your room, sketch out the living space, and proceed from there to pick a color, furniture, texture, and accessories. There are also some good hints like arranging accessories in odd numbers, etc.

I felt she missed the mark in the color area because she mentions how many people are afraid of choosing color but doesn't do much more than state some moods evoked by certain colors and lists a couple examples of popular design color combinations. I think she should have illustrated more on how she decides on a color, listed some of her favorite popular colors (there are several she mentioned as using over and over in her TV shows), and finally taken examples of rooms she was making over and following the process from the beginning to the end with pictures and commentary. There are finished project photos but they arent my favorite illustrations of design work and dont provide much help if the point of the book is to aid in design step-by-step. Another thing I feel she needs to go into more detail with the the concepts she talks about. Her rules are stated in very broad terms and don't help much besides giving people an idea and why she thinks it is useful in most chapters. If she is directing this at all experience levels of readers, she definitely needs to go into more detail on her concepts. Finally she needs to help with the accessorizing step more than saying accessories smaller than grapefruits can make a room look cluttered and the like. It would have been helpful I'd she had said how she decides on the shape, color, texture, and placement of these accessories. Something as simple as a lamp for the nightstand sounds easy until you ae faced with a room full of lamps of all sizes, shapes, and colors and there is no guidance on how to choose which fits the space. This book is a fairly good read but leaves out some really important information needed to put it's concepts into practice.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars LOVE this book! April 18, 2012

By CSM

Format:Paperback

This book is amazing! Beautifully illustrated with SO much info that you just want to linger over each page. Sabrina has really packed all of her design knowledge into this manual -- it's the ultimate road map to perfecting your home design. The book is broken down into eight chapters or "layers", i.e., planning your design, colors, surface treatments, integrating storage, editing furniture, textiles, lighting and accents, which makes it easy to look for the design component you are trying to master. The narrative is conversational yet authoritative, and Sabrina manages to let her vivacious personality shine - even through text! If you like watching her shows on HGTV, you'll love reading this book.

This isn't simply a how-to book, but a gold mine of decorating ideas and a springboard for formulating your personal decorating style. I think the best part is, she incorporates her HGTV High-Low experience by offering design tips that don't break the bank. She says you don't HAVE to buy one-of-a-kind pieces to make your home perfection, you just have to learn how to "edit" what you have to create your dream design. This book breaks down the design process for any budget, any space, and any style -- it's the best decorating book I've purchased, well worth the money!