Lonely Planet: Hidden Libraries by D.C. Helmuth
Review by Liz Dexter This attractive and heavily illustrated book covers fifty unusual libraries from around the world. Informative and rich, it celebrates libraries of all kinds, from mobile ones…
Dockland: Smokestacks and Slums: In the Shadows of British Industry, by Cedric Greenwood
Reviewed by Gill Davies I was intrigued by the title of this book, which didn’t announce itself as a traditional industrial history, and by its format – it looks rather…
Broken: Mending and Repair in a Throwaway World by Katie Treggiden
Review by Liz Dexter These are all menders and remakers working in collaboration with nature. They understand that as humans we are part of the natural world and that we…
Architecture, Homes & Gardens
Art & Design, Craft & Photography
History & Politics, Feminism, Sociology
Non Fiction
Lifestyle Revolution: How taste changed class in late 20th-century Britain by Ben Highmore
Review by Annabel Some years ago, our Shiny editor-at-large, Simon, reviewed a book by Ben Highmore called The Great Indoors. That book explored typical homes over the last century or so…
Suburbs: A Very Short Introduction by Carl Abbott
Review by Liz Dexter There are by now over 700 Very Short Introductions, on the Book of Common Prayer, the Brain, Modern Latin American Literature, Volcanoes, inter alia, and now…
The Story of the Country House by Clive Aslet
Reviewed by Harriet My definition of the country house is this: a work of domestic architecture in a rural location, surrounded by its own land (although not necessarily a landed…
A Room of Her Own: Inside the Homes and Lives of Creative Women by Robyn Lea
Review by Liz Dexter Robyn Lea has a theory that there is a new Renaissance happening among creative women, who are expressing themselves and their creativity in every aspect of…
Architecture, Homes & Gardens
Ecology & Environment, Natural World
History & Politics, Feminism, Sociology
Non Fiction
A Tomb With a View by Peter Ross
Reviewed by Gill Davies Just a few days ago my partner and fellow Shiny reviewer Basil Ransome Davies found a new walk to do in these times of Covid-inspired local…
In the Garden; Essays on Nature and Growing
Review by Hayley Anderton This is the first of the Daunt Books essay collections that I’ve read and I’m mostly impressed. The quality of the individual essays is universally high…
Follies: An Architectural Journey by Rory Fraser
Reviewed by Liz Dexter A delightful little book put out by a relatively new publisher founded in 2017 with a rather intriguing list, this would make a lovely gift for…
The Author’s Effects by Nicola J. Watson
Reviewed by Harriet This splendid and fascinating book – subtitled ‘On Writer’s House Museums’ – has been a long time in the making, and is certainly none the worse for…
Square Haunting by Francesca Wade
Review by Karen Langley “Square Haunting” was published to much fanfare and acclaim recently; a book which looks at the lives of five notable women centred around a specific Bloomsbury…
Futurekind: Design by and for the People by Robert Phillips
Review by Liz Dexter Robert Phillips is a senior tutor on the Design Products course at the Royal College of Art, as well as being an award-winning product designer in…
Architecture, Homes & Gardens
Art & Design, Craft & Photography
Biography & Memoir, Diaries
Non Fiction
Walter Gropius: Visionary Founder of the Bauhaus by Fiona MacCarthy
Review by Rob Spence It probably doesn’t occur to many people as they struggle to fix bolt B to batten F of the Ikea flatpack wardrobe that the exercise in…
The Adventures of Owen Hatherley in the Post-Soviet Space by Owen Hatherley
Review by Karen Langley Author Owen Hatherley has carved out a niche for himself as one of the UK’s foremost commentators on matters architectural and political; his work exists at…
The Long Weekend by Adrian Tinniswood
Reviewed by Harriet This gorgeous book is subtitled ‘Life in the English Country House Between the Wars’, and certainly that is part of its subject. But it’s a book with…
The Reluctant Hostess by Ethelind Fearon
Reviewed by Simon I have a definite weakness for spoof etiquette guides and the like – such as Bed Manners, reviewed in the third issue of Shiny New Books – and…
Nairn’s London by Ian Nairn
Reviewed by Karen Langley Ian Nairn was a regular TV presence in the 1960s and 1970s, but faded out of view towards the end of his life. Born in 1930,…
The Great Indoors by Ben Highmore
Reviewed by Simon If, like me, you have spent many hours of your life watching TV programmes about how to build, renovate, sell, or buy a house, you will probably…
The Making of Home by Judith Flanders
Reviewed by Harriet One of the most important distinctions made by Judith Flanders in this fascinating book is that between the concepts of house and home. While a house is…
The Gardens at Brantwood: Evolution of John Ruskin’s Lakeland Paradise by David Ingram
Reviewed by Barb Scharf. “It comes as something of a surprise to most people to consider Ruskin the Gardener. Ruskin has been much written about as an art critic and…
The Hermit in the Garden: From Imperial Rome to Ornamental Gnome by Gordon Campbell
Reviewed by Barb Scharf If you were a member of the English aristocracy residing in Shropshire in the Georgian era, late 1700s to early 1800s, you might well have received…
Herbaceous by Paul Evans
Reviewed by Barb Scharf HERBACEOUS adj resembling or having the nature of herbs (any non-woody seed-bearing plant which dies down to the ground after flowering but whose roots etc. survive);…
Vita Sackville-West’s Sissinghurst by Vita Sackville-West & Sarah Raven
Reviewed by Rachel Fenn Sissinghurst is the sort of place that you can’t help but fall in love with at first sight, even if you have absolutely no interest in…