Monochrome Home: Harmony, Balance, and the Elements of Modern Style

by Kelly Hoppen

Minimalist style interiors are now a familiar and recognizable part of today's visual culture. Top shelter magazines from Wallpaper and House and Garden to Elle Décor devote monthly features to the latest variation on white or beige, while fashion designers like Calvin Klein and Donna Karan design neutral housewares to match minimalist decor. Cheaper but no less stylish, Crate and Barrel, and Pottery Barn sell their own versions of minimalism, and countless upmarket European designer kitchen and furniture companies entice fashion conscious consumers with advertisements in leading shelter magazines.

Building on this trend, Monochrome Home presents designer Kelly Hoppen's innovative and breakthrough new approach to the next step beyond minimalist style interiors-by using dabs of color, texture, and dimension to establish a refined yet warm environment. A winner of Britain's "Oscars" of interior design, the prestigious Andrew Martin Award, she is considered, internationally, a leading interior designer.

The hallmark of the Hoppen bold, simple pieces of modern furniture mixed with an emphasis on texture and comfort; and counterpointing subtle neutral shades mixed with brighter dots of color to add a luxurious, sensual element to modern minimalist interiors.

Monochrome Home is a wonderful visual resource full of exquisite and original close-up photographs that detail Hoppen's brilliant editorial eye, combined with her talent for juxtaposing various elements to create dramatic, stunning effects.

Monochrome Home is a flexible and inspiring resource, suitable for small studios, or larger spaces. It is equally useful for those with small budgets or unlimited funds. For fans of minimalism who want more than anonymous white spaces, Monochrome Home describes in visual detail how to achieve a more personalized and inspired brand of minimalism-full of simplicity, elegance, comfort and style.

144 pages, Hardcover

First published January 5, 2002

Reviews

[Eric Byrd · Rating 1 out of 5]

Man is she boring! This book confirmed my suspicions. But I'm somewhat admiring of the way she's been able to personally brand a style so banal and anonymous, and of the obsessive, exaggerated degree to which she's mastered this very popular look--vaguely Japanese, but partaking of none of the rigorous virtues of really artful austerity. From my old job I got the sense that many people associate wealth with interiors that have an impeccable, hotel-ish impersonality. They want to get as far as possible from the "chaos and kitchen fumes of a middle-class dwelling," as Mandelstam would say. I remember how some clients had the designers pick out everything--even down to personal things like the art on the walls, the books the shelves and on the coffee table--and the finished homes were serene and cool, but totally bare of any personal or familial idiosyncracy. For all its suave perfection, the Hoppen style is ultimately gaudy--it's an arriviste declaration ("money has cleansed us").