Elan: The Interior Design of Kate Hume

The first book from celebrated interior and furniture designer Kate Hume.

Kate Hume's passion for interiors stems from her lifelong love affair with color and her respect for anything artisanal. Color, light, and texture inform all of Hume's projects to create a distinctive style that is casually luxurious; bold patterns are expressed in rich, elemental hues. Though color drives her design schemes, it is never dominant. For Hume there is no wrong color, only wrong combinations.

Hume's inimitable approach to design favors tactile materials such as linen, grass cloth, silk, jute, and impeccably sourced homespun fabrics. Unabashedly mixing different furniture genres, Hume prefers vintage over brand-new, considering for instance the best dining tables to look as if they've witnessed countless lunches and dinners. That is why she and her husband and collaborator, Frans van der Heijden, design their own pieces from sandblasted wood and brushed timbers where signs of age already exist. Exquisitely employing beautifully crafted furniture, intriguing objects, engaging color schemes, and seductive, ambient lighting, Hume consistently demonstrates her mastery of eclectic, warm, and sophisticated design.

Linda O'Keeffe has been involved in design for over three decades, including sixteen years as the creative director at Metropolitan Home magazine. She currently contributes to a variety of shelter and architecture publications and is the author of Heart and Home: Rooms That Tell Stories.