White Hot: Cool Colors for Modern Living

by Tricia Guild

Book Overview

An acknowledged international virtuoso of color design creates a modern palette for the millennium--an adventure in home simplicity. 250 color photos. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0609604937
• Release Date: October 1999
• Publisher: Clarkson Potter
• Length: 224 Pages
• Weight: 3.15 lbs.
• Dimensions: 12.0" x 1.0" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

Your Arctic Sanctuary

The author states her favorite colors of the moment are "slate-gray, purply-grape, lavender, chartreuse, and aqua". You will see quite a lot of these colors when looking through her book "White Hot". I live in east Texas which is a sweltering sauna for 6-7 months out of the year. I prefer to use cool decorating colors because they give the impression of, well....coolness. Walking into a room full of frosty blues, chilly lavenders, and watery aquas after being out in the hot stickiness is so refreshing. Guild's book presents ideas about how to use a vast spectrum of cool colors together so that you have both contrast AND harmony. I would have to describe her photos as having a "chilly vibrance". The look is absolutely frosty and yet it is very vivid and interesting. I would call the furnishings and arrangements "eclectic"; maybe not what you would have or want in your own home, but the point of this book is to show the potential of cool colors and I think that goal is accomplished.

The Power of Color to Inspire

I bought "White Hot" almost the minute it came out, after seeing it on display at the Pottery Barn. I should say at the outset that my taste in color and decor coincides with that of the author, so I was thrilled to finally find a decorator who spoke to my aesthetic sensibility. As a watercolor painter, I adore Tricia Guild's romance with color and her exploration of beauty in simple, natural objects. I frequently keep her book open and find that each time I study the photographs of rooms, I get new ideas. The author quite deliberately chose to avoid making a "how to" guidebook. This book is not designed to give ideas for projects, or tell you what to put with what, but rather is designed to inspire and to trigger the reader's imagination and empower a person to tap their own subconscious creativity and come up with solutions for their living spaces. To me, decorating and design are processes that grow and cumulate organically, at different paces for different individuals. In my opinion, Guild is something of a decorating midwife, helping the reader tune into their own design vocabulary and re-imagine their space by being able to perceive space, color and objects in different ways.Unlike many other books which I have tired of, I regularly look through the pages, which are meditative and relaxing in their beauty and tranquility. If you like Cirque du Soleil, you are going to love Ms. Guild's work. There is a magical quality to all of her work. I view her book much as I view "The Artist's Way" by Julia Cameron, because this is ultimately a visual workbook. Many of her ideas are democratic and easily accessible- the placement of plants, the use of pillows, fabric, wood, ceramics, and the rhythm of color combination. It is a far more right-brained approach, and one that enabled me to look at my space and get past the "stuckness" I had in seeing the same objects in the same way. As a result of using her books and getting a feng shui consultation, I redid my entire apartment, which I veiw as my work-in-progress. My inspriation came in spurts, sometimes in 14-hour long passionate bouts of rearranging. I had many ideas for re-imagining my space, and also was better able to conceptualize room arrangement.I was able to edit and groom my belongings in ways I never thought previously possible, and found that I had far greater confidence in making purchases of new things for my apartment. Guild's book trains you to see your space as a living, breathing, mutable canvas to which ordinary objects are orchestrated into a symphony of color, form and texture. The spiritual component of this approach to decorating is that one does not envy what Ms. Guild has or uses. Guild's approach is not to aim for perfection, or to motivate the reader to do the same. If there is a perfection in style embodied in her book, its goal is to coach, to challenge, and to inspire the user to groom his or her belongings, much as one treats oneself to a spa, to appreciate the

Brainstorming high quality art book!

From the moment I received this book I have loved it, as it is. For me it is a beautiful artwork about how your home can look and be, it is very inspiring and shows a lot of what you can do with light and nuances in your home. I think it is a bit unfare to say it doesn't tell you 'how to' - it is not a how to book, it is intended as inspiration, not that I know Tricia Guild but it is usually the purpose of books of this kind. It does tell you, however that color works different ways in different light and that I see as a definite 'how to' hint..As inspiration and setting your mind to work it is assume!

Colorful and Lively and Fun...

Looking with the other reviews written, I do see their sense of frustration in wanting more practical ways to decorate a home, however I felt it needed to be seen in a postive light as well. It is a very artful book, and I don't believe the author intended it to be a "How To" as much as it was intended to be lively, inspiring, "get-you-to-think" type of book. It has beautifully tipped-in pages, and is a very high quality book. I am a graphic artist, and I bought it for the book's design as I did for its content. If you would like a wonderful coffee-table type book, as well as some inspiration for decorating, you should enjoy this book!