Designs for Living: A Canadian Home Decorating Guide

Janet Arnett is the former campus manager of adult education at Ontario’s Georgian College. She is the author of Antiques and Collectibles: Starting Small, The Grange at Knock, and 673 Ways to Save Money.

Kemp assumes that her readers know the look they would like to achieve
with their interior-decorating efforts and want only to know how to
achieve it with a minimum of expense.

The guide gives fairly detailed information on dollar-stretching as it
applies to painting, wallpapering, lighting, covering floors, and
selecting fabrics. Practical and money-saving suggestions are clustered
by room type or situation—home, office, or apartment, for example. The
whole is capped with a chapter of hints on successful shopping at garage
sales and auctions.

The underlying theory that Kemp promotes for achieving affordability is
to go slowly, choose wisely the first time, and know your own
preferences and ambitions. This is supplemented with a generous helping
of detailed directions for everything from sponge painting a wall to
covering a lampshade and making a shower curtain. The special decorating
constraints faced by tenants receive consideration throughout the work.

This guide’s weaknesses are its murky black-and-white photos and an
unfortunate tendency to sneak in little commercials for product
suppliers. The latter undermine much of the integrity of the
recommendations.

Its strengths are its informal, approachable style, the quantities of
advice that pack every chapter and the emphasis on Canadian sources.