Good news: I just received the Clarkson Potter Spring 08 catalog and we’ve been given two full color pages to promote “Stylish Sheds and Elegant Hideaways.”

This puts us smack in the middle of very good company. Stylish Sheds is featured between “Chocolate Epiphany,” by famed pastry chef Francois Payard, and “Living like Ed,” by Ed Begley Jr. (Hollywood’s eco-guru).

A preliminary cover design (see above) features a fantastic cedar potting shed in the Seattle garden of our friend Joan Enticknap. I have a feeling this isn’t the final cover, because when art director Marysarah Quinn needed to create a cover for this catalog in early April, she had photography from only 10 of the book’s locations to choose from. But the inviting spirit of Joan’s gem of a shed appeals to me – and I wanted to share it here.

“Shedistas,” by Alexander Brooks (10)

“Sheds,” by Benjamin Brooks (15)

 

When we were going through all the hoopla to figure out the cover art (not to mention the book title), my sons created their own book covers for me. I’ve had their sketch with Benjamin’s “Sheds” and Alexander’s “Shedistas” cover ideas taped to my computer during the grueling process of writing 50,000 words (these drawings are accompanied by some wordsmithing, including possible alternatives to the adjective “Stylish,” including “sensational,” “sublime,” “superb,” “saucy,” “spicy,” and – this is an odd one – “syncopated.”)

The effort my family has invested to help us create this book has always put a smile on my face. And thank goodness for children who naturally simplify the things we adults find complex. After all, why are we grownups drawn to backyard sheds? I think it’s to recapture those fleeting moments of childhood joy when we hunkered down in the playhouse or climbed a rickety ladder to the tree house Dad constructed.

This is a favorite quote of mine, which explains in part what I wanted to explore in Stylish Sheds:

“All really inhabited space bears the essence of the notion of home . . . . We travel to the land of ‘Motionless Childhood,’ motionless the way all immemorial things are. We live fixations, fixations of happiness. We comfort ourselves by reliving memories of protection.” (Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space)

On location in Atlanta in early July — a hot, humid summer day after photographing our 34th location.

 

We’re done, we’re done, we’re done!!! As of today, when I finished writing the dedication and acknowledgements, the manuscript for Stylish Sheds and Elegant Hideaways is complete (oh, except for 200-plus photo credits, but who’s counting?).

This book project has been so fulfilling, so inspiring and motivating as Bill Wright and I have journeyed around the country to find, photograph and interview owners, designers, architects, builders, artists and shed aficionados.  We can’t have enough of it!

The book has finally been listed for advanced sales on Random House’s web site, so it feels real. That we’re still in design and editing is a mere hurdle to overcome.

Now, what I really want to do is finish moving into my house. The one that I’ve neglected for a full year. The one with white walls, no hung artwork and bare windows. Oh, and the “inherited” garden that’s been somewhat neglected. But that’s another chapter: figuring out how to grow plants in SoCal’s dry, hot climate.