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The most interesting, intriguing and truly stylish interiors are those that best reflect their owners´ lifestyle, enthusiasms, memories, talents and skills.

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English Eccentric celebrates that interplay, visiting the homes of artists and designers, a director of wildlife documentaries, a hairdresser, a politician, and a ringmaster - people with a strong sense of the visual and the courage and flair to be original. Ros Byam Shaw looks at 14 different homes in a wide variety of styles, from a tiny cottage packed with circus memorabilia, to an elegant country house full of stuffed animals. None of the interiors featured are at the extreme end of eccentricity but all of them provide a multiplicity of inspiring ideas, whether through their vibrant mix of colour and pattern, their imaginative use of space, their witty juxtapositions of old, new, upcycled and homemade, or their novel and eye-catching ideas for display. English Eccentric is a book about interiors that will amuse and inspire in equal measure, and about people whose creativity, rather than wealth, informs their take on interior design.

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Ros Byam Shaw is a celebrated interiors writer. She contributes to World of Interiors magazine and is the author of Perfect English, Perfect English Farmhouse, Farrow & Ball Living with Colour and the forthcoming Farrow & Ball Decorating with Colour (all Ryland Peters & Small). She lives in Colyton, Devon, UK with her husband and her dog.

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