Pottery Barn Bathrooms (Pottery Barn Design Library)

Over the past 50 years, Pottery Barn has developed a reputation as a home furnishing chain with its own distinctive, elegant designs. Intended for both the serious re-modeler and the aspirational dreamer, Pottery Barn Bathrooms does a thorough job of explaining the elements that make a bathroom comfortable and stylish enough to serve as a private retreat or communal spa. Each of its ten chapters is devoted to a single subject (fixtures, lighting, color, windows). After a quick overview of basic issues related to each topic, readers are invited to tour spectacular bathrooms through luscious photos and text explaining the color palette, room plan, and materials used. While the rooms tend toward the high end in terms of materials and available space, there’s a wealth of useful advice throughout that would be welcome to almost anyone looking to spice up an existing bathroom or planning to build a new one. --David Bombeck