Rating: 
Summary: Great sense of style!
Review: The Christopher Lowell Show was my favorite thing to watch weekdays in between classes, so I nearly cried when Mediacom Cable took my Discovery Channel away!! But I still have my 7 Layers of Design book to read when I am suffering from Christopher Lowell withdrawal. The only downside to this book is that I've already seen most of the projects featured on his show - but I guess if I didn't have Christopher Lowell addiction it wouldn't be that way, eh? Anyway, it's nice for there to be an interior decorator with an inviting do-it-yourself attitude that actually has a fantastic sense of style! I can't stand the Martha-wannabe types who merely teach you how to hot glue some raffia to a rusty bucket. And what the hell is raffia anyway? Looks like straw to me. Christopher Lowell will teach you step-by-step how to turn any boring room into a luxurious and welcoming living space - without breaking the bank! Trust me, these tips work -- I followed his advice in my dorm room and never has a 10 X 12 white concrete cube looked so inviting - and all on a college student budget! (Now if only I could get the school to let me paint the walls...!)
Rating: 
Summary: I love this book!
Review: This book is everything and more than what I expected it to be. Christopher has excellent ideas, and isn't afraid to tell it like it is. I now have several projects that I am going to use from the book. I feel like I can jump right into my room now and get started, whereas before I was reluctant. I just didn't know where to begin. Now with the Seven layers, I know exactly what to do.
Rating: 
Summary: Fun and informative
Review: This is a fun book. However, if you already have furniture and can't afford to buy a lot more accessories, this might not be the book for you. He advises doing things in layers, which, in theory, is a great idea. I just don't have the time or money to do all the things he suggests. If you have an empty room and are starting from scratch with no paint or paper on the walls and can fill it with furniture and accessories, then this is great. Also, the big problem that I've noticed with some of these interior decorating books is that they don't offer a lot of different ideas. I have one book that has quite a few color palette ideas in the back and I've found that I use this a lot more, since it gives some definitive "use these colors to look coordinated" advice without being restrictive.
Rating: 
Summary: Need more layers
Review: What I liked about this book was that Lowell broke the decorating muddle down into seven simple layers. What I didn't like was that the layers needed to be more in-depth and more examples needed to be given, rather than use just one room to illustrate his decorating lessons. For example, in layer two discussing the placement of furniture, he did explain his placement for that particular room, but not for placement of furniture in other rooms with different configurations. It would have helped to have several examples of placement of furniture, taking into consideration traffic patterns, conversation areas, etc. So, although the pictures were beautiful, I felt that there should have been a greater variety of examples of how each of the principles applied in different types of rooms/homes.
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