Literature is very much a source of inspiration for the kitchens we design at Johnny Grey Studios, whether to conjure creativity or explore how the latest neuroscience research might affect kitchen design. Here’s a list of several food and garden books Johnny has picked up this year, and he recommends you do the same. (And if you missed this last year, make sure to check out Johnny’s Most Delicious Reads from 2010.)

Since our outdoor kitchen for Alitex was opposite Cleve West’s show garden at the Chelsea Flower Show, Johnny decided to go to Cleve’s talk about his new book Our Plot at Petersham Nurseries, near Richmond. Starting out gardening an allotment, Cleve ended up living there during the day, cooking and eating in a simple but sociable way with his newly-found extended family of gardeners. Our Plot details this with charm.

Dan Pearson’s newly published Home Ground: Sanctuary in the City is garden writing verging on poetry with photography to match. Colour in the Garden by Val Bourne, a subject Johnny always wants to learn more about, is very useful. Nicole de Vésian Gardens: Modern Design in Provence by Louisa Jones is inspirational and, from the English side of the Channel, a pleasurable fantasy.

There are two pillars of modern eating, according to Adam Gopnik author of The Table Comes First: the restaurant and the recipe.  We’d like to add a third, the sociable home kitchen, which captures our core idea of kitchen design based on instinct.

Build your own bread oven: Johnny’s family did. Build Your Own Earth Oven by Kiko Denzer is about the one most worth having, simply produced and usable.

Egon Ronay, a biography edited by JGS client Peter Bazalgette, is the story of a Hungarian immigrant succeeding in bringing food awareness to a grim post-war Britain, which probably suffered one of the worst dearths of decent ingredients and cooking in modern peacetime.

At Elizabeth David’s Table. Though written almost sixty years ago, these recipes stand out. They are delicious, authentic to their country of origin, and take us armchair travelling to the ‘blessed sun and shores of the Mediterranean’, as Elizabeth says. Johnny keeps it by his stove.

Our desire for home design that speaks to the heart and gives comfort to the soul has never been stronger. Last weekend at Grand Designs Live, I joined designer, writer and TV presenter Kevin McCloud; Habitat creative director Theo Williams; and designer, author and TV presenter Naomi Cleaver in a panel, “Home is where the heart is: interior design with emotion.” (It’s not a coincidence the name of the seminar is eponymous with the title of Ilse Crawford’s recent book).

Kevin talked about his new book 43 Principles of Home, while Naomi discussed her own title, Joy of Home, and Theo Williams talked about the new direction for Habitat. I chose 10 books that highlight thinkers who have valuable insight into planning our homes, but who, for one reason or another, have not become prominent voices in the world of design. Here’s the list:

1. A Perfect Mess by Eric Abrahamson and David Freeman.

The antidote for those who want total control over their environments. Mess, it turns out, can be good for us. There are hidden benefits to disorder. Brace yourself for some undoing of shibboleths.

2. World of Goods: An anthropology of consumption by Mary Douglas and Baron Isherwood.

Our motives for purchasing goods are a thinly disguised communications system. We want to tell ourselves and others about who we are through buying things from clothes to furnishings.

3. Happiness by Richard Layard.
Fascinating, unorthodox insights into where, when. how and with whom we feel happy. Based on research from psychologists, neuroscientists, economists, sociologists and philosophers.

4. I’m Still Here by John Zeisel.
Zeisel is a leading neuroscientist and sociologist whose advanced approach to designing environments for Alzheimer’s sufferers offers many clues for home design.

5. Healing Spaces by Esther M. Steinberg.
Readable account covering the science of well-being and place based on the way our brains, emotions and hormones are hard wired. Moving and accessible with a lot of joined up thinking.

6. Wabi Sabi for artists, designers, poets and philosophers by Leonard Koren.

The Japanese concept of imperfection and understanding of nature’s explained as key to beauty, time and authentic environments. Straightforward language to the point of poetry and truly inspiring ideas.

7. The Art Instinct by Denis Dutton.

We are hard wired to art. Its not a nicety, more a necessity and it’s a relief to see this set out in such a comprehensive way. Using Darwin’s evolution theory as a basis, Dutton explains art as a motivation for creativity, our admiration for skill and our need for transcendence.

8. Alexander Technique by John Gray.

Explains its core tenet of how moving with economy can be achieved and its benefit for long-term body maintenance and well-being. Not quite yoga for westerners but along those lines and taught at many performing arts schools as essential for enhancing the performance of the body’s architecture.

9. The Craftsman by Richard Sennett.

Redefining craftsmanship in a civilised society through rigorous and original analysis; from the definition of 10,000 hours of work, skills that take you beyond technical ability, the appreciation of the hand and to exploring the philosophy applied to making things. It speaks to both practitioners and users alike.

10. House as a mirror of self by Clare Cooper Marcus.

Exploration of bonding with your home and garden, as a child and adult; what self-expression means as you evolve your relationship with home, living and working, privacy and going beyond the house as ego to the call of the soul. Cooper Marcus narrates moving interviews many householders from her base in San Francisco to form the basis of her research.

This weekend, we will launch our new furniture collection at Decorex interior design fair in London (September 26-29). The Modern Cottage kitchen is a coalition of opposing aesthetic concepts and it has been about playing with new ideas. We decided to build four new pieces of furniture, each one designed by a member of our design team. Miles designed the light dresser, Matt took the the sink cabinet, Leila created the cooking island (she also deserves credit as the mastermind of the entire show), and I was responsible for the Tree Corner cupboard and overall artistic direction. All pieces are experimental.

‘The Tree Corner cupboard. I designed this when I was around 7 years old. It has taken a while to gestate. The Holly trunk comes from my garden at my home in Hampshire, England.’

I am nervous about the outcome, but this is an exciting step in taking our design thinking to the next level, as happened with past shows in San Francisco, New York and Chicago. (See more on our exhibitions here.) Will it all add up to a coherent whole or feel like a bit of a hodge podge? I paid an early visit to Chris Height, who is building the Tree Corner cupboard, and chuckled. It had a sense of humour, but will anyone really want it in their home? Seeing the early progress on the cooking island also made me realize we have created a piece of furniture might feel at home in the Lord of the Rings with its craggy burr oak panels and glowing textured glass inserts.  The Light Dresser could have almost come out of 2001, A Space Odyssey. Light glows through its curved Corian back seamlessly into the countertop.

All in all, there is plenty to think about. If you manage to visit Decorex, please stop by and say hello.