John and Sherry Petersik have fun with their new coloring book. (Photo by Beth Furgurson)
They founded a hugely successful home design blog, have written two New York Times bestsellers, have designed a line of home accessories for Target and recently launched a podcast. So what’s next for John and Sherry Petersik of Young House Love? An adult coloring book, of course.
“Color at Home: A Young House Love Coloring Book” will be released Oct. 4 by Paige Tate & Co. Illustrated by Joan Borawski, the 74-page book features a wide range of rooms in different styles just waiting for your color inspiration.
More than simply a way to zone out and give your Crayolas a workout, the book also offers design exercises, basic information on color theory, and color advice. “At first we weren’t sure what we could bring to this medium,” Sherry says. “The more we thought about it, we saw this could be a really fun way for people to experiment with color schemes.”
The duo began work on the book last February, compiling collages of photos and items they wanted in the rooms and sending them off to Borawski, who translated them to line drawings that could be filled in with color. “We would then color them on the computer to quickly see how they would look,” Sherry says, “or I would print them out and my daughter and I would color them.”
Fans of Young House Love will also recognize some of the rooms pictured in the illustrations — they were taken from the Petersiks' own home. Others are completely imaginary. “It was a lot of fun to think about how [a room] would look in two dimensions, and what would be fun to color.”
Daughter Clara’s bedroom even makes an appearance. “She colored her room in rainbow colors,” Sherry says. “I wish I could be that fearless with color. You can take it as seriously — or as not seriously — as you like.”
