Alexandra Stoddard

We can finish a house, but never a home. Once you fall in love with a house, you find continual pleasures in fixing it up and making innovations that satisfy your creature's comforts.

Feeling at home with ourselves and being able to create a spirit of place that nourishes us physically, emotionally and spiritually is a goal worthy of our highest priority.

My grandfather was a Methodist preacher, and my father was an unsuccessful businessman. We didn't have status or wealth.

When you leave a beautiful place, you carry it with you wherever you go.

If we could make our house a home, and then make it a sanctuary, I think we could truly find paradise on Earth.

We have to establish time boundaries and learn how to say no.

Our home, just like our garden, evolves. We experiment, try out different things and new colors until we feel content. Try to keep the metaphor of home as garden in your consciousness.

You're not going to be dreary on the inside if you're not dreary on the outside.

A home should be an intimate autobiography of the things that you like. One of the things I'm so keen on expressing is that, if you don't do it for yourself, if you're always seeking affirmation from outside, you'll never have a home. It'll just be a house.

Colors are important. People are in clinical depression whether they are on medication or not. Neutrals are another form of medication.

I'm an interior designer from the soul. It's not about just putting things in a room. It's much deeper and broader. It's about self-discovery.

You learn to give up what's not working and surround yourself with things you love - not what's correct or proper.