Useful.Beautiful is written by Laura O. You could say I was born to be a design geek. Daughter of a furniture turned car designer, and a mother who was always creating from scraps of fabric, wool, paper, in fact anything she could get her hands on, I grew up surrounded by creativity. Fast forward a few years and I now have a Masters in Art History from the University of St Andrews specialising in the decorative arts, and am just finishing a research Masters in Design History from the University of Oxford. This blog is my way of sharing all the beautiful design I see and am inspired by, and hopefully of creating a community of like minded folk who can open my eyes to more that I haven't yet seen. I hope you enjoy and please do get in touch with suggestions for future content.

Oh, and 'useful beautiful'? I was hugely inspired by William Morris and in fact used the work of the Arts and Crafts Movement as a focus for my undergraduate dissertation. He said 'have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful'. Well quite. I couldn't agree more. It seemed fitting for a site dedicated to the designed environment.