Books I’ve written
The Power Age
Murdoch Books, 2019
The Power Age is a celebration of growing older for women not willing to sit back and become invisible. Revel in your personal style, maximise your health and wellbeing, love what you do and find your favourite ways to connect and give back.
Featuring dozens of interviews and words of wisdom from women working their power age, including former New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark, designer Leona Edmiston and food legend Maggie Beer, as well as exquisite illustrations by Jessica Guthrie and photographs of the most outstanding of older icons, The Power Age is your guide to navigating midlife and beyond with power and panache.
Minxy Vintage
Murdoch Books, 2011
‘Kelly Doust introduces readers to her wonderful world of reviving and customizing vintage pieces, with tips on how to find, buy, clean, repair and salvage vintage clothing… Minxy Vintage is a great guide for anyone who wants to bring their crafting and sewing skills to create personal and individual pieces from budget vintage finds, while bringing a modern and unique twist to wearing vintage clothes.’
– Dita Von Teese
‘Kelly Doust is a girl after my own heart, reinventing vintage finds to suit her personal style. Her book is a vintage vixen’s guidebook for the chic: just read, shop, recreate, and repeat. Her finds are exquisite and her reinvention tricks are inspiring and achievable for even the newest vintage shopper among us. You can’t help but get inspired by her vintage acumen.’
– Janie Bryant, Mad Men costume designer
Dressing the Dearloves
HarperCollins, 2018
Failed fashion designer Sylvie Dearlove is coming home to England – broke, ashamed and in disgrace – only to be told her parents are finally selling their once-grand, now crumbling country house, Bledesford, the ancestral home of the Dearlove family for countless generations.
Romantic, warm, and glamorous, moving from Edwardian England to the London Blitz to present day London, Dressing the Dearloves is a story about the corrosiveness of family secrets, the insecurities that can sabotage our best efforts, and the seductive power of dressing up.
A Life In Frocks
Murdoch Books, 2010
‘There’s more to fashion than pretty frocks. Kelly Doust flicks through a wardrobe of memories conjured up by her favourite and not so favourite outfits to discover what makes us fall in love with clothes within a lifetime. Delightful and charming, with a sprinkling of sound fashion advice.’ – Kirstie Clements, Vogue Magazine
For as long as she can remember, Kelly Doust has been passionate about clothes. They are her first, and most enduring, love affair to date.
A Life in Frocks is about the 'divine obsession' - a woman's love for clothes. In particular, it is a personal, entertaining, joyous and seductive exploration of the significance of clothes, filtered through one woman's life-long sartorial infatuation.
Precious Things
HarperCollins, 2016
Precious Things tells the story of a collar – a wonderful, glittering beaded piece – and its journey through the decades. It’s also the story of Maggie, an auctioneer living in modern-day London, who comes across the crumpled, neglected collar in a box of old junk, and sets out on an unexpected mission to discover more about its secret and elusive past.
A wonderful, absorbing and moving novel about desire, marriage and family, telling the story about how we so often reach out for the sparkly, shiny things (and people) we desire, only to realise – in the nick of time – that the most precious things are the ones we’ve had with us all along.
The Crafty Kid
Murdoch Books, 2010
The Crafty Kid shows just how easy it is to make irresistible items both for and with children, from recycled or inexpensive materials. Written especially for those who want to hand-make their own beautiful gifts, and to help steep children in the creative life from an early age onwards, The Crafty Kid is full of fun, simple ideas for rainy day entertainment and passes on the sensible adage: make do and mend.
The Crafty Minx at Home
HarperCollins, 2013
‘A truly beautiful Minxy mix of charm, inspiration, practical advice, and pretty projects to simplify and beautify your life and home.’
– Jane Brocket, The Gentle Art of Domesticity
A gorgeous guide to creating an original, appealing and handmade home, The Crafty Minx at Home is all about the joy of making things by hand so as to create a uniquely personal home around your favourite people.
The Crafty Minx
Murdoch Books, 2009
The Crafty Minx is about making simply gorgeous things from preloved, remnant and vintage items. Written especially for non-crafters who are desperate to be more creative but don’t know how, author Kelly Doust shares the delicious rewards of living with and giving away beautiful handmade objects. Included are more than 75 projects – from summer beach bags and cotton apron tops to cosy lambswool throws and cashmere-covered hot water bottles – which give traditional crafts a modern makeover. Featuring innovative ways to get creative, it reflects the huge cultural shift taking place towards recycling and buying locally.