Geraldine James has passion for collecting and finding unusual and beautiful things and her job as a home buying manager at London department store Selfridges takes her all over the world. Today's extract is from her new book Creative Spaces (published by Hardie Grant), which features inspired homes and creative interiors from London and Milan to New York. Leave a comment here for your chance to win - full details are below.

Without question, we all enjoy looking into other people's homes. observing the design and decorating choices made by others offers an intriguing insight into what makes them tick and what their priorities are. In my previous books, I have taken bite-size snapshots of walls and displays, but here I wanted to show entire homes, revealing how the owners and their families live, and how they relax and entertain.

Each and every one of us has a creative side, which we must take care to nurture, and our home is the one place where we can truly express ourselves. The homes have been grouped by theme or style, to make it easier to appreciate the concepts behind each one and to see where you instinctively feel a connection. There will be spaces that might alarm but others that will surprise and delight and form the seed of an idea that you can adapt to suit you and your life.



Art-loving Modernists - Family Fashion
Patric and Christina Shaw live in an early 20th-century Brooklyn brownstone with their two sons, Callum and Alex. Informal collections of artwork feature throughout the house. On top of the 1960s sliding door sideboard in Patric's office space is an eclectic display, including a painting by Patric, and a Guy Bourdin photograph of a Zandra Rhodes creation, taken for British Vogue.



The Archivist - The skillful visionary
Barnaba is the son of Piero Fornasetti, one of Italy's most talented artists, sculptors, and interior decorators. He lives in his father's house {cke_protected_1}, right in amongst the archive, in a wonderfully magical and eclectic space. The kitchen is a new extension which has been added to the original house. Floor-to-ceiling windows allow breathtaking views of the garden. Hanging majestically above the table is a spectacular glass chandelier from Murano. The table, laid by Barnaba, displays the most recent Fornasetti porcelain.



Modern Industrialists - Style fusion in a calm urban space
Trained as an interior designer, Caitlin McCann works as a retail interiors and textiles buyer. In contrast, her husband Bradley Ridge, a restaurant owner, is an avid collector of street art and urban graphics. The pair spent a long time looking for just the right place to call home and eventually found this period property in Streatham, southwest London. This view reveals the couple's vintage finds and the apparently effortless way they have been put together. Sheepskin throws add a bohemian touch to the desk chair and the black Barcelona chair with the ottoman footrest. A small copper jug containing the creamiest of roses sits on the small glass table with its decorative supports in a golden wheat design. Casting atmospheric shadows over the wall is a 19602 Chrome Pistillo lamp, a funky contrast to the vintage decorative crystal chandelier.



Individual eclecticism - Pushing the boundaries
Shaun Clarkson is an interior designer, while husband Paul Brewster is a textile designer - a formidable duo when it came to renovating their central London Georgian home. In the screening room, a crystal chandelier floor lamp makes a sophisticated counterpoint to the amateur paintings. These are just two of the many portraits from the 1950s and '60s that the couple have discovered at flea markets and turned into a collection.



Raw beauty
The house summed up exactly what I wanted to bring to my readers - it is the perfect example of a Creative Space with no rules and no boundaries. On the ground floor is this redundant fireplace, now a convenient home for a mid-20th century desk lamp. The two 16th century chairs are unexpected companions, and bring a slight majesty to the space. The artwork in the rough wooden frame, made from tiny coloured tiles, is by Ruth Elliot. A selection of very collectible ceramics by Hylton Nel, the South African potter, painter and sculptor, is displayed on the open shelving unit.

To win a copy of 'Creative Spaces' by Geraldine James, leave a comment here on the blog before 5pm (AEST) on Friday 9 January 2014. You must be a member of Temple & Webster to enter, and you may only enter once. We will choose our favourite comment, and will notify the winner via their Facebook page or at the email address attached to their Temple & Webster account (if we are able to ascertain it) by Friday 16 January 2014. If we are unable to make contact with the winner via either of those methods within 30 days, we'll choose a replacement winner. Good luck! 
Competition closed.