Our Top Picks for World Book Day

With World Book Day bringing a welcome sense of excitement, inspiration and celebration, we couldn’t resist curating our top five books of the year so far - each one chosen to share the quiet joy of a truly good read and to celebrate the brilliance of the stories we’ve loved.

While it may not be possible to dress up as a character from every title (as tradition now encourages!), we can promise that the books below will soon find a well-thumbed place in your home, returning again and again to bring thoughtful moments and delighted smiles.

For over a decade, Minalima Studio has reimagined classic children’s literature as books to be handled, unfolded and truly explored. Their edition of Mary Shelley’s Gothic masterpiece presents the full, unabridged text, enriched with foldouts, pop-ups, cut-outs and beautifully intricate paper-craft details.

The result feels fittingly stitched to life—tactile, theatrical and wonderfully immersive. It offers a fresh and compelling way to return to this enduring classic, thoughtfully crafted for modern readers of all ages.

A perennial classic of modern gardening, this is a truly exceptional book. Piet Oudolf’s naturalistic planting style lies at the heart of his celebrated garden designs and landscapes. While many inspiring volumes showcase his work, this gem goes further offering the detailed insight into planting and structure that serious gardeners need to recreate some of Oudolf’s most glorious effects.

Through comprehensive plant lists, thoughtful design guidance and evocative descriptions, Oudolf and Henk Gerritsen reveal how grasses, perennials, wildflowers and seedheads can be combined to shape gardens that feel airy and exuberant, quietly restrained or softly dramatic. Rather than striving for static perfection, the emphasis is on movement, seasonality and change - on gardens that grow looser, richer and more beautiful as the years unfold.   

What’s not to love about Hari Beavis’s Comfort in One? Building on the warm, reassuring spirit of her earlier cookbook, Country Comfort, this latest offering is all about creating generous, soul-soothing food for friends and family—with minimal fuss and maximum time spent around the table together.

Each recipe is thoughtfully designed for a single pan, tray or pot, making cooking feel simple yet deeply satisfying. Among our favourites are the creamy, indulgent Butter Bean and Broccoli Alfredo with crisp, dunkable sourdough; the vibrant Peri Peri Salmon, Potato and Broccoli Traybake; the ever-tempting Chimichurri Chicken; and the Seasonal Fudgy Apple Cake, best served with a generous dollop of clotted cream.

Whether you’re planning an easy midweek supper, a leisurely Sunday gathering, or a light summer salad for a warm evening, these recipes promise to bring comfort, ease and a welcome dose of joy to your table.

For more than thirty years, Sims Hilditch has honed an approach to interior design that feels unmistakably British - rooted in history yet comfortably suited to modern life. This beautifully considered book brings together a collection of recent projects, from refined townhouses and coastal retreats to thoughtfully restored historic homes, each reflecting the studio’s deep respect for architectural heritage.

Throughout its pages, the interiors feel balanced rather than ostentatious, layered rather than overly styled, and always deeply liveable. Rich photography captures spaces that are elegant without being formal rooms designed to be lived in, loved, and gently worn over time.

Readers have already fallen for Alice Melvin’s intrepid little Mouse, and in this third adventure, Mouse leaves home to follow a winding river through the turning seasons. Along the way, woods, fields, towns and waterways unfold - each offering new encounters, hidden discoveries and gentle lessons in how the landscape shifts and softens over time. Mouse eventually returns home, quietly enriched by all that has been seen and experienced.

The story’s encounters are tender, its revelations subtle, and the passage of time delicately traced through changing scenery. Told with Melvin’s characteristic restraint and quiet magic, and illuminated by her exquisite cut-paper illustrations, the world she creates feels both intimate and expansive.

Beautifully produced by Thames & Hudson, this is a book to be read slowly and savoured - by children, and by those who cherish reading aloud to them.

This is one of those gloriously unclassifiable books. It is an art book, certainly, but it is also a meditation on Paris, on timeworn objects, and on the quiet corners of a city steeped in history and character.

It reads as a love letter to Paris’s gentler soul: its ateliers and hidden courtyards, its bookshops and cafés, its objects burnished smooth by years of use. These pages invite you to move slowly, just as you would when wandering the city itself—attentive to small rituals, fleeting charm and the poetry found in everyday details.

A beautiful object in its own right, it is an enduring companion for dreamers, would-be flâneurs and collectors everywhere.