Widely acclaimed for being at the forefront of today's reporting on homes and how we live in them, Katherine Salant is a lifelong explorer of houses who encourages consumers to think in fresh new ways about home planning, design, building and remodeling.

Her “Housewatch” column has appeared in The Washington Post since 1994. It’s been syndicated for media outlets across the U.S. and honored numerous times by the National Association of Real Estate Editors.

Trained in architecture at Harvard, Katherine was a Fulbright scholar studying (and living in) village houses in Nepal. She has been a National Endowment for the Arts Professional Fellow and winner of the prestigious University of Missouri Lifestyle Journalism Award. She is the author of The Brand-New House Book and Four Villages: Architecture in Nepal.

With experience on both sides of the table — as an architectural designer helping homeowners realize their dreams and as a client with her own dreams — she understands that building is not only a financial commitment but an emotional one, and that the process can be overwhelming. Always hands-on in her reporting, she insists on seeing actual samples of products such as fabrics or finishes rather than settling for photos. Frequently, she runs her own informal tests on products she writes about, setting up a “lab” at home.

Katherine grew up in Northern Virginia and now lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan, in the home where she and her husband, Steve, raised three daughters. There, as in every house she writes about, she ponders her signature, mantra-like question: Does this house make sense for the people who live in it?