All posts filed under: Wallpaper

Mood Board Pink Interiors

In The Pink – Is there a better way to end 2020 than some pink interiors?

Well it seems I have done all my Christmas wrapping and have a bit of time to share some pink interiors to end this year, what a rosey treat! Let’s start with this room: Before – sales listing This will soon be the guest bedroom on the top floor of a lovely big Victorian house in Ilkley. You can probably fathom it was a teenage bedroom, and whilst it looks in half decent nick, the room was tired and needed stripping back and starting again. Carpets up, fitted wardrobe removed, walls stripped, and re-skimmed and floorboards sanded and re-stained. And of course I had to choose a ‘new outfit’ for it to wear too. During the big rip out, carpets up, floorboards revealed and room ready to be stripped before being re-skimmed Working around the client’s existing metal bed and two pine bedsides, I went for a slightly bonkers, yet Scandi take on a traditional Victorian striped wallpaper. The stripes giving a gentle nod to the Victorian style bed frame but the scale and colour …

Next Door @ The Old Forge

The Old Forge York – Two Years in the Making – Final Reveal Part 2

Hello hello, how are you all? Thanks to everyone who read Part 1 of final reveal for The Old Forge. I’ve heard from Karen (the owner) that bookings at the newly renovated holiday cottage have been going swimmingly since its launch with Next Door @ The Old Forge now being fully booked until the end of September, so get your skates on if you’re looking to book a break in North Yorkshire over the October half term or fancy an autumn/winter break. So, where was I on the final reveal tour? I think I was about here… Corten steel cladding with a slither of hallway peeking through By their very nature of generally being long and narrow, hallways are spaces where people don’t tend to push the boat out design wise. However, a hallway is a place (much like a downstairs loo) is a place you can have plenty of fun. It’s somewhere you pass through fleetingly on the way from one place to another, not often somewhere you hang about for shits and giggles. But …

The Snug - Rebel Walls

The Snug – Final Reveal – in collaboration with Rebel Walls

Hello again you lovely lot, I’m back again with another final reveal post of a project I began work on last July. Do you remember the snug? You can read the introduction to this project here. For those that can’t be arsed clicking back, let me remind you… The TV/Playroom is split on two levels, two thirds being down two small steps where the sofa and TV was. The top third being a walkway from the kitchen to the back door and another door into the integral garage. Originally this space was used as a playroom but as the kiddos had since outgrown the need for dedicated play space, it was time to turn the room into the family friendly but grown-up snug. And when I say grown up, I mean it has direct access to alcoholic beverages. It wasn’t a complete redesign by any means as I had to work around the items that were staying; a white, leather corner sofa, old trunk/coffee table, white UPVC French doors and the rich coloured, oak floor.  Sometimes this …

Brick Wall - Loft Bedroom Moodboard

When is a brick wall not a brick wall? – The Loft Bedroom at the Victorian Terrace

I’m back at the Victorian Terrace this week talking brick walls. And today I’m up on the top floor showing you the progress in one of the two second floor bedrooms. Before This room was to become a guest bedroom, but until then the homeowner, Mr H will be using this room until the bedroom on the first floor is complete. Which will be later this year once the bathroom has been ripped out. You might be wondering what a bathroom being done has to do with getting the master bedroom completed, a fair amount actually. In a terrace, you don’t get a spacious landing or much transient spaces at all for that matter, the first and second floor rooms come almost directly off the staircase. When ripping out a bathroom and fitting the new one, the trades need space to work and a lot of the prep work needs to be done not directly in the bathroom. Bathrooms are already too small for two grown adults as it is. So the master bedroom opposite …

Rebel Walls

Making Spaces with Rebel Walls – The Snug

It’s new project time today. Yay! And it’s twice as exciting as normal as it’s in collaboration with Rebel Walls. Yay yay! Let me set the scene…. Before – July 2019 I was invited to a lovely house in North Leeds a few months ago to tackle the design of the family room which links directly off their kitchen diner. It was a lovely but rather awkward space set on two levels. Before On the lower level there was a large white leather corner sofa facing a large wall mounted TV and sound bar, along with large French Doors into the garden. The top level was a play area where the kids toys and games were kept. There are also three doors in this area, one off the kitchen, one into the garage and one to the outside. So it was mainly used as a walkway, resulting in the middle of this upper tier being left unusable except for passing feet. View walking in from the kitchen As their two children had now grown and …

Devol Inspired Kitchen

The Victorian Cottage (deVOL inspired) Kitchen – Final Reveal

Hello again! It’s another final reveal post and today it’s the Victorian Cottage (deVOL inspired) Kitchen. The last time I wrote about this project was back in February, which is how long it’s been since I last visited! It’s fair to say this one has been a slow burner. I have taken so many photos of this project i’ve struggled to keep them down to a minimum. But there are definitely less than 30 50. Let me remind you of the space on my first visit… Before This cottage has an awkward shape and size kitchen. There are seven doors off this space, it is literally the heart of the house, leading to the: utility room sitting room garden room first floor cellar storage cupboard study Not only are there seven doors, there’s an almost floor to ceiling window and huge chimney breast with faux brick surround. Wall space is officially limited. Layout before The U-shaped kitchen, with the peninsular chopped the room in half. The kitchen half of the room was originally overloaded with base …

vine bleu

The Vine Bleu Room – A Remote Design Project

Today is a special post for me. I’m sharing some before and afters of a remote design project I worked on at the end of 2018.  The homeowners had moved into a new family home, but not your average property, their new pad formed part of a Grade 2 listed Arts & Crafts mansion, designed by the architect George Morley Eaton, a follower of Sir Edwin Lutyens. As you would expect, architecturally, it’s stunning. However, one room in particular left them feeling somewhat overwhelmed; The Drawing Room. Estate Agent Photo Here’s how the room looked when it was sold. As you can see, it’s a huge at over 5m by 7m. With rooms like this, you don’t need to work too hard to make it look amazing. But what you do need to do is know how to use Scale and Proportion.  You can’t put an average sized sofa, rug or ceiling light into a room like this, you’ve got to supersize everything so it matches up to that fireplace, the beams, those door frames…. …

Victorian Cottage Kitchen Pre-reveal

The Victorian Cottage Kitchen – Pre-reveal

It’s been a long time coming but the Victorian Cottage Kitchen project has been ticking along nicely (and sometimes not so nicely) in the background. If you remember we were “faking it until we could make it” by reusing all of the existing cabinets and updating lighting, wall coverings, worktops and appliances. You can read all about the plans and where all of the new elements are from here in this post. A quick reminder of the kitchen as it was on my very first visit: All of the next set of photos have been kindly sent by my client (last night at 9pm in fact) she sent me a tiny pic at about 8pm and I was like SEND ME MORE, I NEED TO SEEEEE! I honestly get so excited when one of my rooms comes to life in someone’s actual house. Especially when the client keeps telling me how much they love it. Makes all those sleepless nights worth it. Just. During So here we are, very nearly at the end of the project. …

Renovation Budget

‘Fake it until you can make it’ – What do you do when your budget won’t stretch?

You may (or may not) remember I started working on a rather big and exciting project earlier this year. The Old Forge The plans for this cottage renovation and soon to be holiday let are all pretty much sorted and despite a slight glitch with planning (which was super annoying and dished out but a week before the build was due to start) it’s looking positive we can get started within the next few weeks **crosses fingers**. During the wait for all the faffy paperwork to be shuffled, signed and filed, we’ve been chugging away with the family home instead. They sure do love a project! The floorplan below gives you an idea of their home, how the nooks and crannies of the cottage fit together and how they’re used. The sections marked in red were the bits to be demolished ready for Phase 2 of the big build. You can see how small and quite fiddly the kitchen/dining space is, there are seven doors in and around the heart of the home, along with beams, …

Munich Project After Farrow & Ball Downpipe

When remote design works… And why…

I wrote a post last year about the pros and cons of E-Design; what remote interior design actually was, how it works, who it’s right for, because it’s certainly not for everyone. Today I wanted to show you some images from three remote projects i’ve worked on over the past year… and talk about why they turned out as well as they did. The London Flat The is the newly acquired apartment of a young, recently married couple. A couple who couldn’t quite decide on how to put their stamp on their new home. Having differing tastes and a limited budget to completely re-do a living space, dining area and kitchen, this blank canvas left them feeling a little stuck. So we started with a two hour remote consultation, which is how all of my projects, either remote or physical begin. A two hour remote consultation works like this: First hour – I go through photos, floorplans, and Pinterest boards you’ve collated, and of course your brief. You have to gather and supply all of this …