Please forgive last weeks lack of posts crazy crazy schedule with very early starts and late finishes. Would love to elaborate but bound for a few months to keep very quiet but fear not by March I am sure I will be talking about nothing else! A big thank you to everyone who came to the master classes on Friday and Saturday it was fabulous meeting so many people and talking interiors. Something we talk about in class is my formula for creating homes with big personalities - and adding texture and pattern is pretty integral to my plan. I know pattern can be rather scary however it makes such a huge difference which is why its so fab holding the classes here as I can take people round and illustrate. You can have the most beautifully decorated room or rooms in the world but if they strike the same visual note you have on your hands a very dull space. Think of pattern and texture as the herbs and spices of the decorating world - they add that extra bit of zing the way thyme does when you add it to spuds for example. Texture is easier to add as you can literally overload a space with different textures and it will never, repeat never seem too much. Woollen rugs on floors, velvet cushions on sofa's, wood baskets toppling over with logs, metallic shiny vessels on and on I could go. When it comes to pattern my top tip is to restrict the colour palette and that way you can use up to 6 or 7 patterns in a room without it seeming crazy. If you want your homes to have big personalities make friends with pattern and texture they will I promise totally transform.
- Photography Jonny Valliant
See here how this bedroom literally comes alive with the patterned linen. Rugs, cushions, bed linens are the easiest thing to source when you want to reinvent your space and push it to new heights. Forgive the credit not being near the image, Mung's is asleep by me and is pretty useless with helping me out with computer questions, Maud is still in bed and Graham is who knows where!
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Not many of us have a textured wall as fabulous as this, but its easily achieved through wallpaper, paneling, art etc the key is to try and create as much visual friction as you can. Do that and wham bam you will instantly give your space a new lease of life.
That's me done I've got to zip around the house and tidy before the cleaner arrives crazy, yes possibly? Pack Mungo and Maud off to school who I must say seemed to really miss me when I was away last week and then research interiors all day. Big fire, lots of coffee to keep me awake and that is pretty much my day
