You know how books (or at least certain ones)Â wrap you up with their narrative and take you away to someplace else well that is the kind of feeling I want to emulate from the spaces I create.
When I think of my pad I think of glamour, grown up parties outside huddled around the most amazing kitchen on earth (another post I promise, because I haven't even received this latest obsession) I'm dreaming a little here. I think of coming home from a long day snuggling up with the two M's having cooked, fixed a drink, lit a fire and hit play on the Sonis. Basically what I am trying to say is my home makes me happy simple as that. The things in it lift my spirits; no matter how long or how tough the day when I leave the studio, trundle downstairs I feel I am in a different world.
There are certain things you can do that will instantly cosy, jollify and create that feeling of immediate contentment the second you walk through the door.
Colour is probably the simplest thing you can do especially if you introduce some hues most people are scared of like yellow, red, burnt orange, hues that automatically make you feel cheerful (all the following images by the way from Real Living Magazine)
Attention grabbing artwork. Adding something unexpected will lift the spirits - for me that is bad boy art, it makes me linger, ponder and draws me in. It doesn't always make sense but that is the point, it grabs you!
Nothing cosies and jollies up a space like wood, if you have real fires that is. Heaps of it in baskets, stacked in alcoves - for me one of the best sounds on earth is a fire quietly crackling in the grate on a winters afternoon. If you don't have a fire, wicker baskets heaped with piles of old papers or throws next to a sofa or under a console do the exact same thing!
Finally put your stamp on it, don't listen to me on anybody else - buy what you love, do what you love. The only thing I ask is that you experiment a tad, push a few boundaries and go off grid because when you do that you will create one of the memorable spaces on earth, one that you will never want to leave!
