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Showing posts with label 2013. Show all posts

Showing posts with label 2013. Show all posts

The Ancients

One of the upcoming interior design trends for 2014 will be Greek and Roman inspired themes, a revival of the components from these ancient cultures but with a fresher, new approach. This neoclassical inspired look will feature an overwhelming presence of the ancient warrior modernised to present influences.

Rooms will feature more busts - conventional but current, murals and columns; a return to symmetry to create a balanced, timeless space. This new trend from ancient civilisations also includes an Egyptian revival. Please see a selection below…

Illusions of Grandeur

From the opulent palette to elaborate fittings, such splendour might make one wonder among which rolling acres of countryside this stately home sits. The answer is none. The tiny one-bed flat is the back of a former laundry in Clapham. The flat is the work and home of Tim Gosling, who trained as a theatre designer and, for almost 20 years, worked with the Queen’s nephew viscount Linley before 4 years ago starting his own company… View interior feature

Restoration Drama

An East London Victorian pub was the perfect building for Owen Pacey to convert into a showroom for his reclaimed furniture store. But having also made his home above it, the more beautiful pieces he acquires don’t always linger downstairs for long. The work included raising the ceiling into the frame of the new roof to increase the head height of the rooms on the top floor by 3ft, without altering the exterior profile of the building. "We needed the extra space to make it viable to put the bedroom, dressing room and bathroom at that level," says Pacey… View interior feature

Nice village, I'll take it

When Brunello Cucinelli, the cashmere king of Italy, bought a huge house in a 14th-century hill town, he couldn’t stop there. He had to have the town as well If you had to describe your dream home, it would probably be much like Brunello Cucinelli’s. The cashmere mogul lives in a 17th-century manor house in Umbria, just up the road from Perugia. It’s set in an impossibly romantic 14th-century hill town, which he also owns and which forms the HQ of his business empire. And casa Cucinelli is the dream: flagged floors and vaulted ceilings, 400-year-old charm with 21st-century air conditioning. The house is filled with Renaissance art and antiques, the gardens with cicadas and cypress and olive trees. Terraces lead off every room and there’s even a choice of swimming pools, for goodness’ sake – indoor for winter, outdoor for summer. If Cucinelli weren’t such a nice, sincere chap, you could easily hate him. Or at least not buy his clothes in protest. But it’s difficult to begrudge him his house, because he’s worked incredibly hard for it, hauling himself up from humble beginnings… View interior feature

Theatrical in Paris

Interior architect, Oscar Ono graduated in art history. “From my earliest age, I moved all the furniture around the room in the House of my parents. My mother was “mad”! I think it was my vocation, something innate. I always wanted to do this job, create moods, and express my sense of aesthetics. The sceneries I create are all different depending on the place, its history, and the client.” Once the door closes on the small courtyard in Paris, we enter into his universe, dark but suitably light, intimate and theatrical. The living room takes advantage of the large plate glass windows, and other parts become animated, through the different lamps and spots, that are widely used… View interior feature

House in Somerset

Shortly after the arrival of their fifth child, Damian and Patricia, realized that they needed a place in the country to escape to. They are both professional consultants in the financial industries, and quality time off with their children was important. They soon found their dream - a rambling old manor house in a small village in rural Somerset, along with stables and outbuildings, with lots of surrounding land. It needed a lot of work, including repairing the stonework and replacing the roof of the main house which dates back to the 1600s, and to help them they employed Baldassare La Rizza, an interior designer who had the requisite qualities and quantities of experience, taste, patience, and perseverance to undertake this mammoth project in such a remote location in the most beautiful English countryside. As many of the original features were kept and enhanced wherever possible, and the interiors were decorated in a simple but classical manner… View interior feature

Spring light

The changing of the seasons is always a time to bring changes in one’s life, work and surroundings. The urge in Spring is towards renewal, growth and regeneration; getting rid of the old, tired and cold to make room for the fresh and invigorating, new ideas and inspirations.

This is the idea behind the notion of Spring cleaning and it is an essential factor in Spring interior design for the home. After the heavy, dark and sombre months of winter Spring brings a lightness to the world, both in terms of weight and illumination. Lightness should be the theme of any Spring room. Heavy fabrics and dark colours make way materials that are airy and minimal, such as sheer window treatments. Colours should also be paler hues that reflect and amplify light instead of absorbing it. Cool colours, airy patterns and floral themes will go a long way towards creating a spring feel and will hold up well through the summer months too. The key to spring decor is to bring as much nature indoors as possible, there are endless options as long as one keeps in mind the essential feel of Spring: light, bright, growing, and natural.

Oslo colourful

Dagny Thurmann-Hoelseth is the creative director of Colourful, a Norwegian chain of stores selling their own brand of paints and wallpaper. Dagny is sitting by her kitchen table in her detached house in the heights just outside Oslo, where she lives with her husband Pål and her two lovely girls Stella and Indie. They just finished the house this spring, and moved in with all their colourful clothes and objects. The glamorous blogger, spokeswoman, TV personality and professional, refuses to accept BORING interiors. Some would describe that as a very un-Norwegian, rather unconventional thing to do in Norway; possibly even slightly American - but there you go, that’s Dagny! She has even given her own taste, or outlook on interior design, her very own term 'Scandinavian maximalism'. This is the way she has always preferred it. She cannot think of anything more depressing than grey, and wants people to feel happy upon entering her home... View interior feature

In perfect isolation

Sitting at a table on the sun-bleached deck outside her home on the Norwegian island of Asmaløy, designer Ragnhild Wik is the picture of contentment. Her happy demeanour says it all, but it wasn’t always so – once she was a harried commuter in metropolitan Oslo. “For 14 years I worked in fashion design. My friend Linda Walsøe, whom I have known since we were students, and I would fantasise about starting our own business. Then the time was finally right, and we decided to create a range of porcelain that captured the style and nature of Norway.” When the pair launched Wik & Walsøe in 2007, it took only three years for them to become established as an international brand. But Wik found that she was still spending too long commuting from Oslo to the studio 60 miles south in Kråkerøy, so in 2009 with husband Vegard Øie and their son Lauritz, she set about finding a home in the area, part of a national park dominated by huge boulders sculpted smooth during the Ice Age... View interior feature

On display

Intoxicated by the light and the magical evening glow in Hornbæk fishing village. Pia Dalgaard Saabye loves bright colours and great patterns - both in her work, textile printing and in her family home. "The best is when the apple tree outside our living room window pops out in May you see the light in the different rooms," says Pia, adding: "When the sun goes down the whole room takes on that very special evening glow - you are close to happiness and I'm really glad to have my textiles and art books on display." View interior feature

Unique and ornate style

The Irish interior designer Orla Collins is justifiably well known for the richness and classical quality of her interiors, and this apartment in Kensington is a great example of her unique and ornate style. The dark, rich tones of the mahogany floor in the living area serve as a backdrop to the bright and colourful furniture, arranged around the fireplace. Mixing modern styles with vintage designs, the retro look is further enhanced by the 1960s style mirror on the mantelpiece and the bright red tulip design of the floor standing lamp. Luscious purple flowers – a trademark colour of Orla whose company is called Purple Designs – adorn the coffee table and dining tables. The private rooms are shamelessly opulent; with the rich dark tones of granite offsetting the lustrous steel and glass in the bathrooms, and luxurious bedspreads and sumptuous headboards dominating in the bedrooms. The kitchen is more modern and functional, yet still retaining a sleek and stylish look... View interior feature

Riant Chateau

Riant Château is a luxury residence located in a unique setting facing Lake Geneva and the Alps, built by the famous architects Polak and Piollenc in 1912-1913 on the eve of the First World War. During the Roaring Twenties this ultra-modern attracted personalities linked to the world of cinema and originally included several large apartments for wealthy families and a cosmopolitan clientele seeking discretion. A renovation turned this former 20th Century palace in Montreux-Territet into apartments that still attracts many foreign followers of anonymity. Former hosts include Charlie Chaplin, Alain Delon and Freddie Mercury. The mysterious and invisible entrepreneur who lives here with his in-laws, between sky and lake, turned to the talented decorators Lyon and Dominique Herve Giughese to add the finishing touches to his penthouse apartment. Throughout the day in this beautiful residence with its pure white décor, the changing light brings different contrasts to the pieces, giving an extra life to the choice of the simply furnished with tones of baroque. The light and shadows, sitting on a large roof terrace with the cry of gulls, the sound of the wind, the house offers a variety of environments outside of time... View interior feature

A choice of colours

The first thing they did when moving into their new Oslo apartment, was to paint it all white… ‘We were in such a great hurry with our move, as we were expecting our son Otto to be born any day, and so he arrived the day after we got our keys.’ says Synne Skjulstad. As soon as they had got used to their new arrival and their ever so ‘nice’ nest to bring him up in, they got out their paints and wanted to play… They started off with a bucket of glossy signal-red oil paint and dressed the hallway with built in storage solutions and shelves. Then they moved on to a patch of bright yellow in their Amish dove grey kitchen. These two colour choices and the dominant painting in the sitting room led them to an acute stop in their process. The solution came when trying to ‘’keep up with the Jones’s’’. When at the home of their architect-neighbours Andreas Joyce Nygaard and Heidi Pettersvold they started thinking of their home as having the look of a boring council office! So they asked their neighbours for help with the rest of the colour chart... View interior feature

City Limits

Living in the city may have its limits, but not its limitations. Whether you want to be centrally located nestled amongst cafes, restaurants and shops or you prefer to be up on high enjoying the amazing views of the thriving metropolis, there is a plethora of options for the city dweller.

In contrast to urban warehouse conversions with beams and exposed brick columns there are also small spaces where slick planning and concealed storage utilise every facet to maximise every square meter. Conversions include former banks, shops and even a laundry; the home environment becomes a shared workspace as an artist’s studio or the base for a fashion company. Each home allows the crafting of the minimal, contemporary or vintage, to the eclectic and shabby chic. We have a great range of features in our section Urban Living, here’s a slice of city life…

Renaissance Man

Pauric Sweeney masterminds his luxury bag empire from a buzzing Florentine Palazzo, then cycles to his minimalist family home. Although he is responsible for some of the fashion world’s most sensual and seriously lusted-after handbags, it when you discover that he originally trained as an architect that parts of the jigsaw start falling into place. For a man with such artistic bent, it’s not surprising his studio is in an ancient palazzo near Santa Croce. Parts of it date from the 14th century and the floors and frescoes are original. View interior feature.

Live-Work Space in Berlin

For Berlin-based artist and alternative musician found a former print works with a walled garden proved the perfect place in which to set up home and studio. I put a bathroom in what had been the chemical lab and painted the walls grey. Cezanne had grey walls in his studio…. The peeling paint and rusting metal balustrades at the entrance to the building serve as reminders of its past. View interior feature.

Bohemian Chic

With a mix of the poetic and strange, Tone Dalen’s created small still lifes which seem to move from here to there as the light travels around the room. And yet, she’s done nothing here except fill the place with herself, her things and her art. Not a single square meter has been designed, constructed or refurbished. Things have been placed intuitively as they’ve been accumulated, found, received as gifts or made by herself. 'For me the fun of owning your own apartment is that you can make as many holes as you like in the walls,..'. Tone says that, in summer, when the light fills the apartment nearly all of the time, she removes the visual white noise. However, when autumn has made its arrival and the long period of Nordic darkness is a fact, she wallpapers the walls with pictures again, mixing new purchases with earlier work ... For each season, she makes a new exhibition in her own private gallery at St. Paul’s Place. View interior feature.

Stephan's Loft

Stephan Schulte – an American TV consultant – bought this loft in a former industrial building after seeing it advertised as offering “the largest lofts in London”. Space is, according to Stephan, the ultimate luxury in life. Being a highly methodical and organized person, he naturally laid out the former industrial space in a clear, orderly manner in order to accentuate the open plan style, with the layout of the cavernous space designed around a centrally located kitchen, utilizing the least number of different materials and colours possible in tribute to his inspiration Mies van der Rohe. The design is arranged as a series of ambiences flowing around the kitchen, including a couple of private areas that can be closed off, and there is a restrained variety of materials visible – slate, concrete, exposed bricks, pale oak flooring and glass walls, all brightly lit by the wide windows along each wall. A rigorously restrained yet surprisingly comfortable home! View interior feature.

Retro Fun / Homemade In the Old Town

On their way home from a long day of ‘doing the local flea markets’, Dag and Gjertrud decided to stop at a public viewing of an apartment which was up for sale in the ‘Old-town’ of Oslo’s east side. It was love at first sight for them both in this bright and airy apartment. Despite lowered ceilings, and a recent and fairly unbecoming modernization of the place, they instantly felt the urge to move in restore the apartment to its former glory. Their charming reworking of the interior has provided them both with a sunlit-flooded arena in which to work and live. There is no doubt that the proportions of the rooms in the apartment now back to their to their former stature. The generous space for two, large windows, original cornice detail and even the wood panelling have now been given a new lease of life. Not to mention the patchwork of an old kitchen they have created together… View interior feature.

Penthouse in Albert Dock

The novelist Chris Fowler bought this penthouse when he was looking for a bright and spacious space to live and work. Spending all day working at home, he wanted something which was open to the sky and nowhere could he have found a brighter, sunnier penthouse than this delightful, modern house built above a former industrial building by the Battle Basin in the King’s Cross area. The apartment has an overwhelming emphasis on the colour white – furniture, flooring and walls, apart from the few odd touches of steel grey in the kitchen, oak doors, brown cushions and the occasional bright splashes of colour in the artwork, flowers or fruit which punctuates the space. Undisputedly modern, this sleek apartment captures the essence of open plan, 21st century living. View interior feature.

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