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Monday Inspiration: Beautiful Rooms

Good Morning to you all. Or Hello depending on what time you are reading this. It’s proving to be a funny old summer (can we use that word yet) in The Mad House as school finished in June when the exams finished so there is a definite holiday mood in the air without anyone actually being on holiday. Anyway, for this week’s Monday inspiration I thought we would take a look at the best of this week’s instagram as it’s such a joyous place for inspiration and, unlike Pinterest, if you like something you can ask the photographer what it is, where they got it and what they paid for it, so it can be a real help for your own interior schemes.

farmhouse table via @home-stead
farmhouse table via @home_stead

I adore this room with its natural floorboards and farmhouse table and while it’s always lovely to have natural features such as that ornate cornicing, what caught my eye here was the clever use of paint in the cupboard. Painting it dark makes a real feature of it and makes everything inside stand out too. We have painted the inside of our pantry pink although it’s so crammed full of stuff you can hardly tell but the thought was there. Painting inside cupboards is a great way to add a little decorative boost to a scheme that might otherwise be quiet and classic. It’s the paint equivalent of saying “Boo” when someone opens the door.

green sofa and window by @siobhanhaylesinteriors
green sofa and window by @siobhanhaylesinteriors

More clever ways with paint in this window treatment here. Yes the frame and the sofa are the same colour but by painting around the edge of the window there is more decorative emphasis and it makes the window look bigger. If you don’t have a large wooden frame like this, you can always paint the reveal or just paint the wall round the edge of the window to make it look bigger. And it’s not just about making it look larger than it is, it’s also a subtle way of bringing in a splash of colour to a room.

farmhouse kitchen by @house_of_henry_jones_
kitchen by @house_of_henry_jones_

Next to this kitchen which was created in the former sitting room of this west London house. This is another thing I think we don’t always do – move rooms from their original spaces to where they might serve us better. Of course it costs money to move plumbing and electrics but it’s worth asking yourself if it might be worth it and if you will get more use and pleasure out of it than if things were to stay the same in the traditional way.

I know, for example, that we could manage perfectly well with a small sitting room as the boys don’t really watch television and we do only in the evenings for an hour or so before bed. We entertain mostly in the kitchen so that, for us, is the room that needs to be the biggest. Do ask yourself the same thing if you are planning a refurbishment.

dark green pantry via @ plainenglishuk
dark green pantry via @plainenglishuk

And who wouldn’t dream of a pantry like this. It’s not always possible of course not to mention that with those glass doors you would need to keep it tidy but hey, we can dream can’t we?

Now what about this? A gilded staircase? I love that that stairs and bannisters are very low key black and then suddenly there is just a flash of gold at the sides. It’s not over the top but it will bounce the light around and throw it back out from the black that surrounds it. A clever idea and while I have a gold ceiling, I would never have thought of this.

gilded stairs by @raspberry_flavoured_windows
gilded stairs by @raspberry_flavoured_windows

Talking of adding features, what about this diagonal moulding in this bedroom below? Many people live in houses with beams (and wish they didn’t as they can be dark and bring the ceiling down) but this is a great decorative feature that takes the current fashion for wall panelling one step further. I love that it is painted all the same colour and the wooden strips almost look like shadows but I can imagine too painting them out in a darker shade like burgundy or even creating a full on striped effect. You could, if that was too much for you, create an ombre effect by taking a Dulux colour card and using all the colours from 1-6 across the wall.

design by Rachel Chudley, @houseandgardenuk - story by @emily.k.tobin photo by @michaelsinclair
design by Rachel Chudley, photo by @michaelsinclair for @houseandgardenuk

Staying with pink and its new best friend yellow – note how it makes an appearance in the chair and bed cushions above – and we have this bathroom of zellige tiles. Having just come back from a working trip to Marrakech, where you can’t move for these tiles – which are ceramic and handglazed and often uneven in shape so not for the perfectionists amongst you (despite them being screamingly fashionable and correspondingly expensive). The upside, if you can cope with the above, is that they are meant to be laid next to each other with no grout lines visible, so they look stunning with no dirty lines.

pink zellige tiles with a yellow accent by marion pastiche
pink zellige tiles with a yellow accent by  Marion Reynolds @marionpastiche

Finishing with pink and this restful space by Hayley of Home is Where the Pack is. The sofa is by Cassandra Ellis, of Atelier Ellis, whose paint adorns The Mad House sitting room walls and I have long admired this chaise. Grey isn’t dead. It’s calming and restful and mixed in with a little dark wood and some soft pink creates a beautifully harmonious and peaceful space.

That’s all for now folks as the saying goes. Come back tomorrow to find out what my six desert island decor items are and get thinking about yours because we will want to know.

pink sofa by @atelierellis in the home of @wherethepackis
pink sofa by @atelier.ellis in the home of @homeiswherethepackis 
Kate Watson-Smyth

The author Kate Watson-Smyth

I’m a journalist who writes about interiors mainly for The Financial Times but I have also written regularly for The Independent and The Daily Mail. My house has been in Living Etc, HeartHome and featured in The Wall Street Journal & Corriere della Sera. I also run an interior styling consultancy Mad About Your House. Welcome to my Mad House.

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