Monday Inspiration: Beautiful Rooms

Is that it? Is the coast clear? Have they finally gone back to school? Is the house silent? Are you secretly relieved to be back at work? I thought so and it’s ok to say it out loud. I always used to say that my holidays began when the school term started which isn’t exactly true as I was still working but there were fewer meals to cook, less entertaining and definitely less clearing up so it felt like a partial holiday.

Now, of course, they are teenagers so they don’t need entertaining in quite the same way although it costs a lot more to fill the fridge and I have to go on daily foraging trips to their bedrooms if I want to find a mug or a plate. I don’t know what happens to teenagers but from about the age of 14 all crockery that isn’t in the dishwasher seems to gravitate to their bedrooms. I don’t even see it happening but it does.

Anyway, enough of that. Have you got time for a cup of coffee and stroll through some beautiful rooms that might inspire you with ideas for your own. As I mentioned the other day, I am reducing this to eight this year as we’re all busy and but it will, I hope, be no less interesting and inspiring for all that.

Stripes. I’m desperate to put this striped paper on the ceiling of the spare room but, so far, The Mad Husband is having none of it. We haven’t yet had a marital veto issued but I’ve dropped the subject for now. Mostly until he comes up with something he really wants and then we can have a “negotiation”. I would paint the walls plain – in one of the colours in the stripe but so far we haven’t reached an agreement. I haven’t given up though….

Of course I could leave the ceiling if we did something interesting with the woodwork. Which I know won’t be an issue but *stamps foot* I want stripes as well.

Returning to the wall as a feature and this one which has tongue and groove two thirds up the wall which looks great and has been finished off with a row of shaker pegs. This is a great idea if you fit it all round the room as you can hang dressing gown, pyjamas, the laundry bag and the clothes that you can’t be bothered to put on hangers in the wardrobe on them. This, by the way, is my number one tip for kids’ bedrooms as they can rarely be bothered with hangers and you can also hang baskets on the peg – one for sock and one for pants etc.

Here is the same thing done in a bathroom which is a look I love. Doesn’t work if you have a shower but for a bath it’s perfectly fine as there isn’t that much splashing. And you could change the whole look of this bathroom by painting the bath a different colour too, which given the size of it means you could do the whole thing sitting down – my kind of painting.

We will be looking at neutrals in more details tomorrow as I know many of you were very – let’s be euphemistic and call it “unsure” about the return of beige to our interiors when I wrote about it in my trend piece the other day. Remember beige is a word that covers a multitude of things (much like grey) and while no-one would call this bathroom beige it is, definitely, a warm neutral which is what the headline writers mean when they beige but it’s less attention grabby. Not to mention long.

This is another angle of the same room and I love how Rebecca has repurposed an old chest of drawers as a basin unit so she gets storage as well. You can do this with any table or chest you find on ebay and it will bring a more individual look to your bathroom as well as softening all the hard edges. Or course it won’t work in an ultra modern space but, instead of painting, you could always top with a piece of marble on a modern table, which would serve the same purpose and work with different styles.

And clearly the painted vintage chest is a thing as it’s been used in exactly the same way in this bathroom by British Ceramic Tiles using Ted Baker tiles. There have been lots of versions of these tiles around for the last couple of years in an attempt to create a more free-flowing and organic pattern using them. I love this and, as I have said many times, when you start with a black and white base, you can add any colour you like to ring the changes.

The other trend in tiles that I wanted to show you was that you don’t have to do whole walls or straight lines. Here, they have been used across the corner and while I think it’s a great idea I might have done a similar pattern but on one wall behind the shower attachment but you get the idea.

Let’s make 2019 the year of using pattern and paint in bold ways – even if you’re using quiet shades. Half walls and interesting shapes. Use it with purpose and create something really unique.