Your decorating dilemmas solved, part II
How to carry off a feature wall, why white paint is wrong, how to choose a sofa, quick fixes for rentals, and remembering that walls are not magnetic. Read on for the answers.
Last month I did a round-up of the 10 most common design questions I am asked and it seemed to go down well, so I thought it might be helpful to tackle some more topics that arise again and again. And as I said last time, if the same things are coming up repeatedly, they must be affecting and possibly holding up a lot of projects – so let’s dive right in.
1. HOW DO I KNOW IF I’VE MADE THE RIGHT DECISION?
The rest of that sentence goes: “and because I’m so scared of getting it wrong, I won’t make any decision at all”, which is a slightly different take on last month’s ‘analysis paralysis’.
It’s about making a decision and letting go because you feel comfortable with that choice – and not constantly returning to it and changing it because you’re worried it wasn’t the right thing to do in the first place.
There’s probably no completely satisfactory answer to this situation – but I do believe we have often lost the ability to listen to our gut instinct. You know how, when you make a decision but you want to keep talking about it? When that’s me, it signifies that I haven’t found the right answer because it’s not going away and allowing me to move on to the next thing. And, at other times, you make a decision and you almost forget about it, because somewhere inside you know it was right, so you can just stop thinking about it.
When it comes to interiors I suspect we get stuck around the practical stuff such as cost and the possible knock-on effects (resale) and feel that we must always make sensible choices rather than choosing things which are completely right for us and the way we live. But if you love love colour and pattern and that is what makes you feel you, then surely that’s a more sensible decision for you and your home than a magnolia ceiling. Plain decor might please the estate agent, but if you’re not planning on inviting them round for a few years it’s a rather pointless choice.
When it comes to cost, of course we all have budgets to work within (or around!) but taking the time to make the right decision for you and the way you live means you will only have to do it once. Can you put a price on peace of mind?
Don’t decorate your house for the person who may live in it after you – chances are they will be looking for an excuse to personalise it for themselves anyway, so by doing things your way, you have just given it to them (the one concession to selling I would make is tidying up and showing that there’s plenty of storage).
That means decorate for you. Don’t worry about trends, but do what you feel will make you happy. As always, look at your wardrobe. What is it about your favourite shirt that still appeals, 10 years on? Is there a colour, a pattern, a style that you always reach for because it makes you feel your best? Your home should do that for you too.
2. QUICK FIXES FOR RENTALS
As you know this is a reader-supported publication. I do two free posts a month but for the juicy interiors know-how, access to a very full archive and my monthly drop-in design clinic you can upgrade to a paid subscription.
There’s a whole post in this, but some of the easiest things you can do to personalise a space:
Change the bulbs to a warm white – try 2700 kelvins – rather than the stark blue white that the landlord may have left.
Try to avoid the big, single, overhead light and add lots of lamps (you can, of course, take these with you when you move).
It’s hard to cover a shiny grey rental carpet, but if the door clearances will allow it then big rugs are good – flat-weave kilims will reduce the thickness.
If replacing or covering isn’t an option, then try and incorporate a little of that colour into your own scheme so it joins up and looks cohesive. (This is from Katherine Ormerod, whose book on renting is brilliant and who gave me this tip for the rental section in my own book.) So to work with that grey carpet, pick cushions with a little bit of grey in the pattern, or buy grey lampbases and add coloured shades.
Vinyl wrap is your friend (if not the planet’s). Stick it over tiles or kitchen cupboards. To remove, heat gently with a hairdryer to warm the glue and it should peel off easily.
Replace the shower head – they are standard sizes and a shiny new one might improve water flow.
Change cupboard handles – obviously it makes sense to buy new ones with the same fixings so you can put the originals back when you leave and take the new ones with you, but sometimes landlords will allow you to replace them permanently if you have already proved yourself a responsible tenant.
Make liberal use of throws and blankets to cover sofas and chairs you don’t like.
To change walls, stylists use flats - large pieces of painted wood - this technique can work for a headboard if you don’t have one.
3. CAN I HAVE A FEATURE WALL?
This is asked again and again – and the short answer is yes. The longer answer is that there are ways it doesn’t work and ways to make it work brilliantly. To take the first: if you just paint or paper a single wall that contrasts with the rest of the room, it won’t work. It will hang around awkwardly looking like the uninvited guest who doesn’t know anyone and is too shy to make conversation.
Basically you have to introduce that wall to the rest of the room. If your feature wall is painted, then one easy way to do that is to take that same colour around all the skirting boards, door frame and door. That way the feature wall (guest) is shaking hands with everyone present, if I may extend the analogy. If your feature is wallpaper, then pick one colour and do the same thing. You can also pick one of the other colours to use on the remaining walls and ceiling.
How you approach window frames is optional – you can match to the wall they sit in or to the woodwork as you choose.
Then, to really finish things off, make sure there are a couple of other elements in the room that talk to the feature wall - this might be a matching cushion if it’s wallpaper, a vase if it’s paint, or a painting that incorporates all the colours.
You can be as matching or as subtle as you like. For years the idea of “matchy-matchy” has been shunned. But what goes around comes around and now it’s perfectly OK, nay screamingly fashionable to match fabric to wallpaper to bedding.
4. IS IT EVER OK TO TAKE OUT THE BATH?
I’m beginning to feel that all these questions may come down to the same answer: If it’s right for you, then do it. That is really the most important thing and, I have to say, the most easily forgotten.
If you never bathe, if your bath is basically a supersized towel or jeans rail, then perhaps you might want to take it out and install an extra- large shower in its place. If you have kids you can perhaps put in a large shower with twin shower heads. That’s fun. My sons (now 21 and 23) bathed until they were about seven and nine, but then we moved house and the bathroom nearest their bedrooms felt squashed with a bathtub, so we put in a big shower and they preferred it.
Of course, if you love baths then don’t consider it. If you hate baths but worry about who comes next, know that the bathroom is often the first thing a new owner will want to change. And that if you do go ‘shower-only’, the bath plumbing will almost certainly still be there – just capped off – so if anyone desperately wants to put the bath back, they can.
Finally, this move only works if you are planning to stay in your current house for 10 years or more. If it’s a five-year plan then it’s probably not worth the expense of moving plumbing around and redoing it. A simple retile and paint job is going to be better value.
5. WHICH PAINT GOES ON WHERE?
These are the basic rules, followed by how and when you can break them.
Emulsion is for walls. It won’t stick to wood or metal, so you can’t use it on doors or radiators. This is because these materials swell/warp/change in heat and emulsion won’t move with them as it has no elasticity. In recent years a dead flat chalk finish has become very fashionable, but it scuffs and it’s hard to wipe clean. Avoid for halls and high traffic areas and choose instead a so-called ‘modern emulsion’ or something with 5-10 per cent sheen.
Eggshell is for woodwork and metal for the reason above. It has a slight sheen, so you can use it on walls if you want to create a more reflective effect. It’s also great on ceilings as it will bounce the light around.
Gloss is currently out of fashion, partly because until relatively recently it tended to be oil-based so it wasn’t environmentally friendly, took forever to dry, and was quite smelly to boot. These days you can easily buy water-based gloss paints so it’s coming back into favour. Try painting a ceiling in gloss for more light bouncing – although be aware this will also show every lump and bump, so it’s not for everyone. Traditionally used on woodwork because it’s super tough.
I also like to use gloss below a dado rail, with the same colour in a more matt finish above. This is both modern and practical as you can wipe it clean.
All that said, paint companies have begun to wise up to the fact that their customers don’t want to either waste paint or have to buy the same colour in different finishes, so the technology is changing all the time. The Architect’s Finish from Paint and Paper Library can be used on a variety of surfaces, for example – while Farrow & Ball’s Dead Flat option is suitable for use on wood, walls and metal.
6. ARE RADIATOR COVERS NAFF?
Erm… I’m not a fan. That’s mostly because they tend to be created in a sort of Moroccan fretwork effect which is nearly always at odds with the decor of the rest of the house. I have only rarely seen radiator covers I like, and they have tended to be been made from metal. At Charleston House, Vanessa Bell made covers out of beads on string and at the Villa Necchi in Milan, the covers were made from metal grilles which, while being more ornate, worked because the design was so specific to the look of the whole house. If I was covering my radiator this is what I would look for. (Metal is also better to conduct heat back into the room rather than masking it.)
Pictured is a restaurant near my house in Italy, where the brass grilles covering the radiators look great. I was slightly distracted by the dessert trolley which was parked next to them, so it’s not the best photo, but you get the idea. Now I appreciate that these radiators are set into alcoves but if you wanted to borrow this idea you could mount them on bigger brackets.
All of that said, most of the time it’s modern white radiators that are especially ugly. My first job would always always be to paint them to match the wall on which they sit. That way they do recede into the background and you really don’t notice them too much.
I dislike that feeling of walking into a beautifully decorated room which has been painted in strong colours and all you see is the white radiator beaming out and totally fighting with a gorgeous sofa or deep wall colour.
But running through all this (as ever) is the phrase You Do You. If you like them and it’s your house, then you must use them. I am simply saying that you should ask yourself the question and decide on what is right for you and not just do what everyone else does, or what the builder tells you to do as it’s traditional. Traditional doesn’t necessarily mean right and that’s today’s aphorism.
7. HOW DO I CHOOSE THE RIGHT SOFA?
It may be a truth universally acknowledged (etc) that you should sit on a sofa before you buy it but that’s not always possible in these days of online shopping, so here are a few pointers.
Firstly, buy the best you can afford at the time. This is an investment piece like a mattress that you want to keep for at least 10 years. Next, you need to be honest about what that sofa is for. A sitting room without a TV can have a more upright “conversational” type of seating, a television room might want something more relaxed where everyone ends up lying down. If like many people you need both, then make sure it’s not so deep that you end up lying down anyway and that it offers good back support.
Try to ensure the frame is made from hardwood as that will last longer. Companies are allowed to claim hardwood, even if they have added MDF or particle board, so ask questions about what exactly the frame consists of before buying. If you are in store try picking up one corner – the sofa should remain completely rigid, rather than flexing or twisting.
Remember that narrow arms mean more sitting space. This is also a good way of bringing a larger sofa into a smaller room, as the effect will be more dainty. Chunky arms will make the whole thing look bigger and can dominate the space.
On the same note, visible legs – so that you can see some floor beneath the sofa – will make the room look larger. Even low legs will give the impression the sofa is floating so it will look lighter in the space.
When it comes to fabric, look for the martindale/wyzenbeek rub count, which is industry standard for how tough it is. Under 10,000 means it’s for cushions or even curtains that don’t get touched that much. up to 20,000 means it will probably have to be dry cleaned, so don’t put it on an ottoman that you can’t easily move. Up to 25,000 is said to be suitable for general domestic use. I wouldn’t put it on a sofa but it’s fine for an occasional chair. Up to 30,000 is heavy domestic use, and higher than that is commercial.
It’s worth pointing out that if you wear jeans a lot then the rivets will wear away at the fabric and we have lost a couple of pretty linen covers to those. For that reason I’m a fan of velvet, which has a reputation for being delicate, but is thicker. These days the man-made velvets are stain resistant and companies are also working on their fade resistant properties, so you don’t have to worry if one end is in the window.
8. CAN I MAKE MY CEILING LOOK HIGHER?
Yes! Firstly, match the skirting boards to the wall colour. This is just optics - if you wear a pair of cropped trousers and a shoe with an ankle strap you are cutting your legs in two places, which is why Victoria Beckham always wears floor-skimming trousers so you can’t even see her feet; it makes her legs look longer and she looks taller. Simples.
Next, colour drench. As previously discussed, this can mean either a dark or a light colour but use the same one for the walls and ceiling. If you go dark then, at night, it will cause the ceiling to recede into the darkness. If you go light it will blur the boundary between vertical and horizontal and have the same effect.
Finally, decorate to elongate. When hanging curtains, put the pole as close to the ceiling as possible and take the fabric down to the floor. Consider using vertical stripes as patterns. Hang pictures portrait-style rather than landscape (the short sides top and bottom) which will take the eye upwards. Use floor lamps or table lamps with long shades – that Seventies look is back in fashion at the moment.
9. THE BASICS OF FURNITURE LAYOUT (or, walls are not magnetic)
When arranging furniture there is a tendency to stick it to the walls to maximise the amount of space in the middle of a room. In a large space this makes it look as if you are waiting for the show to start – plus no-one can reach the coffee table. Bring the furniture in from the edges so that people can chat without shouting, reach the table, see the TV.
In the house in Italy, which has a big sitting room and a big sofa, there is a gap of nearly a metre between the back of the sofa and the wall. This not only allows us to walk behind it to access the lamp in the corner and turn it on, but it also announces that the room is so big that not only can it take this huge sofa but this huge sofa has space to walk around it. By bringing the sofa closer to the central table and the fireplace, the whole room, which could be forbidding if the furniture was spread out, appears cosy and more intimate.
This tactic is also key for small rooms. Try to bring the furniture away from the walls, even if it’s only by 10cm. It just allows a little breathing space and immediately makes everything feel more relaxed and not like it’s breathing in to make room for someone to walk past.
Back to large rooms: if you cluster the furniture in zones you can create different areas within one large space. This means you can have a cosy group seating area but perhaps you might have a couple of accent chairs by a small table in another corner for reading or chatting. Or a small table with pictures on. In a kitchen it’s OK to sit with your back to the cooking area.
10. CEILINGS ARE WHITE, RIGHT?
My personal bugbear. I’m not saying that you can’t have a white ceiling, but it’s not called the fifth wall for nothing. White ceilings are traditional because they bring more light into rooms but sometimes white just doesn’t work with the colour of the walls you have painstakingly chosen.
As I have said before, think about dressing a room as dressing yourself. You don’t wear a white shirt with everything in your wardrobe, so why assume you must top off a room in white? If you have blue walls, then a paler blue, a soft pink, or even a rich cream/yellow might look better. This will have the added advantage of making your whole scheme look more considered and thought through.
In our last house we had off-white painted ceilings and floors, so there was a logic to that. In our current home the floors are all dark wooden, so I have a mix of pink ceilings, ceilings that match the walls, and cream ceilings – all of which have been chosen specifically to go with the colour choices of the rest of the room.
In Italy, most of the rooms have coloured ceilings - either to tie in with wallpaper or as a kind of modern fresco or just, actually, because we felt like it.
Because decorating should be fun, right? As long as it’s fun for you and not waiting to be fun for the next people who live there, of course.
If you have enjoyed this post, please do like and share. Interior Design is a tiny category on Substack (we don’t get our own section) so the more visibility we get, the more we can grow. Also, it’s coming to ‘that’ time of year – and if you’re stuck for present ideas, why not give a subscription to the interiors obsessive in your life? Or perhaps, as you’re reading, get them to give one to you.
I am number 1 all the way and Kate’s advice on the monthly drop-in design clinic was invaluable. What struck me after I had done everything except the kitchen was that I ended up sitting or lying in each room and mostly thinking “yesssss”, except one room: “oh I would rather I hadn’t colour drenched my green guest room ceiling in exactly the same shade of green”. And my head didn’t explode. Another stylist on Substack said that part of the problem/ the cause (for herself anyway - and definitely true for me) is that there’s a mindset that this is a decision that you’ll have to live with forever (or as long as you stay there) and therefore it must be perfect. So you do nothing. I made a mistake in my last home with the bathroom. I learned from it, but I ended up not really thinking about it most of the time. We’re wired (and reinforced) to optimise, optimise, optimise. And “in the process”, we are hyper-focused upon every little detail. But: if that green ceiling was in my bedroom, I would repaint it. But the guest room: turns out it’s fine and I just don’t care enough. So trust yourself. If it’s hideous and reasonably easy to change, you can. But after a while, you probably won’t notice. Life gets in the way.
Painting radiators.
I successfully painted lots of radiators with Dulux Emulsion paint. Never a problem in England or Italy.
I haven't tried another brand of paint but Dulux worked.