5 steps for creating a fabulous home office

Morning, I’ve spoken before about the importance of creating a home office to die for, that’s cosy, tantalising and that inspires productivity, creativity and anything else you so wish.  I’ve broken it down into steps to make it easier so you can dip into or out of as you wish. The steps aren’t rules (there are no rules when it comes to design) so tweak and improvise as much as you wish.

So in no particular order:

Step number one is a practical point, I am so not a practical designer but this is pretty fundamental. Move your home office into an area away from noise, kitchen noise, and more importantly TV noise. You don’t need to dedicate a whole room to a home office in NYC I’ve seen some beautiful home offices in hallways, passageways even alcoves. I’ve seen bedside tables that double duty as home offices, hell I’ve even seen home offices crafted from an impromptu table sitting on a landing. The important factor is not to have a load of distracting noise going on or at least as little as possible.

Step two, ramp up you’re lighting, you might think you have enough but believe me you haven’t. Now you’ve all seen my studio a thousand times I am sure but I’ve recently created another desk space in the adjoining room and upped the anty with the lighting. An angle poise gives me perfect task lighting for typing, reading etc. and a super sized table lamp adds a decorative note. Go round the room and you will find seven other lights (yikes)!

Step three; add flowers or plants they immediately soften the space give it personality and break up the corporate feel. I’ve got white faux blossom on my new desk, take it away and it just doesn’t have the same impact. I’ve also got a posy of fresh flowers from Columbia Road on the desk this week purple and pink hydrangeas, next week who knows, herbs, eucalptus some lovely scented foliage it really doesn’t matter.

Step four, move away if you can from buying office furniture particularly the desk since it takes up the most room and sets the tone. I’ve got an old zinc thing from Petersham which I adore, you don’t have to go vintage you just ideally need to source something that doesn’t look too corporate. If you have a corporate looking desk then acessorize the bejesus out of it.

Step five, accessorize. Prop pictures and paintings against the desk, skim the floor with a rug, heap a pile of books on the table, add a scented candle. Easy no?

My new space below, (don’t look at the wiring we haven’t wired it all up yet, its me being impatient and wanting all lights on asap so extension leads, tons of wire all sorted by my DIY guru this weekend). So the trouble I now have with with creating this second zone is the internal battle each and every day -  which desk to sit at, it’s a conundrum!

Oh I forgot one more step making it 6 – ditch the beige haze paint colour, go dark, cross over to the dark side its way, promise way more fun this side and pretty darn life changing!

 

Retail classes launching this Friday

The interesting thing about writing courses is that they throw up all sorts of questions. For example the retail course that we’re launching this Friday (which I should say I am terribly excited about) throws up about a zillion questions. Why do all our high streets look the same, why does everyone buy from the same shows, why do so many retailers play it safe with product selection, how come when I want to list a handful of truly amazing stores (talking interiors here) around the world no more than a handful pop up? As a retailer isn’t it our job to push boundaries a tad to make customers think wow I never thought of doing that – something as simple as putting a mirror that is too big on a wall that is too small. Something as simple as papering a wall to enliven it and then plonking a super sized zebra on it, or lighting some candles when the light drops or accessorising a table or mantle like you would at home, rather than in a clinical boring fashion.

I didn’t go to retail school, I learnt the hard way from experience and yes I’ve made mistakes some huge mistakes but I am a true believer you have to make mistakes in order to succeed, and I know the economy sucks and its tough out there so I totally get the lets play it safe theory rather than lets take a punt theory. My problem and its either a problem or an advantage is that nothing goes in that store of mine that I wouldn’t have at home no matter how commercial it may appear. Nothing makes it thru the door unless I can envisage it at home on a shelf, a table, wherever. Obviously that isn’t the golden rule for everyone in retail but it works for me, more importantly it works for our customers and I think it creates a point of difference from all the other hum drum stuff out there.

The point I here you ask, Ok the point don’t buy things that you don’t love, say you need a pick me up on a weekend so I don’t know maybe some cushion which is mediocre takes your fancy and does the trick for a second, except a few months later it doesn’t so don’t buy it. If I need a pick me up I go to Aesop or buy flowers, or books but when it comes to filling my home with stuff I never say just buy a lamp because I need a lamp and I think sod it will replace in a year. Nope no light for me until I find the exact thing – which is perhaps a little bonkers and yes I probably need therapy but when you buy what you love  you will never want to get rid of anything. Anyways I’m rambling and I should go for a run except I am trying to stay here in the warm rambling way to you guys.

Retail classes launch this Friday if you’re thinking about setting up a business in retail, on line or bricks and mortar and want to know the pitfalls and how to succeed is all in the class. Our advice doesn’t come from books it comes from experience, we failed many times but we’ve succeeded more than we’ve failed and as odd as this sounds when other businesses are going bust left right and center we have never had such a strong year. The reasons, well its all in the class, happy Tuesday

 

 

Stylistic tricks

Morning, big huge thank you to everyone who attended my weekend class, both Friday and Saturday were fabulous days with so many passionate, inspiring funny people, I loved it. Today we’re putting more classes online for next year as well as creating a gift voucher for the classes since we’re getting emails in by the sack full asking about them for Christmas, fear not all online later today.

In the classes I talk about layers and the importance of them (here she goes again I here you cry), stay with me, as this idea is as simple as anything. If you’re room is feeling a little bland and needs a tad more personality start introducing books into your space. I’m talking about plonking them on consoles, mantles, chairs, shelves even the floor. Pile them up into little groups, plonk a posy of blooms on top, a scented candle, a decanter of whisky, a plant and wham bam you’ve suddenly given your room a little soul. They don’t by the way have to be posh arty tomes, catalogues, magazines, novels all do the trick. Infact just yesterday in from spending most of the afternoon in the garden I felt I needed to ramp up the height of one of my lights, a  couple of books later they elevated it to a new status (and height).

Below a lovely collection of images showing you just how books can transform a space, I cannot take any credit for the compilation, all images from, http://mirrormirror.typepad.com

Hats off

Morning, its Design School weekend kicking off today as well as tomorrow which is fabulous fun and I must say one of the coolest parts of my job. We have a full, actually more than a full house so it might be a bit of a squeeze but it will be fun. Maud and Mung’s after a terrible night (foxes) have promised not to put a foot wrong otherwise boarding school!

There are a handful of designers out there that inspire me, not many I hate to say but the few that do totally and utterly knock the pants off the others. NYC design firm Roman and Williams (founded by Robin Standefer and Stephen Alesch) is one of them.. They used to be set designers infact the few designers that I admire all started out doing something else, myself included and its funny but those of us who have gotten into interiors via a different route tend to have a style that is alot looser a little more laid back.

Roman and Williamss interiors tell a story, it’s all about the experience the journey the minute you walk through the door you are  transported into a sensory visionary world where history is respected and where story telling is central.

I adore the lobby in the Ace Hotel in NYC (these guys designed the hotel)you walk in you feel immediately at home, even though its large (its dark, yikes) its comfortable and its inclusive. No rules, no boundaries just a belief that other people will love what they design as much as they do. Hats off I say, a few of their interiors below:

Have a lovely weekend x

Bathroom before and after

I want to show you something that Kate Challis, (a designer, blogger, www.urbankaleidoscope.com and all round super women) sent me recently. Kate as I just mentioned lives in Melbourne but also happened to fly over here to one of my London classes and also recently attended my class at the Supper Club in Melbourne. Be prepared to have your socks knocked off when I show you these images because what Kate has done to her bathroom totally and utterly takes your breath away!  Bathrooms, as I bang on about quite often in class tend to be quite neglected, we treat them a little austerely in my opinion and rarely soften with stuff that we would have say in our living rooms.

Well not Kate, she has used the most beautiful wallpaper to elevate her bathroom to a whole other level. Its glamorous, its boudoir like, its feels like you would want to hang out here all day. I’m inspired, infact I need to get my act together and work on my bathroom as now it’s the most neglected room in the house. Wallpaper like changing up your paint colour is one of the most transformative things you can do

Thank you Kate truly inspirational  nothing makes me happier then seeing images of before and afters particularly when they are on the darker side.

Kate’s bathroom before:

 

 

 

The wallpaper is Porter’s Lace in Aniseed by Catherine Martin (production designer for all of Baz Luhrman’s films). A mazing!

The comeback kids; feature walls and carnations

Some things get a bad wrap in the design world, it can be quite a snooty place. For example feature walls (many designers turn up their noses at them sighting them as suburban or my new favourite word too pedestrian) they show commitment issues, they are to safe to easy blah blah blah. I disagree if you want a feature wall, have a feature wall don’t listen to anybody other than your self. Pot pouri gets a similar bad wrap, anyone who comes to the classes will know how we totally and utterly throw  that one out the window with an out of this world scent that mirrors an Italian woodland in the rain, but we shall keep that one between ourselves. Same goes for carnations, garage flowers I heard someone call them recently, and maybe I’m an odd one but the minute anyone turns up their noses and dismisses something like feature walls or garage flowers I want to prove them wrong.

Every week I walk to the flower market, Columbia Road being very near our house and buy fresh blooms, bunches of eucalyptus s makes the lower ground floor smell intoxicatingly forest like and a couple of bunches of other blooms for tables and desks, and yes I adore the faux’s I have them all over but I like having both. Sometimes I’ll buy hydrangeas (now very much in season) sometimes roses and sometimes carnations. Carnations (aka garage flowers) I here you cry, wait up and I will explain. These poor fellows get a bad wrap and yet they last forever and are one of the cheapest varieties to buy. Here’s the trick and there are a few, cut the stems so that the heads just topple over your vases (and by the way you don’t need a  conventional vase,any old  jam jars, the odd glass or tea light holder will do. Next up try mixing deep red with pink a magical combination and if you’ve got people over for dinner one of the coolest things you can do is decant in little t-light holders, chop stems off so they topple over the container, spray with hair spray and sprinkle with glitter. At night its magical truly truly magical. Or you can mix them with other blooms for another  truly magical combo.

Some flower images below:

These are carnations are from Saipua a Brooklyn florist and one of the coolest around.

Another mixed bunch roses and carnations who would have thought they would look so cool?

These beauties from the blog, www.fromtherightbank.com.

Oh and as for feature walls here is my one which I love, and which I intend to keep just like so until at least 90 years of age! Wallpapering this double height wall totally softens it and makes it feel like an art installation,  so to  all the naysayers out there I do not give a rats ass if they are in or they are out. Happy Wednesday

How to create a perfectly imperfect room

Have overslept, namely because half the night I couldn’t sleep – what with Maud on a pillow above my head breathing into my ear and Mung’s situated in between my legs with his ball (he is obsessed with balls and at bedtime before climbing the stairs I generally try and find each and every ball around the house and stash away because he hunts them out in the middle of the night and brings them up). So last night every now and again he would toss the darn ball up our end, I’m guessing to play, Maud would snarl, I would snap and back down he goes to the legs.  Imagine that scenario times 5! So I need alot of coffees today.

The title of today’s blog is actually inspired from the book The Perfectly Imperfect Home by Deborah Needleman; have any of you guys read it? Its funny,  its not so much a glossy coffee table kind of tome but its full to the brim of sweet little sketches and Deborah’s musings on interiors which resonate with me big time and I love with way Deborah writes from the hip in a super casual relaxed fashion, refreshing considering she is the editor of the Wall Street Journal’s magazine.

Anywasy the reason we want an imperfect home is because if you live in an interior that is decorated just so, perfectly, to within an inch of its life then whether you like it or not it will take on a very formal tone, even its it full to the brim of squishy loungy stuff. To elevate it, to knock it out of the stratosphere you have to add a bit of oddball and the odd imperfect thing which could be as simple as a pile of roughly hewn logs, or as grand as peeling old Victorian table with claw feet. Some pointers below in creating the perfectly imperfect room which with the holidays fast approaching we all want right?

1. Add texture (texture is like a herb it lifts an interior out of the mundane and elevates it to a whole other level, the trick is to create as much friction between surfaces as you can. Friction by the way in interiors is a GOOD THING!

2. Move furniture away from the walls, even by angling a chair or table slightly it will break up the linear aspects of your room

3. Layer, layer, layer the more layers you add to the space the more interesting it becomes. The reason being we want to confuse the eye, we want to tantalise the eye so when you walk into a room you don’t quite know where to look and if you don’t have stuff you just can’t pull that off. Oh and don’t worry about the dusting aspect, a bit of dusting on a Saturday morn with some jazz on its pretty dam cool if you ask me!

4 Lighting the more lighting you add the more interesting your space becomes, in my new studio 9 lights are on softly glowing casting a beautiful light.

5 Add something oddball, an unexpected piece of art, a sculpture, a spare chair in a odd colour anything that doesn’t quite fit with the general scheme

6 Add something funny, easiest decorating trick in the book since it requires no skill but it immediately lightens the mood, animals are great for this, ceramic, papier mache or otherwise

7 Add something imperfect as mentioned above, it you go down the vintage route its easy peasy since vintage pieces have a narrative, tell a story that again elevates your interior to a whole other level

8 Lastly but most importantly add colour, the single most important thing you can do (if you reign in your palette you can mix and match far easier)

Phew!

Talking of holidays the Christmas master classes are booking up pretty fast since there are only four (regrettably my schedule is a little nuts a the moment, we’re trying to figure out more days to add but it might involve cutting me in half and next to flying anything medical (the smell the sight of blood anything makes me faint) so spaces are limited.

All change

Morning, my weekend wasn’t quite as I thought, the idea of strolling across Hyde Park and onto Notting hill got bashed on the head when I realised I couldn’t stand to go one more week without revamping the room adjoining my studio. As the business expands I find I am multi tasking more and more so need more space to spread out and the current room, as shot very beautifully by Mr Todd Selby seen below, was beginning to irritate me just a little too much. You know when you fall head over heels in love with something, a room, a person, an objet and then time passes and you’ll like why was I sooo in love,  is kind of exactly what’s happened to me.

This room looks lovely yet it just didn’t work. I would whizz through barely spending a second in it and you could kind of  sense the room didn’t get lived in much. Anyone who has come to the classes has always said like me the lower ground floor is their favourite, why because I spend alot of time down there so its feels lived in and loved and this poor room got a bit neglected, alot neglected if I am honest!

The room is small the sofa quite big and it dominated with its presence, not just that it wasn’t comfortable the seat way to small so you couldn’t squish and snuggle. The window (now I love love the window, it sold me the house) in the cooler months with the trees bare felt too austere I needed to layer in front of it. Funnily in Australia when I teaching the master classes only last week I got asked that question more than any other. When you have big windows as so many of you do over there what do you do with them? Convention suggests you leave them bare, you put not a thing in front of them they are the star of the house right? WRONG. Layer in front of them I’ve done it in my lower ground floor and the result is life changing, yes you to have to weave around stuff before getting outside but by God its one of the best things I’ve done. So in front of these big windows I plonked a console and it’s totally brought the room together. Before anyone asks what a hassle having to move the console to shut the shutters every night, they never ever get shut on this floor, summer, winter always always open.

(I’ll take more pics when the light comes up its still a little dark here in London)

So other than that and a bit of pinching from other floors (namely the school room) everything else remains the same and I now get a room where I can research on squishy chairs in front of the fire or work on a big desk behind. Mung’s and Maud now can’t sit in front of the window and bark at the neighbouring cats (a good thing), but they can sleep on chairs covered in sheepskins or finely woven merino wool throws with a fire slowly flickering in the grate. Kind of love autumn!

 

Look for inspiration everywhere

Often times if you are in a conundrum with your scheme, colour, decoration, lighting or otherwise, then go for a wander. If you hit a brick wall and it happens all the time with moi, with how you want a room to look aside from trawling the web and amassing tear sheets from magazines go for a potter. I do it all the time, it fuels inspiration. For instance there is there super cool cafe in the Kingsland Road (name escapes me sorry) owned by a couple of French guys – genius store design, food yummy (coffee OK) but for once who cares about the coffee the ambience, the atmosphere the laid back casual vibe it permeates inspires all sorts of thoughts.

Likewise in Sydney last Sunday night had super at the latest, coolest, hippest hang out called Mr Wong’s. Now I felt right at home because it’s quite dark inside, brick walls, large but quite snuggly,  cool lighting and again the atmosphere spot on. Same goes for pubs, stores, hole in the wall cafes figure out what makes them cool and capture some of that magic by taking home the essential ingredients. Design is a snooty old business and although I’m not telling anyone not to study it, sometimes you need to do a field trip on the ground to figure out what works rather than pouring over books. From experience the more you come away  from the preconditioned rules and regs the more exciting a space becomes. Is it the lighting the makes a space cool, the style of furniture, the wall treatments, the scent – break it down, figure it out and capture some of the magic in your pad.

Pretty darn easy right?

For me,my inspiration comes from Merci in Paris (seen below) in my mind one of the coolest stores in the world. I hate overly designed spaces I want them to feel relaxed and effortless and this place totally nails it. From the paint colour to the lighting, to the rugs to the mismatched furniture. Kinda of now want to go to Paris for the weekend!

Happy Friday and weekend– for us on Saturday its a potter thru Notting hill with a wander over Hyde park first of course because the two M’s are obsessed with the swans and ducks on the Serpentine and love rolling in duck poop! Too much information, possibly, sorry  ignore the last part, but if it makes them happy it makes me happy!

Oh and finally an image of my two assistants not the most get up and go couple on the block, their day involves quite a bit of snoozing, eating, chasing and snoozing again. Mention anything to do with work like maybe would they mind sending a few emails, possibly checking in some deliveries and its gets met with a response pretty much like below!

Deck the Halls Abigail Style

Very excited to announce our Christmas master classes launching mid November. It’s the most wonderful time of year to decorate and pull out all the stops making friends, family and the Joneses super jealous! My sister (coolest florist in town) and I will show you how to transform your pad from ordinary to extraordinary including the most amazing floral arrangements (which you guys get to make should you want), we’ll also be creating phenomenal table settings, showing you how to style mantles and tablescapes along with Christmas tree ideas, scenting your home and tons more. Mulled wine, roaring fires and oodles of mince pies will complement the day.

Spaces as always are limited as it’s held in my pad in East London, to book on line click here, or email the store contact@atelierbypost.com, or call +44 207 354 8181

Happy early holidays hope to see you in November

 

Look forward to seeing