Small Ideas Big Impact

Firstly when I say these are small ideas that is not to downgrade them – they are actually big ideas that either don’t involve much work, or might involve simply a tweak to what is already going on and which make a big difference to a room. Big. (Huge, as Julia Roberts would say). First up paint; the most affordable and transformative thing you can do for around £30 (depending on brand and size of tin). So ready for a stroll through these beautiful rooms?

First up is this masterpiece of paint zoning. It’s not a particularly big room, it has no original features, the ceiling is not particularly high and yet it clearly has a sleeping part and a working part. I’ll wait for a second here while you clock that the bed is on perspex and appears to float – yes that is helping with the sense of space in the room – the more floor you can see etc – but that isn’t the point here. The blue paint, which wraps around part of the wall, the ceiling and the desk, and which is matched by the window blind, creates the perfect working corner. At first glance you might even think it’s an alcove with a desk in it but it isn’t. This is perfect for all those who are asking how to add character to new builds. It doesn’t have to have a desk it in. It could be a dressing table, a reading area, a sitting space in a studio flat, the kitchen part of an open plan layout. The point is the paint and clever application thereo.

The fact that the blue paint doesn’t reach down to the floor also helps the space feel larger as your eye flows over the floor – which you can see almost all of – and up the walls which, again, aren’t divided by colour on the lower half. The bedhead design mirrors the L-shape of blue paint and helps it be both sleeping bed and day bed should you require. And studies have found that a short afternoon nap can work wonders for the creative brain by the way (read more of that here and it will open in a new window so you can click and park). Now, of course, you may not have exactly this layout, but hopefully it provides food for thought for anyone who needs to find a way to work in a room that might have another primary function. And, if you can, make sure your desk has its back to that other function so you are not staring at all your space all day.

More clever paint zoning via Green and Mustard who has applied green paint in a corner and, this is the magic bit, taken it over the ceiling to create a sort of canopy. This feels like a proper little reading nook and probably didn’t even use a whole tin. The artwork straddles both green and white wall so it keeps the space as one while clearly indicating a different zone of the room.

During lockdown I interviewed the psychologist Julia Samuel (scroll down to the second half of the post to read/listen) about the need to find our own spaces when everyone is at home all day. Hopefully we are past that but her point remains valid; everyone needs to be able to signal that they need quiet time and if they don’t have their own bedroom/office/locking bathroom you need to find another way to send and receive that message. She suggested a yoga mat or towel for a small child who may not be able to articulate their needs clearly – the idea being that the child can learn that by sitting on this mat (or even rolling it out themselves) that they will be given the space they need. This green corner does the same thing in perhaps a more elegant way than a towel on the floor, but doesn’t take up any more space. You can recreate this in your own living room or even in a corner of a child’s room to create a reading area or a quiet zone or even make it larger, as above, and put a desk in it. The key, for me at least, is that the paint carries onto the ceiling to really create that idea of a room within a room.

Now we’re moving into more bespoke ideas which will, of course, cost more than paint but can really make a room. Above a bedhead that is upholstered rather than painted. It’s colour co-ordinated to within an inch, but the joy of this is that if you have a small bedroom, adding a feature like this embraces its size but shouts that you are not apologising for that or trying to hide it. If you don’t have room for cupboards/dressing tables/chairs then go all out with the headboard and make something fabulous. And yes I do know the woman to help with this since you ask… Jess at Poh Maluna is your woman and I am talking to her about creating several for a large project I am working on in Mayfair.

Another brilliant bespoke project I saw this week is this cupboard that houses a fridge and I dream of this. Regular readers may know I hated my hulking great stainless steel fridge so I covered it in vinyl to disguise it. Here, it has been built into a wonderful cupboard. Now I imagine it’s still an integrated fridge, and it is my sad duty to inform you that large American style fridges are insanely expensive when you want them to be integrated. I remain convinced that there ought to be a way of putting a normal fridge into a cupboard without having to open the cupboard door and then the fridge door (and believe me when I say I am so style over substance that I would do this but The Mad Husband and sons have drawn the line) but I haven’t found it yet. My superglue idea was rejected by everyone. So maybe this is just a lovely cupboard that hides a big expensive fridge. That said, rather than buying an integrated American fridge you could just buy two standard (60cm wide) ones and build a cupboard around them. And if my kitchen was measured out to the last millimetre I would do this. However, in the current format I would have to rip out all the cupboards to make it work so that remains a project for the next kitchen/house/client.

There’s no doubt that the fridge cupboard above is the show-stopping element of that kitchen but here, in a similar colour, for much less expense, the island, wrapped in a gorgeous shade of deep orange does the job. This is the definition of a small idea with a big impact. If you’re having an island anyway then it’s not even extra work to change the colour as it would need painting anyway. But the effect is modern, dynamic and fabulous. Yes, you could paint all the units the same but why would you when you can add a splash of contrasting colour like this which, assuming you pick a colour you adore, will make your heart leap with happiness every time you come in.

Lastly, I have included this, by Kelly Wearstler for the colours. The overall impression is one of warmth but if you look closely there is yellow ochre, green, rust red, pale pink and black. There are florals and checks, squares and circles, wallpaper, tiles and paint. There is a lot going on but it doesn’t feel like it because the colours harmonise so well. This is a tonal scheme pushed to its limits with the red, pink, orange and yellow and a dash of green and black to wake it all up.