By So todays post is actually my first ever interior post to wardrobewhispers.com. My love for interiors started at a young age and then developed whilst working at Next after covering a position on the home department. I then decided to leave Next to pursue a career as an Interior Designer at the department store Leekes.
Due to my love of interior decor and partly because of purchasing our first home back in 2017. I decided that when relaunching my blog as well as my categories for Fashion, Beauty, Lifestyle and Travel I really wanted to introduce an ‘Interior” category to my blog. Interiors has become a huge part of my life and I love spending time scrolling through Pinterest looking for inspiration.
We are finally starting to decorate our home one room at a time as we only ever decorated our living room and dining room when we first moved in. This was due to saving and paying for our wedding and honeymoon so the house decor kind of got put on hold.
Our next project is decorating the hallway and landing. At the moment it’s really ‘drab’ and just needs a good pick me up. Unfortunately our cat has torn our wallpaper to shreds so we are actually having the entire hall, landing and two bedrooms re plastered with all new skirting boards too.
I thought I would put a mood board together to show you my vision for what I have in mind.
Doors:
When we moved in there were two sliding doors downstairs, as they are space saving they work really well, we are just having them replaced with a more modern style. I have also chosen a barn style sliding bracket in black instead of a more old fashioned pelmet. The doors are white but I will be painting them in Little Greene Urban Grey 225 to give a nice contrast against our Little Greene Shallows wall colour.
Lighting:
I absolutely love the new style indoor lantern light trend and this particular one is a bargain at £49.00 from Dunelm Mill. I am not one for following trends but this design fits into our home so well. I will have one in our hall and one at the top of the stairs on the landing. They actually are a bronze effect colour so I might paint them black to tie in with our theme throughout our home.
Tiling:
Our entire house has a lovely cream carpet throughout by Axminster. However cream carpet in the entrance way isn’t really practical at all. I wanted to include a little but of a ‘fun’ tile to give some character to the entrance. I found these tiles in Wickes they are called ‘Central Park’ and I instantly fell in love with the colours in them. Our living and dining rooms are off our hallway so these tiles will tie in with the decor in these rooms nicely, as Im trying to follow a theme throughout our home.
Runner:
I don’t necessarily want to cover up the new tiles we have chosen, however I really want to introduce some textures to the hall. I was thinking of adding a nice jute runner I think it will work well with the flooring. This might be something I may change my mind on once its done but its all about trial and error.
Mirror:
I am in love with the window arch mirrors lately but didn’t realise how expensive they were until I started looking. Thats when I came across this arch mirror from The Range at a bargain price of £57.99 I had to have it. This was the first item I bought for our hallway as it kept going out of stock so I wanted to purchase it whilst I could. Unfortunately it only comes in the off white colour so I bought some Rust Oleum paint in “Matt Black” (250ml is plenty!) to switch it to the colour I wanted. It’s really easy to paint, if you want to do the same as me the entire frame comes away from the mirror so you don’t get paint all over the glass surface.
I also want to add in a black edged full length mirror as soon as you walk from our living room into our hall that will be the first thing you see. I think it will help bounce light in the hall and make the space appear bigger than what it actually is. I’ve found the perfect on in Ikea for only £25.00
Coat Rack:
The original coat rack that was in our hall way was a little ugly and I wanted something more modern. This coat rack is plain and simple and is very inexpensive. Although I was looking at the industrial coat stands on Amazon and now I’m torn on what to pick so this might be a decision to make once the rest of the decor is in place to see what works best for us.
Vases
I love these over sized matt black floor vases for the hallway. I was thinking of styling them with a variety of pampass grass to add more texture in. I may even want to add in some greenery to the hall too.
Console:
I really like the idea of having a console table right at the top of the stairs. Obviously being at the top of the stairs the table would have to be very narrow in depth to be able to still keep a clear walkway free at the top. I found this console table on Wayfair and really like the ‘peg-legs’ I was after something that had maybe two drawers in and a bottom shelf but I quite liked this one as its very minimalistic. My vision is for the large window mirror to sit above this right at the top of the stairs to make a feature as you walk up.
Decor
Ive included a few ‘decor’ pieces in this mood board to give you an idea of how I will be styling our new overhauled space. Finishing touches like these items are sentimental to finish off the look of a space and give it that ‘homely’ touch. See the below subheadings for my ideas;
Console Table Styling
I like the idea of having a diffuser on our console table so every time you walk past you get a nice smell. I particularly like the Antigua one from Next so I may have to purchase that.
I also want to include a vase. I have a lovely smoked grey one I want to put there but I also really liked this bobble one from H&M which might look nice styled next to the vase I have. I think I will either purchase a nice bunch of dried flowers to fill this or raid my parents garden for more pampass grass.
I then quite liked this rattan style basket which is also from H&M maybe to place underneath the table and the wooden bowl to place on top.
Window Dressing
I need to think about what style window dressing I’d like on our landing. Currently there are curtains but I don’t think curtains are practical on the stairs. I think I will chose a roman blind as these look more like a decorative piece whether they are open or closed.
Painting
We are keeping a theme throughout the house and painting the hall and landing the same colours as our lounge and dining room. The main colour is ‘Shallows’ by Little Greene which is an off white. I find white too cold and clinical but love the slight warmth this ‘Shallow’ colour gives a space.
This will be contrasted with ‘Urban Grey’ also by Little Greene which is a grey colour I may use this to paint the wall at the top of the stairs where my mirror and console will go to give a bit of depth. We may also use the grey on the stair rail. I was also tempted to paint our skirting boards this colour too but may just stick to white. Another task to do is to paint/replace our upstairs doors to match the new grey ones downstairs and replace the handles to matt black, but we will do this at a later date.
I hope you liked my first ever interiors post to my blog. I understand my blog is primarily ‘Fashion’ based as the name indicates but I really want to take you on a journey of decorating our first home too.
Shop The Products:
Arch Mirror: https://www.therange.co.uk/home-furnishings/mirrors/ivory-arch-mirror#703333
Ceiling Pendant: https://www.dunelm.com/product/london-industrial-1-light-pendant-bronze-ceiling-fitting-1000119936?defaultSkuId=30571883
Barn Sliding Door Bracket: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Yaheetech-Sliding-Hardware-Closet-Single/dp/B01BXWC0DS/ref=sr_1_5?dchild=1&keywords=black+sliding+barn+bracket&qid=1593782628&sr=8-5
Vases: https://www.maisonsdumonde.com/UK/en/p/matte-black-glass-teardrop-vase-h41-199977.htm?page=1
Runner: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Charles-Bentley-Natural-Runner-180cm/dp/B00Y0QGGIA
Rattan Basket: https://www2.hm.com/en_gb/productpage.0698508004.html
Diffuser: https://www.next.co.uk/style/st305960/628241#628241
Vase: https://www2.hm.com/en_gb/productpage.0748914003.html
Bowl: https://www2.hm.com/en_gb/productpage.0854112001.html
Little Green Paint 225 Urban Grey: https://www.littlegreene.com/urbane-grey-225
Little Green Paint 223 Shallows: https://www.littlegreene.com/shallows-223
What do you think?