I REALLY CAN’T HELP MYSELF
“The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity.” Dorothy Parker
I always say shopping is a bit like sex, in that if you’re going to live with something or someone, you’d better be damn sure there’s chemistry there.
People into one-night stands or furniture flings belong in IKEA, where they can attach themselves to a flatbed trolley, wander around like a cube on wheels and emerge a fully-fledged member of the cookie-cutter generation. As for me, I’d rather create erogenous over homogenous any day.
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The difference between a house and a home is its energy. From squalor to splendor, if you haven’t created a palpable atmosphere, or if it’s lacking life or intrigue, it’s a house.
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I’m not one for staring out of windows like an Ibsen character, but I like to know I’ve dressed them for the occasion should I ever have a change of heart.
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I’ll never lose my curiosity for the magic of color. It’s one of my greatest passions - a secret weapon, my confidante and certainly my starting point.
If you don’t want to drink in a color until it consumes you, you don’t love it enough.
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A fabulous color, like a great song, should conjure a mood that allows fantasy to flourish. If I can describe a color easily, I’ve no time for it. It’s the colors that stop your heart that I settle on. That dusty grape that catches the light as if just plucked off the vine in Bordeaux should make you feel as drunk as the wine itself - or a pink so pale you can’t look away for fear it will fade. Colors purify the soul - they give you a reason to get up in the morning.
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If a sofa doesn’t say take me over the back of it, it needs a fabulous throw. Which brings me to my one true love. Fabric.
What other real-life medium boasts texture, movement, color, art and design - which is why a great dress could turn a librarian into a movie star. The same goes for a room - there’s nothing you can’t do with a pot of paint and some great fabric.
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A beautifully dressed room should be steeped in mystery, with unanswered questions, half-told stories and dreams of things to come
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A cosy corner is an invitation, setting the scene and inviting you to play out a little of the theatre we call life - or at least dream a little, or at the very least wish you had a dream. Whatever works for you.
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People often ask me to describe my style and I find it hard to give a short answer. I’ve been told I’d design ‘a good brothel’ - I’d probably agree with that. How else would I explain my penchant for fringing other than a past life in an old bordello?
I think there’s probably something of a madam in all the designers I love - especially the men.
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Color blindness is surely one of the most evil tricks in God’s great lexicon of mean pranks. Living without it would take the soul out of the world.
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Someone once called me a poster child for bohemian living. I had fabric draped over lightshades the second I was trusted in a room on my own.
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I’m far more hunter than gatherer. The thrill of the chase has always been more exciting than anything I’ve ever dug up, but I’m never fickle of flirtatious. When it comes to finding real style, true love is the only way. Take my kitchen table. When I decided it was delicious enough to cross my threshold, it was because I loved it enough to eat at it, wax it, have sex on it and treasure it for ever.
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There’s nothing I detest more than stepping into a room which feels as though someone sucked the life out of it. We’ve all been in them.
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One of the secrets to making a house a home is giving it a feeling of abundant possibility. A home is a place that adds romance to life. You have to balance the architectural with the frills and flowing elements in a room. The tiniest details carry so much power - a tin kettle that sits on a stove or a dripping candelabra that’s seen it all. Every room has energy - how much you infuse it with your own is up to you.
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A home should ease life’s pain - it should delight you when you come home, lift your spirits when you’re down. How can you know you’re truly living if your house is as bland as your office, if it says nothing about you? I believe a home should be rich with your personality - so much so that it reminds you how to live, reminds you of your dreams, of what you find romantic, sad or happy. It should be a reflection of every part of you and everything you’re hoping for.
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With my own homes, I often get up in the middle of the night and change things around. Move tables, chairs, drapes, paintings.
Begging, bribery - I’d go to any length to get my husband Simon to help me move furniture. I get an idea in my head and have to do it then and there. If I couldn’t carry something, I move it to the edge of the stairs, so the first person up in the morning had to help me move it or stay trapped.
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I always consider both the outside and inside when dressing a room. You’d imagine it was the other way round, but I think it was Matisse who said that painting a window black brings the outside in - it takes your eyes beyond the frame and into the garden or the streets beyond.
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A well-dressed room should complement you and make you look as good in a pair of jeans as you do in a ballgown. If a backdrop works, it’s been designed for you to live into its moment - you don’t need to look great, all you need to do is act the part.