Each building we visit has a new story to tell and makes us look at our furniture in a completely new way. On this trip we visited a very special building in a state of disrepair. This fascinating place was once was an incredibly large baroque home for a wealthy London family in the 1850’s but since then has been cut up and adapted into several guises including (until recently) a hotel.
Inside, the years of renovation have been peeled back and exposed, as it awaits redevelopment. Each room reveals layer upon layer of ornate architecture and heart-breaking neglect.
For the purposes of our shoot it provided a back drop of enchanting character and stunning texture to our Cotswold Company home, so we thought we’d take you behind the scenes and share some of our favourite features of this remarkable building and some key styling tips for you to look out for…
Hyacinths were a dominant floral component for this shoot and we teamed it here with some rigid eucalyptus, to give it even more height and presence on the furniture.
They looked beautiful against this abstract painted wall and surrounded by an abundance of roses, succulents, craspedia and veronica. The colour of our Oakland Small Sideboard gives a nice warmth to the pastel pallet of flowers and the wall behind.
We also love our delicate ceramic swan, filled here with a dusty coloured succulent and surrounded by our vintage pots and bon bon tins. This look was great fun to put together and though achieving this in the home might be a little indulgent, grouping multiple bouquets of flowers together on one piece of furniture is incredibly impactful and worth giving a go at least once!
Take a look at some of the wall detailing that accompanied our Burford Bookcase. You’d think this kind of intricate moulding would be reserved for a palace but in a 1850’s home of this status it would have been part of one of the grand bedrooms or reception rooms. The level of craftsmanship throughout the 19th century parts of this building were breath-taking. We struggled to imagine all the painstaking hours that went into making it so beautiful.
We’ve generated a collection of ornate gold frames over the years and we particularly loved the way they looked with our group of brass candle sticks. Using an abundance of gold on our Caldecote Wine Rack really elevated it from a practical piece of furniture to an eye-catching centrepiece. Take a moment to look at the enormous skirting boards that surrounds our humble wine rack. Even when painted white, with plain white walls you can still get the sense of grandeur this room must have had in its heyday.
We also used our antique gold frames to punctuate the grey on grey look we achieved with our Boston Light Grey Chest. This look also features our NEW Corcoran lighting, a beautiful ceramic lamp with a cork base and simple shade, a modern twist on a classic shape.
If you want to spot some more of our latest accessories take a look at our Caldecote French Grey Curved Console. It houses our new Arka Table Lamp, a classical shape and a pale wooden finish that works well with the rustic flaky wall of the old hotel in the background.
Our new Horatio Mantle Clock can be found perched neatly on top of our Regatta Grey headboard. This sturdy little clock has a warm wooden finish and a silent sweep movement, that wont keep you awake through the night. Its accompanying faces can also tell you the temperature and humidity in the room.
Our Cotswold Co Kitchen is often filled with a mixture of modern cookbooks and vintage pots, pans, crockery and cutlery. The Leon cookbook has become a firm favourite of ours along with the, perhaps lesser known, Canteen, Great British Food book which is full of culinary treasures. We particularly loved the deep red and rusty look of the wall behind the Wiltshire Painted Dresser featured in this shot. It gives a warm balance to the clean cream paint finish of this piece.
Cream is a key colour among our painted furniture ranges as its neutral pallet gives a huge amount of flexibility to your décor. Our Mottisfont Range will sit well against almost any background but here we’ve photographed our Chest of Drawers with a thoroughly distressed wall, completely untouched since the late 1800’s. The crumbling plaster and flaking wallpaper add a touch of romantic drama to our beautiful piece of bedroom furniture.
This room also played host to our chic Regatta Bedroom Furniture. The contrast between the dark, smooth, grey painted finish and the decomposing wall, with subtle yellowy tones, complemented each other beautifully. We also think the Astrid Yellow Throw, featured in this shot, works particularly well with the Regatta Range.
Plants always feature heavily in our Cotswold Company Home, but one of our favourite horticultural finds on this shoot was this charming Alocasia. There’s so much detail on the leaves that they almost look man made and their shape is incredibly unusual, resembling some kind of mini prehistoric species.
We adorned our Oakland Coffee Table with a collection of stunning succulents. We particularly loved the varied texture we created in our large wooden bowl and the Soleirolia soleirolii plant in our vintage green dish, otherwise known to us as Fozzywig!
Displaying a few fresh herbs in your kitchen area can really liven up the surface space and of course give you access to a little extra taste and texture. We found this beautiful vintage pot from a second hand shop and used it to house our handsome chive.
We’ve also scattered a few herbs and succulents across our Westbury Grey Table Set and coupled it with our simple stoneware tea set. We love the understated, humble look of these ceramics and how the beautiful iron specks filter through the clay, making each piece of this set completely unique.
The trusted ivy complements Oak beautifully, especially when positioned up high and allowed to cascade down the length of the furniture. Using ivy on items like bookcases and wardrobes is a great way of introducing a bit of mother nature to a room.
To hop straight to some of our newest ranges and latest products, take a look at the Albany Soft Truffle, Oxford Painted, Westbury Grey Painted, Boston Light Grey and Regatta Grey ranges or browse our accessories page to find new clocks, lighting and more.
