Interior Designing your Own Home

You have read the home magazines, you’ve been to all the furnishings shops and you’ve envied (or otherwise) your friends homes but you still can’t make decisions on how you want your home to look. Sound familiar? Many people reach this frustrating point but following a few key steps in the design process will help you pull the look for your home together. Kate Barraclough of Interior Design Talks provides some insider secrets to show how it’s done.

Many people reach this frustrating point, but following a few key steps in the design process will help you create the look for your home. Kate Barraclough of Interior Design Talks provides some insider secrets to show how it’s done. When you have a new home, it’s very tempting to get started straightaway – to repaint a room that you hate the colour of, to buy a sofa in the sales, or just to put your current furniture in any room it will fit into – but the most important rule in designing your own home is to plan your spaces before you do anything else. That includes the style, lighting, colour, storage, layout and so on. Once this is done, you'll be amazed how your plans come together!
Finding your style
You may like lots of different styles, but it's important to find a key look that suits you and your house, and
then to stick to it. The best way to do this is to gather information. Use a box, a notice board, or even a dedicated place on a shelf, then, every time you see a picture in a magazine or book that you absolutely love, or a swatch of a fabric you feel you have to have, or some information about a product you would like to own, just tear it out and stash it away. Once you have a healthy pile of information, look through the things you have gathered and try to work out what it is that you're all about. The look may be modern, Victorian, colourful, vintage, retro, fresh, comfortable, feminine, neutral or playful; it doesn’t matter how you describe it, as long as you know what you want in your house. Once you've done this, you'll quickly start to appreciate other styles, but you'll realise you should leave them alone – they're not for you!
Planning your layout
Just as important as finding your style is to plan the layout of your home, or of the room in question. It helps to start with a list of allactivities that take place in each room, so a guest bedroom may also be a study or hobby room, an additional storage area, a place for overnight guests or those who stay a month, and also an overspill place for people in the house who may want to sleep in a different bed for some reason. Clever layout planning can accommodate all these uses, making the room a really valued space in the house.

Sourcing products

Once you have a good idea of the style which works best for you and how you're going to lay out your spaces, you need to draw up a concise list of work to be done and things to acquire.
Make sure you have all the relevant information with you before you start shopping, such as the best length and depth for a sofa, height for bedside tables, size of rug, number of lamps and so on, and then you need to look for shops, websites or markets that supply the style of products that will achieve your look. If you can’t find a supplier of exactly the product you're looking for, remember that you can have many items made just for you; for example, finding a good local upholsterer may mean that you can commission exactly the style, size and finish of the sofa that you want rather than taking the closest option from the high street.
Have fun!
Remember that interior designing your home should be a good experience; this may mean putting in a little extra time and effort, particularly in the planning stages, but all your efforts will be worthwhile when you have a house that you can truly call home.

Interior Design Talks runs home design courses in central
Cambridge including a day course on Interior Designing
Your Own Home. For more information go to
www.interiordesigntalks.com or call 01223 328001.