One of the most common storage solutions is the faithful cardboard box with lid – perfect for an office or bedroom. Finding the right size and colour isn’t always that straight forward so why not try making your own. You pick the colour and make it the size you want. Using simple techniques of folding paper or card, you can create your desired storage box in no time. We found some tutorials from designsponge.com, instructables.com and homemade-gifts-made-easy.com to follow.
There’s always room for more beautiful art on a wall. John Lewis has a talent to hunt out some incredible artists and graphic designers and have a huge, varied range of styles of work.
We picked this gorgeous Tiffany Lynch print, that is only £5, as our favourite. The colour, the detail and the stylized effects come together to ensure this is a stunning vibrant piece, inspired by nature and perfect to bring a bold, Spring feel to a room.
‘Tiffany Lynch is inspired by the magic of nature, it’s wildlife and changing seasons, her paintings on canvas always find their origins in her pen and ink sketchbook drawings.‘
For the green fingered of us, now is the time to start tidying the garden and getting ready for summer. For those who don’t have an outdoor space, or just like having plants indoors then these hanging planters from Factorytwentyone are perfect.
The simple wooden box with leather strap [ choose from five colours ] will look great hung individually on a small wall, or group together on a larger wall.
Quince Living is a veritable feast of living and lifestyle shopping, with a huge range of designers and brands in their many departments.
‘…online family run store for Scandinavian home wares and UK made designs along with products from well-loved home wares brands such as Stelton, Nkuku, Orla Kiely and House of Rym.’
With so many great pieces for every room, plus decorations, stationery, kids decor, furniture – it’s endless. The price range varies from affordable to save-up-for and there’s also lovely pieces in their sale section.
The Barbican in London is a fascinating and wonderful place to walk around on any day, but when they have a great exhibition it makes the trip all the more worth while.
The Barbican Exhibition: Designing for a Living City is a new exhibition tracing the controversial design of the 1970s residential development – explore the range of flat types and interiors which would accommodate some 6000 people within 35 acres. The display includes the original 1971 residential layout and landscape plan, as well as original fittings, archival illustrations, leaflets, brochures and films.
A must for any Barbican fan, and those interest in architecture and interior design of the past. Plus after, take some time to explore the building, visit the conservatory, take a tour or browse the shop.
In the modern world of interior design, net curtains fell out of favour to other now popular window coverings including Venetian or roller blinds and recently wooden shutters. However with both the growth in popularity of the vintage-look in the home, as well as the trend for minimal white light filled interiors, net curtains have gained a fan base again.
And they really do make sense. They’re are brilliant way to ensure privacy for large windows, they diffuse sunlight but still allow rooms to remain bright and sun filled, and as a cheap material they are easily updated with colour or pattern trends as desired. Styled in the right way within a vintage style or minimal clean interior, they can create a great modern look, especially layered up and with extra length so they puddle on the floor.
The window covering market is worth more than £1bn, and designers and brands are offering a great range of affordable styles across the high street. Head to IKEA for some modern Scandivian designs.
Colour wise they are classic in white, but to bring colour into a room, layering a lace curtain over a coloured net can give a subtle coloured, softened appearance to the window area. With the current metallic trend being popular, that can also translate into voile or net, as can black to exaggerate a monochrome themed room.
If flowing nets are a little flouncy for your taste the benefits of net, including light and privacy, can be achieved with the net, lace or voile stretched over frames and used as modern look panel covers for a window. Alternatively the pattern from the lace can also be found in adhesive opaque window film designs.
Taking a slightly softer approach to the Industrial trend of last year, Rustic Utilitarian focuses on worn and textural finishes – combining hard working materials with a soft colour pallete.
In the 1900s utilitarian design was created for use rather than beauty, but now things have changed.
For example the practical use of enamel-coated tableware and light shades has now become desirable for the home as objects of beauty, but still maintaining the usefulness if needed.
Another example of this adaptability could be galvanized buckets which aren’t necessarily used for carrying water anymore, instead used for storage or as a planter.
The great thing about this trend is that traditional materials are there to be used, whether you choose to use them for function, for looks or both, it doesn’t matter.
Mix wood, metal and leather on furniture and seat covers, softening the look with linen and wool soft furnishings such as throws and floor rugs.
Wall colours to consider are cool grey, moss green and cream, which work really well next to metal and wood tones. You can also add small punches of colour like yellow and red – achieve this with chairs, lighting and accessories.
A couple of shops who do Rustic Utilitarian very well are Labour and Wait [ step back in time to find traditional products, from hardware to clothing ], and Rockett St George [ great selection of industrial furniture and lighting ]
How about your very own cloud lighting up a room? Perfect for a kids room but cool enough to look grown-up in any room.
There are countless tutorials about DIY cloud light making, so we’ve rounded up a few.
Essentially, for a basic DIY cloud light you will need :
• a standard paper light shade, available on the high street and online from various stores including Homebase, IKEA, B&Q and Wilkos. The cloud light can then be hung from an existing ceiling light pendant
• cotton wool balls (and lots of them)
• a glue gun or PVA
Extras can include fairy lights to create a drizzle of ‘light’ rain from the cloud-looking shade, and you could also buy multiple shades in various sizes to create a bigger impact with a few clouds.
With Spring here and flowers in bloom, now is a good time to freshen up your living room with some new vases to put them in. If your looking for on-trend pieces at great prices then head to hm.com. With a huge selection in glass and ceramic there is something for everyone. [ from £4.99 ]
Gather a few different styles & colours together to bring interest to a shelf, or pick a large statement vase for a centre piece on a table. [ We love a monochrome look, sticking with black and white in various styles ]
Miss Print at John Lewis / bringing the outdoors in
Not that we don’t appreciate a painted wall and the ease of changing colour, but recently wallpaper has just grown in choice with incredible options of style and look for any room.
Technology has helped us by bringing in paste-the-wall paper instead of paste-the-paper, which allows us all to have a go at hanging wallpaper with much more ease.
To pin point a favourite would be hard but we’ve rounded up groups of our favourite designs and found some of the best stores to head to.
Make a statement with a bold design. For a wow factor, especially effective with nature and floral designs, cover all walls and then push the look further with more strong patterns in the soft furnishings. This look can be softened, instead, by using minimal accessories, clean line furniture and lots of white.
Bold patterns can also be effective on a solo wall as a feature wall and then when styling the room pick one or two colours to follow through in the choice of soft furnishings.
Baltic Shop / Graham & Browne
Fun and colourful designs are great for a children’s bedroom and can also be both educative, when the designs involve words, pictures and numbers, and interactive, with designs that involve stories, colouring in and games. Visit Graham & Browne and Baltic Shop for interactive options.
For a grown up, strong look, it is currently a key trend to go dark in interiors and contrary to belief it actually brightens a room. Contrast with white ceilings, light floors and sits well with dark woods and accessories in monochrome and metallics.
A constant favourite is monochrome. Easy to style and regularly update with black and white accessories as well as new on trend colours like copper and also 80s brights, monochrome allows flexibility and never fails to look fresh and stylish. Monochrome sits well with walnut, white or wire furniture.
If you decide to go for a wall covering we’ve discovered the excellent range of Betapet who not only have a great selection of bold, on-trend patterned and exciting designs but also, quite brilliantly, their range is self adhesive ensuring decorating is even easier! Head to their Etsy shop and choose from stripes, geometric and nature-inspired designs.
Betapet / self adhesive wallpaper / find on Etsy
Wallpaper is definitely a modern look and needs to be considered a great way to bring pattern and strong design to interior design. And it isn’t to be discounted, thinking its a hassle to change as realistically it’s just a strip and re-paper if desired. Patterned designs can be great at covering imperfect walls (unlike unforgiving paint) and with new methods of hanging there’s very little mess and fuss!
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![home: found this [ net curtains ]](https://anotherhomeblogdotcom.files.wordpress.com/2016/03/img_5353.jpg?w=863&h=0&crop=1)
![home: trend [ Rustic Utilitarian ]](https://anotherhomeblogdotcom.files.wordpress.com/2016/03/img-20160324-wa0004.jpg?w=863&h=0&crop=1)
![home: made [ cloud light ]](https://anotherhomeblogdotcom.files.wordpress.com/2016/03/img_5218.jpg?w=863&h=0&crop=1)
![home: nice price [ vases ]](https://anotherhomeblogdotcom.files.wordpress.com/2016/03/wp-1458683331292.jpg?w=863&h=0&crop=1)
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