Category: Interiors

Home Improvement Blog 0

Interiors

Top 5 Interior Design Tips to Update Your Home

If you are thinking about how to update your home but, like many people, have a limited budget then take a look at these tips from an interior designer friend. None of them will cost too much (although your actual choice of products will, obviously, affect the price) and, just as importantly the changes will not cause too much disruption to your life.Some of the best tips are about combining patterns, texture and colour through the use of fabrics and distinctive artworks.

For some projects you will have to declutter your home or, at least, the room you are updating to be sure the redecoration runs are smoothly as possible.

beautiful windows 0

home improvement / Interiors

4 Living Rooms With Beautiful Windows

Good light is one of the most important aspects of any home, which is why interior lighting schemes are a major part of any interior design project. The right light can completely change the ambience and bad lighting can detract from an otherwise well-designed space.

But just because we can create beautiful lighting artificially doesn’t mean we should neglect the natural light entering our homes and maximise it where we can. Here are some of my favourite room setting with wonderful windows that bring in as much natural light as possible. Even if the windows in your home are not as large and beautiful as these you can still improve the levels of natural light either with appropriate window dressings or by the more drastic measure of increasing the size of the window openings. These images might just inspire you to do that…

preparing your home for guests 0

Interiors

Preparing Your Home for Guests

Ever invited someone to stay with you and felt a huge rush of panic the moment you remember the state the spare room is in? When you realise you forgot that several ‘car boot ready’ black bags, a spin bike, ten unopened boxes from the house move and a Christmas tree all obstruct anyone from even getting more than half a foot into the room, let alone staying in it.

What you probably want to do is slap those marigolds on and get waist deep in cleaning and tidying the room right now. But it needn’t be such a panicked affair.

Follow this list of tips to help you calmly and easily get your guest room guest ready

the hassles of moving house 0

Interiors / Property

The Hassles of Moving House

Many reports indicate that moving, just like other major life events such as divorce, illness, or job loss, causes a lot of people to feel stressed and overwhelmed. Even if you plan to hire a mover to take care of the basic moving tasks like packing and transporting your belongings, you still have to go through the hassle of settling down in a new home. Moving doesn’t always have to be troublesome or stressful. In fact, if you plan ahead and follow a few simple but essential tips and tricks, it can be downright easy and stress free. If you want to make sure that your precious wedding china and expensive photo frames do not get damaged during moving, take care to buy the right boxes for your needs and ensure that they are clearly marked “fragile” and “this side up”. If you are interested in more such useful moving precautions, facts, and tips, don’t forget to check out this infographic…

family home 0

Interiors

Creating a sanctuary in a family home

Modern society is characterised by an interconnected world where the “always on” culture has made it increasingly difficult to disconnect from our routine. Escaping the daily grind comes with an added difficulty in households where there are children, since young kids need constant stimulation, and sometimes right when their parents need to wind down and relax. So does this mean that creating a sanctuary in a family home is just not possible? In this article we offer some tips for parents looking for ways to create a small haven of tranquillity in a busy household with kids.

laying wall tiles 0

DIY / Interiors

6 Tips to Use when Laying Bathroom Tiles

A tile floor can make any room look great. Now a person can tile their own bathroom floor with these easy to follow tips. Use Spacers When laying the tiles, it is important to...

digital ceramic tile decoration 0

Interiors

Top Twitter Accounts for Home Ideas

Here are the best twitter accounts you can follow to get a little bit of inspiration for when you are redecorating or improving your home. They range from contemporary interior design to traditional so...

wooden flooring 0

DIY / Interiors

5 Indispensable Floor Installation Tips

Maybe you are unhappy with the way your floor looks, or you just want to try out something different for a change. Also, you may be fed up with floor cleaning and require a...

DIY Home Improvements 0

Interiors / Property

7 Best YouTube Home Improvements Channels

When you take on the project to redecorate, you may feel the need to hire a professional as it can get a little to much, but these YouTube home improvements channels provide simple ideas. Sometimes...

wooden flooring 2

Interiors

Wooden Flooring and Underfloor Heating – The Basics

Wooden flooring is available in many different types of wood and different types of construction. There are solid wooden floors in both softwoods and hardwoods in the form of long, narrow boards or planks, or smaller pieces used in, for example, parquet floors. Solid wooden floors are usually nailed or screwed to the sub-floor. There are also engineered wooden floors that consist of several layers glued together with the top layer only being solid wood. These are most often installed as a floating floor above a series of joists. […]

0

Interiors

Why We Love Monochrome Bathrooms

Black and white bathrooms always look so stylish whether they are in a traditional Art Deco style or designed with modern minimalism in mind. They are perfect in character or period homes and also in modern homes. And, best of all, they don’t date quickly so will look great for years to come so be a good investment in improving a home.

Bathroom manufacturers and the buying public all love white in bathrooms, whether it is the bathroom suite or large, glossy porcelain tiles there is really nothing to compare with gleaming white lines. White bathroom suites look equally good in period reproduction styles as they do in sleek contemporary styles and any of the huge range of bathrooms to choose from will look fabulous when complemented with black. Accent tiles in black can be used to create unique patterns on borders or tiled panels and black accessories such as vases, towels etc. enhance the monochrome look. If you are feeling very daring (and either don’t live in a hard-water area or have a water softener fitted) then I have even seen a black Art Deco style basin. Just be sure it will suit your style of home and bathroom (I’m personally still cautious about using any sort of coloured sanitary ware).

0

Interiors

Popular Styles of Bathroom Design

The bathroom has come along way in the past one hundred years. Once just a basic tub set in front of the living room fire and filled with buckets of water, the bathing experience is now a luxury in almost every western home. Back then, a ‘bathroom’ was something only the wealthy and privileged could afford to have in their house. It was this trend which lead to the mass production of bathroom products.
The Edwardian and Victorian styles of the time are still a popular choice today. They look exquisite in a villa or cottage bathroom, and never loose their appeal in terms of design.
Today, thanks to advanced plumbing and modern technology, the bathroom may well have evolved as far as it can. With luxury steam rooms and hydrotherapy baths, it’s difficult to imagine how bathrooms could get any more sophisticated. That said, the bathroom, like any room in the house, is ever changing in terms of design trends.
Here we look at the five most popular styles of bathroom designs. Traditional, Country, Shabby chic, Contemporary and Fantasy.

Close-up of Wood flooring 0

Interiors

Wooden Floors in Interior Design

There are many challenges to get rooms right when you are creating your new home. Most important of all, is the look and the feel of the place. Wood has been a popular choice of flooring for many years and that is largely because it gives so many options. There are many different styles of wooden floor and just like the choice of colour on the walls, the choice of flooring can set the tone or mood for a room. Getting the floor right in a room is an essential finishing element and this needs the most attention because it is usually the most difficult part of the design to change when in place.

0

Interiors

Advances in Tile Manufacturing

Ceramic tiles have been around in one form or another for thousands of years and for much of that time nothing much changed in the manufacturing process. But in recent years there have been huge advances in tile manufacturing technology and this has also led to inspirational new design processes. Tiles can now be produced that are super-thin and light or that are anti-slip or resistant to large temperature variations. There are even anti-bacterial tiles being produced and others with a coating baked onto the surface that purifies the air in the room.

0

Interiors

A Makeshift Retro Kitchen

Having just moved house I am overwhelmed by the number of jobs that need doing in my new house, which could best be described as a project. It is, or will be, a fantastic space when it is finished but for now it is proving to be a bit of a challenge. And because there are some repairs that simply can’t wait my plans for a sleek new dream kitchen will have to wait for a couple of years, maybe longer so I will have to live with the existing one but what I am hoping to do is revamp it with black and white ceramic tiles so that it looks more retro than just old-fashioned.

decorative-pebble-tile-from-solistone-o 1

Interiors

Make Your Bathroom Stand Out From The Crowd

As well as being a functional space, a bathroom is also a sanctuary in which to relax at the end of a hectic day. But the average bathroom in the UK is pretty small and many bathroom fittings are fairly standard so how can you make your bathroom stand out from the crowd; somewhere that you are proud of and where you want to spend time?

Here are 5 ideas for adding some design flair to that small space…

bathroom-tile-indoor-wall-porcelain 0

Interiors

How Much Does a New Bathroom Cost?

Probably the major factor in choosing a bathroom for most of us is the cost. If you are anything like me you will look through piles of interior design and other inspirational magazines but then be faced with the prospect of re-creating your dream bathroom on a tight budget. Instead of limestone or marble maybe ceramic tiles or porcelain tiles would do just as well, or would they? Can stone effect porcelain tiles, for instance, ever look as good as natural stone? I know they are much easier to maintain but I still can’t make up my mind whether the additional cost of the natural stone is worth it.

laying tiles 0

Interiors

Why Tiles Are Eco-Friendly

People concerned about their environment often ask if tiling their floors or walls in their home is an eco-friendly choice. It is perhaps understandable that this question is asked so often as it is difficult to know whether a manufactured product is good or bad for the environment and when it comes to natural stone tiles, the product might be natural but what about the process to extract the natural stone and make it into tiles?

 

About Our Blog

I think you'll agree that we all love our homes and love to improve them as much as we can. While the percentage of people who regularly do DIY has fallen in recent years that doesn't mean we are not interested in how our homes look – we are just less keen on doing the hard work ourselves. But whether you are a DIY fan who can turn their hand to anything from laying porcelain tiles to re-tiling the roof or someone who prefers to sit back and let the decorator or interior designer work their magic we hope you will find some inspiration here.

If you are keen on colour or prefer neutrals, love natural beauty and texture, or super perfect finishes; whether you are an upcycler on a budget (I think that's many of us really) or able to splash out on designer items and beautiful unique art we are all drawn together by our love of all things in the home (and the garden too).

And if you are moving house we love to talk about that too – the excitement of a new place – new colours and finishes to choose, maybe some new furniture. And just the excitement of a new outlook from the windows, new plants sprouting in the garden (if you are lucky) and a new area to explore are reason enough to go through all the stress of the house buying process, packing up our things, shipping them off to self storage, and then unpacking all over again at the other end. But it is definitely worth it if you are fortunate enough to have found a better house for your needs and wants.

So why not read some of our posts and better still get involved by commenting and sharing…

More Interesting Stuff...

 Tiles don’t have to be square or flat!
The 5 Types of Wall Paint and How to Pick The Right One
Gazebos – Outdoor Entertaining Spaces for Your Garden
Do I Need A Flexible Tile Adhesive?
Creating a Wet Room – Some Additional Advice
The Right Tools for Installing Porcelain Tiles
Popular Styles of Bathroom Design
Removing a tile step by step
Fixing Bathroom Tiles – Part 1
Wooden Flooring and Underfloor Heating – The Basics

More