A Georgian House in Westminster

A stone’s throw from the Houses of Parliament, on one of the finest early Georgian streets in London, is this beautiful pair of houses that in 1906 had been combined to form a single dwelling.  After 40 years with the same family, the house was bought by new owners and we had a wonderful project working with them to repair and restore the interiors and the complete a programme of decoration.

We remodelled the whole house, moving the kitchen and bathrooms, restoring the staircase, putting back panelling, replacing walls that had been taken down – all steered brilliantly through Listed Building Consent (the house is Grade II* listed) by our senior design director Rupert Cunningham, who designed and oversaw the architectural project.

The interiors are intentionally simple, drawing on the original early 18th century character of the rooms, but with a playful sense of pattern, and a palimpsest of history, running through its veins.  We used extensive fabrics and papers from Watts of Westminster, Morris & Co and Robert Kime in developing a palette of soft, calm greys, taupes and greens, with splashes of burned red, yellow and Prussian blue throughout.

The garden was completely remodelled by Pip Morrison and we designed a metal glasshouse at the corner of the garden which catches the rays of the evening sun.

An Apartment in Regent’s Park

We designed this apartment for a young client with an extraordinary and confident sense of style and taste. Located in one of the finest terraces in Regent’s Park, the building had been badly bombed during World War 2 and had entirely lost its historic interiors as a result. A significant lateral apartment had been created which had been remodelled two or three times since the 1960s, most recently by the previous owners in a neo-classical French style.

Our client liked this backdrop, and we build upon much of the existing fabric in developing our design. We have a real policy within the studio to work with existing building detailing wherever it is well done and authentic – not least from a position of sustainability, and avoiding unnecessary waste. However, we did entirely remodel a poorly designed kitchen and bathroom, as well as creating a new library and media area in the drawing room.

The decoration of the rooms is intentionally spare and restrained, with an almost minimalist aesthetic in areas – the softest palette of grey and lilac is used in the living room and kitchen, but combined with a far more dramatic treatment in the central entrance hallway and master bedroom. A palette of dusky blue, the softest shell pink and taupe reverberates throughout, and provides a foil for our client’s wonderful collection of antique and mid-century furniture, and contemporary art.

Elgin Crescent

For a happy former client, we were delighted to help on a new project in the heart of Notting Hill, restoring and upgrading one of the boldly coloured 19th-century townhouses in Elgin Crescent.

Following a significant programme of architectural redesign – the house had been very poorly renovated by a developer, and our task was to put back an interior will a suitably authentic historic character – we moved on to design the interiors throughout the tall townhouse. We were inspired to create a layered house that blended the spirit of today with the best of 1970s and early 80s English decoration – hessian walls, Morris & Co wallpapers, traditional joinery – an atmosphere that the house had perhaps been inherited from a stylish aunt rather than having a top-to-toe, bland renovation so beloved of the Notting Hill Estate Agent.   A strong sense of colour and pattern abounds throughout, but with the hope that this interior will look as fresh and interesting in thirty years’ time as it does today.