Tonbridge Family Home

Tying it all together

The focus of my brief for a client’s house in Tonbridge was to make it more comfortable for family living and bring an overall sense of cohesive design throughout the whole house. We used soft furnishings and found key pieces of furniture, lighting and accessories to tie everything together, blending with, offsetting and adding to an overall palette of blues, greens and neutrals.

Kitchen, dining and living space

This crucial space at the rear of the house had just been renovated, so we were looking for the right furniture to set off the beautiful Tom Howley kitchen in neutral and blue. The mood board I created depicted a sofa with one or two armchairs to go on a rug overlooking the garden, and some framed prints to add a touch of softness and homeliness to a room with an abundance of hard surfaces.

Sitting room and games room

Pictured below are the mood boards I created to show the clients how I wanted to create the appropriate atmosphere for each of these, quite different, rooms. This sitting room is their formal social space – they have 2 other sitting rooms. The idea was to bring the colour scheme to life, with darker blues and some contrasting throws and cushions in burnt orange with paintings and prints to blend with existing paintings. The Games room was trickier to define as they wanted something “blokey/industrial” but also fitting with the period features. This made the lights difficult to choose - did we want just a filament bulb in a brass fitting or something more substantial?

Guest bedroom #1

This is a relatively large room, but I felt it needed a little more vibrancy. I created visual impact by adding a Charlotte Gaisford headboard to the bed, using coordinating fabrics for the cushions and changing out the lampshades. Charlotte Gaisford is a British fabric and wallpaper designer, who creates refreshing pattern designs which look amazing in both traditional and modern interiors.

Guest bedroom #2

The smallest of the guest rooms. As it is mostly used by children/young teenagers, I wanted this to have a slightly different feel from the other rooms. To this end, we changed the bed for an upholstered French style, which also added a little more comfort, both to the bed and the overall atmosphere of the room.

Guest bedroom #3

The largest of the guest bedrooms, with a double-height ceiling. We played on this by selecting a tall, shaped headboard for the bed to echo the slope of the ceiling, adding studs for extra detail. The clients already had a lovely chair in this room which was upholstered in a busy floral fabric so we opted for more muted soft furnishings elsewhere which included some beautiful Wallace and Sewell cushions and throws, which added depth. The high ceiling enabled us to install a cluster of hanging coloured glass pendant lights, which served the dual purpose of both enhancing the room’s extra height and adding a subtle touch of extra colour to the room.

Flat

This is a suite of rooms above the garage, previously used by au-pairs, but now needed to be suitable as a living space for the client’s mother, when visiting from Australia. I created two mood boards for her to choose from and use as a springboard for the redesign. In the end, we opted for a smaller, bespoke headboard, as the bed needed to go under the window, choosing a matching fabric for the blinds, with cushions and throws on the bed to create layers of depth, texture and interest.

The overall idea was to make the room feel plush and relaxed, so we added a rug and a velvet chair in the main room for extra comfort, with a runner going up the stairs leading up to the room.

Work in progress

There is still more work to be done in other rooms throughout the house before the overall redesign is complete, but we are pleased with the work done to date.

Below is the mood board I have created for the master bedroom, where I have suggested some artwork, to break up the plain walls, and some curtains to replace the shutters. As this room already has a lot of angular cabinet furniture, the new curtains will soften the overall palette, giving it a more relaxed atmosphere better suited to a bedroom.

I love creating homes that truly reflect the personality of the people living in them. So, if you would like a hand creating your dream home or just want a second opinion, give me a call on 07773 372 158 or send me an email via nicky@nickypercival.co.uk