Interior Design - Inspiration

[wobs]

Looking for ideas for our front room. Its south facing (although not the lightest, as there's a tree nearby).

We are looking for wallpaper ideas, and something I have learnt here, is that you want something that won't look out of dated in a number of years.

Mrs Wobs doesn't like a lot of the traditional patterns (eg. damask), and we have some colour limitations, such as the curtain colour (see below), or the gold in the fireplace detailing. House is a 1900s terrace.

Curtain smple:

Room:

I'm planning to put picture rails back in as well, although I may do them a bit lower (22" from ceiling), as they seemed to meet the top of the window frame, which looks a bit too high. We may do a cream colour above the picture rail, although nothing has been decided.

We will also be getting a new sofa next year, which given we haveyoung kids, will have to be patterned and fairly dark.

Some plastering may be necessary as well before hand, as you can see.

 

[plasticpigeon]

Hello

Your house is probably a bit like mine, also a 1900 terrace. Yours looks more fancy, mine never had any cornices anywhere, and just one ceiling rose in the hall, it was probably and still is quite a cheap house. Anyway, I wouldn't worry too much about the colour in the fireplace, it is mainly black, and in the 1900s they put together all sorts of colours we would never dream of today such as yellow, brown, turquise, red, especially with tiles. Anyway we ended up with this. I've posted before but as it seems relevant I'll post again. We wanted a Morris wallpaper but it went out of print before we decorated, and my other half didn't like any of the others in print, but it looks ok a plain colour.

 

[MikeG]

Nice PP. I'm a bit of a sucker for a good Captain's chair. We've got that exact same curtain material in a couple of rooms.

 

[plasticpigeon]

Thanks that chair is my favourite one in the house, it is beautifully made, and has marquetry inlay of musical instruments, a violin, cornet and manuscript paper, which is especially meaningful to me as my dad was a violin maker and my mum a violinist! unfortunately I am not an accomplished musician.

 

[88v8]

Choose something pertinent to the period you are evoking. Anything from 1900 on. Are you going to be Victorian? Edwardian? Deco? 50s?
Presumably you will furnish to match. Likewise door furniture and lighting. Antiques hunting, an enjoyable pastime.

If it 'dates', so what? When you go round a National Trust house do you say, 'oooh, that's dated'.
No. It's in-period.
We never redecorated any room, in 31 years.
It matured, like a good whisky.

For that room, I might choose classic Morris wallpaper and curtains, and a turkey carpet. Paper with a cream background can have a bold foreground colour without becoming too darkening. The pattern size should be relative to the wall area. A small pattern can look fussy on a big wall, and a large repeat can look silly on a small one. Sorry if that's statin' the bleedin' obvious.

Will you be in there more in the evening or during the day? If the former, then the effect in artificial light is important, the daytime appearance less so. Lamp shades and light positioning creates significant ambience, or mars it. I particularly detest spollights on ceiling bars.

Not all rooms have to be the same Period, but to create a unifying theme we painted all the doors cream - I can see that would be inappropriate for you - and all radiators cream.

Beware of lowering picture rails. It affects the perceived height of the room. Cream above the rail is a good scheme. Presumably you will paper the freize and ceiling with an embossed paper. Silk emulsion provides a little reflection without being too glossy.

We spent hours and hours choosing paper, paint, carpet, curtains. Sometimes a paper choice had been made, then we found curtains we liked but they didn't match so we had to revisit the paper. And we painted, then didn't like it in-situ. And then our tapestry settee clashed. And we papered but didn't like it. No wonder the cant-be-bothereds settle for white.

Ivor

 

[JBean]

If it helps, we're in a similar house (1905 semi) and went for William Morris, as Ivor suggests for you. Hubby took a bit of persuading, but we have embossed paper on the ceiling and above the picture rail, painted cream (Earthborn Mittens or some such), and then a splendid acanthus wallpaper that suits the room really well, and a snakeshead blind. I agree it makes it easier to choose a period and then work with that (within reason of course - we haven't reinstated the gas lights for which we found the pipes among our joists...).

 

[LadyArowana]

I like the 1stDibs online magazine and it’s inspiration pictures, they tend towards ‘mid century modern’ rather than anything earlier, but often the designers they feature have good use of colour and texture. If you sign up for alerts or whatever then you get their news and features ( it’s free ) but you can just browse the site too. Most of the dealers are US based, but there are occasional UK ones, similar things can probably be sourced from auctions or whatever though. https://www.1stdibs.com/photos/room/living-room/

 

[wobs]

Thank you for the replies.
Unfortunately, Mrs Wobs has a hatred for W.Morris wallpaper. I think its that there are some very busy designs, which puts her off the whole lot. Or the stories about arsenic poisoning.

Personally, I've seen some good Morris designs, but we all have different tastes.

If you look closely at the bare walls in the pics above, you'll see the remains of some possibly original design, involving branches or ferns. It would be good if we could have something of a similar idea, but not essential. I have seen some ideas at Homebase (including some gold coloured paper), but I have told Mrs Wobs that she needs to go to our local decorator supplies shop, which has masses of sample books of very nice designs (but many are expensive). This could be a bad idea.

PP, the dark red is something we have in out bedroom (and our previous house in the bedroom). It could be too dark for the room in question though, owing to the tree outside. Its a nice scheme though.

LA: I have a feeling I've been on 1stdibs. Reminds me of pinterest, but some very expensive ideas!

 

[wobs]

Choose something pertinent to the period you are evoking. Anything from 1900 on. Are you going to be Victorian? Edwardian? Deco? 50s?
Presumably you will furnish to match. Likewise door furniture and lighting. Antiques hunting, an enjoyable pastime.

If it 'dates', so what? When you go round a National Trust house do you say, 'oooh, that's dated'.
No. It's in-period.
We never redecorated any room, in 31 years.
It matured, like a good whisky.

For that room, I might choose classic Morris wallpaper and curtains, and a turkey carpet. Paper with a cream background can have a bold foreground colour without becoming too darkening. The pattern size should be relative to the wall area. A small pattern can look fussy on a big wall, and a large repeat can look silly on a small one. Sorry if that's statin' the bleedin' obvious.

Will you be in there more in the evening or during the day? If the former, then the effect in artificial light is important, the daytime appearance less so. Lamp shades and light positioning creates significant ambience, or mars it. I particularly detest spollights on ceiling bars.

Not all rooms have to be the same Period, but to create a unifying theme we painted all the doors cream - I can see that would be inappropriate for you - and all radiators cream.

Beware of lowering picture rails. It affects the perceived height of the room. Cream above the rail is a good scheme. Presumably you will paper the freize and ceiling with an embossed paper. Silk emulsion provides a little reflection without being too glossy.

We spent hours and hours choosing paper, paint, carpet, curtains. Sometimes a paper choice had been made, then we found curtains we liked but they didn't match so we had to revisit the paper. And we painted, then didn't like it in-situ. And then our tapestry settee clashed. And we papered but didn't like it. No wonder the cant-be-bothereds settle for white.

Ivor

Some interesting ideas here. I agree with the idea of the size of design needs to be in proportion with the size of the wall. What used to be there sent our eyes funny, as the design was small over a large area inside some frames. And no one died from someone stating the obvious.

BTW, when you say "turkey carpet", do you mean a Turkish rug?

 

[88v8]

Yes, the Turkish rug seems to harmonise with most traditional schemes, despite or perhaps because of its multiple colours. One large or two or three smaller.

Can be difficult if one wishes to have patterned paper, curtains, stuffed furnishings, carpet. At least the Turkey rug takes care of that aspect.

Did Google some Turkey rugs of other varieties, but probably not durable.

Ivor

 

[Feltwell]

Personally, I've seen some good Morris designs, but we all have different tastes.

Wobs, c’mon, you’re a married man. Have you not realised yet that in terms of interior decoration choices your opinion carries slightly less weight than the average feather?? :wink:

In all seriousness, my & Mrs F’s arrangement works well for us. She narrows the choice down to no more than 6 options that she likes and I get final choice from those (in theory at least!). If I disliked them all then I would say so but so far that has never happened. We’re helped here that the previous owner was quite arty, she ran her own millinery business from the house, and she definitely had an eye for what would look good in the context of a fairly formal Victorian house. Her choices were bolder than ours would have been but showed us that they can look good - in particular she has showed us that darker colours don’t necessarily make a room look gloomy.

I confess though that for sheer practicality the kids bedrooms and the kitchen, so far, have been done with super-heavy duty lining paper and paint, so they will be quick and easy to freshen up with a new coat of paint in the future. I highly recommend “Vario non-woven plus” lining paper, put up with heavy duty ready mixed adhesive rather than the crystal mix it yourself stuff, under whatever you choose to do if the plaster is not perfect - much better than conventional lining paper in my opinion, really tough stuff.

 

[wobs]

Personally, I've seen some good Morris designs, but we all have different tastes.

Wobs, c’mon, you’re a married man. Have you not realised yet that in terms of interior decoration choices your opinion carries slightly less weight than the average feather?? :wink:

In all seriousness, my & Mrs F’s arrangement works well for us. She narrows the choice down to no more than 6 options that she likes and I get final choice from those (in theory at least!). If I disliked them all then I would say so but so far that has never happened. We’re helped here that the previous owner was quite arty, she ran her own millinery business from the house, and she definitely had an eye for what would look good in the context of a fairly formal Victorian house. Her choices were bolder than ours would have been but showed us that they can look good - in particular she has showed us that darker colours don’t necessarily make a room look gloomy.

I confess though that for sheer practicality the kids bedrooms and the kitchen, so far, have been done with super-heavy duty lining paper and paint, so they will be quick and easy to freshen up with a new coat of paint in the future. I highly recommend “Vario non-woven plus” lining paper, put up with heavy duty ready mixed adhesive rather than the crystal mix it yourself stuff, under whatever you choose to do if the plaster is not perfect - much better than conventional lining paper in my opinion, really tough stuff.

Last week, I popped into that large orange DIY shed, and found some wallpaper that looked ok. Took it home, and Mrs Wobs approves! What do I win?

Only issue for me is whether it reflects the sun light too much at certain times of the day, as it does reflect a bit. Wouldn't be a major issue, but I'd hate to find it more annoying than anticipated, after getting the whole room done.

 

[Feltwell]

Took it home, and Mrs Wobs approves! What do I win?

An easier life, I reckon!

 

[88v8]

We used a paper in the (north facing) library that was reflective, but it was only apparent at night. Very effective with oblique light, wall lamps.

Ivor