Wednesday, August 02, 2006

It's Official My House Is For Sale


Oh yes there is a method in my madness. We are selling the house and moving lock stock and barrel to our cottage in the country. We have reached that point in life where you say "enough is enough" and we have decided to spend the rest of our years doing what we most enjoy and take as much stress as is possible out of our lives.
All the kids have flown the nest and are busy multiplying, working abroad or starting new careers and businesses. No more school runs and traffic jams, no more stupid parking charges, no more pollution, no more massive bills and more importantly no more mortgage.
Still it has been fun and I never thought I would see the day where I could be more than a mile from the city without inducing a panic attack. With age comes serenity - I HOPE!
You can download a PDF of the sales brochure it you really want to.

Tuesday, August 01, 2006

Where We Bathe



I'm a shower person myself but when I ache it is good to have a bath. My partner is a bath person so he uses this room much more than I do. However I do enjoy a soak in this bath but it is so large that I tend to slip down it as my feet don't really touch the bottom.

This room is very dramatic and is a bit like bathing in a theatre. Thank God there's no audience.

The pillars and sculptures on the crushed velvet effect walls are from The Stencil Library who have a fantastic range of stencils that are fantastically detailed and realistic.

The bathroom suite is Italian and is very high quality. It has been in the house since the early 80s but it is so good I could not bear to change it. It is a four piece suite but I have to confess the bidet is only used by the small grandchildren to get washed in.

Where We Sleep



A Haven at the top of the house. The window seat has a huge soft leather cushion sitting over a storage cupboard, so handy for storing bedding. This is a very light room and faces onto a main road but double glazing would make the room to hot in the summer. My solution to this was to install very thick oak shutter, which are mirrored on the inside. This keeps the traffic noise to a minimum and blocks out the light at the same time without trapping heat in during the day.

I decided to keep everything white to give the dark furniture a bold contrast.

The pile of orange boxes are a collection of Hermes boxes I have acquired over the years when buying their fabulous scarves whenever I am in Paris.

Where Charlotte Sleeps



This our youngest daughter's room. She has been living in Paris for the last 2 years so it doesn't get used that much. The designer bags on the wall were put there not so much as a statement but as a novel way for her to store all her bits and pieces out of sight.

The rich wine colour on the walls gives this room a really cozy feel and the C on the wall came from an old local pub sign that was torn down.

The bedding is from Feather and Black.