If you’re in a rental, the idea of investing in the design of a room can seem frivolous and, well, a bit pointless. But life is short and good interiors can be life-changing, and so with that mantra I decided it was finally time to tackle the kitchen-dining room in our cottage in Sussex. Interiors consultancy services are perfect for this kind of project: they allow you to approach a house piecemeal and are much more appropriate for a rental. Patrick O’Donnell, Farrow & Ball’s charismatic International Brand Ambassador and a man of many talents, is one of a handful of decorators and designers to have recently launched his own consultancy service. Unsurprisingly, he’s a dab hand when it comes to colour, but he’s also got a great eye and I was attracted by his practical attitude, which is made abundantly clear through his own house where he’s made little tweaks to create a space that feels layered and lovely. ‘Everyone deserves to live in the nicest space available and it doesn’t need to cost a fortune,’ explains Patrick. ‘Through consultancy, I hope to demystify and democratise interior design.’ With promises like that, I could barely contain my excitement before our one hour virtual consultation over Zoom.
The problem: how to give soul to a dark kitchen-dining room that and doubles as a playroom for my two year old
I like to think that having spent 10 years working at House & Garden, I should be able to pull a room together, but I admit to being flummoxed by the kitchen-dining room in our Victorian cottage in Sussex. Since we moved in two and a half years ago, the space has presented as something of a challenge. Thanks to a previous porch-extension that means its two windows are now internal, the L-shaped room is fairly dark, and at approximately 8 metres x 5 metres never feels quite large enough for all the functions it needs to serve. It’s the room you enter first and you have to walk through it to access the sitting room and stairs, but it also needs to be a place for cooking, eating and playing, as my two-year-old makes very clear by fashioning everything from milk cartons to carrot peelings into imaginary creatures. It felt like it was serving none of these functions particularly well.
The perfectly functional kitchen is built-in along one wall, while there is a woodburner on the opposite wall. Our round dining table – once my husband’s grandparents’ – sits at the end of the space, but we’ve always struggled with where to put it without interrupting the flow of the room. There is also a half-glazed dresser, which provides some storage: the cupboards at the bottom hide tablecloths, serving platters and boxes of crafty bits for my daughter, while the upper half behind the glass plays host to pretty glasses, ceramics and cookbooks. But storage has always been an issue and this room always feels like it’s overflowing with stuff, with little useful storage for all the clutter of daily life.
The solution
‘It’s a very challenging space,’ was the first thing that Patrick said to me when we looked over the floor plan and the handful of images that I had shared with him ahead of our Zoom. ‘I woke up in the middle of the night thinking about how we could improve the flow, but it’s tough.’ I was thrilled – and a little bit shocked – by his commitment, but to be honest, this was exactly the validation I needed and it put me at ease. ‘What we need to do is find a way to be as clever as possible with the space you have,’ continued the interior consultant who aims to offer his clients a ‘road map’ that they can follow.
First in that was cracking the layout. Patrick agreed with me that the fact it was a rental meant there was no point in thinking about the walls we could pull down or put up. ‘You don’t want to make the mistake of over-investing,’ he adds. Instead, he agreed that the table, dresser and kitchen units were in the best positions they could be. ‘Leave everything where it is, but I’d swap out the bench running along one side of the round table and replace it with a couple of chairs, which allows you to be a bit more flexible.’ He suggests there might be space for a small slipper or nursing chair or wing back chair, which could look towards the wood burner and provide a comfortable spot to read. Dean Antiques and Howe, of course, do lovely ones, but he advises finding something at a market or antiques shop to suit my slightly more modest budget.
Next, he came up with a plan for storage to clear up some of the chaos. ‘Storage is a priority,’ he stresses. While he felt I didn't need to start investing in lots of pieces, he did think a couple of well-chosen storage solutions would help clear up the clutter. I’d always wanted a nice antique wall-mounted cabinet for cookbooks in the recess to the left of the log burner, but had never found the right thing so Patrick suggested just putting some wooden shelves in here that could be simply made by a carpenter using a baton to support each one. Then I could use them for cookbooks, freeing up some space in the half-glazed cabinet. ‘Take them as high as possible to make the most of the space,’ he advises, suggesting that we stop them just above the rather ugly radiator, create a cable hole at the back so I can thread the internet router through, and hang a pretty little curtain off the bottom shelf to hide the radiator. But more on fabric later.
He suggested asking the same carpenter to create a big stool-type piece to sit under the large internal window, which would provide storage underneath and a seat to perch on. Built-in would have been ideal, but since it's a rental, Patrick wisely suggested freestanding was probably better. ‘It just needs to be a really simple thing with a central support for solidity, which will give you two internal storage spaces,’ he explained, drawing it up there and then with dimensions that were perfectly thought through so my daughter’s toy cooker could be popped on one side and a wicker toy basket on the other. ‘On the top, you can pop a really lovely generous, tufted squab cushion to create a nice seating spot,’ continues Patrick, who suggests covering the cushion in Howe’s 36 Bourne Street ‘Knurl Linen Woad’, which could also be used for the little curtain hiding the radiator. ‘You could even carry the print motif through onto the back of the glazed dresser cabinet, using the paper to line the back and sides in a lovely nod to a 1950s larder,’ says Patrick.
And so to colour. ‘Bringing texture, pattern and fabric in are crucial to warming the space up,’ explains Patrick. He suggests painting the walls in a lovely warm tone, such as Farrow & Ball’s ‘Biscuit’, to give the room a cosiness. I was already drawn to painting the kitchen units blue – Patrick suggests the lovely ‘Berrington Blue’, also by Farrow & Ball – and Patrick advises the best way to approach that. ‘Use Zinsser Bin 123/ Bullseye for your primer as it’s good for polycoated/ laminate units but they will still need a good sugar soap wash and sand before attempting any DIY painting.’
Although it seems counter-intuitive in an already dark room, Patrick suggests adding a little sheer cafe curtain on the large internal window that looks through to the chaotic boot room. ‘It will obscure laundry and coats, without taking away too much light and just bring some lovely pattern in,’ he explains, suggesting Decors Barbares ‘Polonaise’ in red. He’s quick to acknowledge that this is an expensive choice. ‘If using small quantities, it can be nice to splash out to elevate the look, but if the budget is a little less generous then I always look to Tinsmiths or The Cloth Shop on Portobello,’ he suggests. I should say that these are two of the more obvious sources that Patrick shares with me – he’s generous with his sources, for everything from an affordable bespoke cushion maker in Essex (the aptly named Cushion Supplier) to a textile merchant in Cheshire with surprisingly affordable factory seconds and end-of-rolls.
Elsewhere, Patrick suggests bringing in more layers through rugs: simple seagrass squares, stitched together to form an L-shape that follows the room’s layout, layered with an affordable, colourful rug on top. ‘La Redoute do some great value rugs if the budget is tight and it needs to be practical too with a dog and small child, so err on a bit of pattern for more forgiveness,’ suggests Patrick. He suggests employing a couple of well-placed floor lamps and a plug-in reading light that could go next to the new bookshelves just to create a little more light into the room.
Would we recommend?
For the cost of a nice frock (Patrick prices start from £250 an hour), my relationship with this room has been utterly transformed. Not only was he reassuring and understanding, but his practical approach and respect for my modest budget has resulted in a ‘road map’ that feels entirely achievable. I’ve got the carpenter booked in, some nice bits of wood waiting in the wings to be fashioned into shelves and am keenly on the hunt for a nice little slipper chair. Patrick followed up our conversation with a thorough email, detailing pieces I might be interested in, that all important sketch of the storage stool and a few of his favourite sources, all of which felt new and exciting to me. ‘I’m not just a curator,’ he explained to me. ‘I like to tell my clients the good curtain makers and upholsterers and help them be clever with their space.’ He’s done that in spades.
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