DESIGN YOUR HAPPY PLACE
Happy new season! This month is so much more exciting to me than January, which only the calendar decrees as a fresh start. Right now – as the wallpaper and fabric houses release their new designs for summer – is the time I feel most buoyant, most excited to make a change, most optimistic for the months ahead. With new patterns comes a world of new possibilities.
Here at Livingetc we’ve been talking a lot about deckchair stripes – big swathes of block colour seen first on the work of Buchanan Studio and now starting to filter out to the luxe ateliers. I love Manuel Canovas’s emerald take on the look on page 115. It’s as verdant as a summer meadow and as bright as a sunny day. These stripes speak of holidays, of parasols on the beach. Use them to add vacational vibes to your home – I find they work best next to more neutral or classic fabrics or wall colours and they instantly make me happy.
Every single page in this issue was compiled with the aim of helping you create an area in your home that lifts your mood. Perhaps it’s the nooks on page 154, where I dream of sitting in peace with an endless supply of coffee and an entirely free morning. Or it’s Hugh Metcalf’s inspiring curation of paint suggestions for tricky compact areas on page 158 that will turn an unloved corner into a smile-inducing, feel-good space. And there’s also designer Staffan Tollgård’s approach to making homes more liveable on page 42 – the portrait he paints of how design fits into modern life filled me with joy. Whatever project or update you decide to tackle, start with how the result will make you feel, and make choices based on what will put a bit of Spring in your step.