Confessional

What the decorator thinks about you

THE main problem is getting people to be honest about what they actually need doing. I’ll quote for a basic job wallpapering a room, then I show up and it turns out they expect me to strip off all the old wallpaper and re-line the walls, too, which costs almost double.

I’ve had to move furniture, meticulously stick masking tape around the edge of carpets because I’ve been told I can’t pull them up at the edges and work around children who ask to have a go or traipse in and out all day to get their toys.

I dread jobs in homes with young children, especially more well-off families — it seems the more money they have, the less they discipline their kids. And they’re always the ones who don’t offer me a cup of tea.

Period houses are much harder work, too. Clients don’t realise papering round a chimney breast or painting cornicing and moulding is time-consuming.

People sometimes ask my opinion on colours or patterns, but I’m not the one who has to live with it. I did a bedroom for a bohemian older couple and at first I thought the paper had a nice floral design — then I realised it was a silhouetted couple in all sorts of sexual positions!

The worst jobs are when the client pops in every five minutes, saying ‘Oh, is that what it’ll look like?’ when I’ve only put on the undercoat. One woman changed her mind about paint colour three times. She paid me to redo it, but by the end I was ready to dump a pot of it over her head.

I’m always polite, but I’ve been known to write a rude message on the wall and paint over it. It’s my little revenge — and they’ll never know.