Trying to be as sustainable as possible is always on our minds here at the Kit Kemp design studio. Throughout the hotels, you will find all areas are considered to ensure we are being environmentally conscious. Organic vegetables, recyclable coffee cups and toiletry bottles made from sugar canes are to name but a few.
When it comes to our interiors, it’s possible to be sustainable by refreshing a scheme rather than refurbishing the entire room. This bedroom scheme at a recent project has had some fresh new additions.
So what did we already have in the room? Well, the chalky blue linen on the walls by Lewis and Wood was staying, so the new fabrics needed to work around this.
The curtains too, in my ‘Autumn Leaf’ fabric for Christopher Farr Cloth with a leafy, eau de nil linen with tiny embroidered soft pink and cream wisteria were also staying, so we needed to factor these elements in when choosing new fabrics for other areas of the room.
Of course, with any room, certain aspects need to be repaired or replaced over time. In this case, the headboard, valance and handle chair were all recovered using fabrics we have in the design studio that are going spare from other projects. We always keep these pieces, however small, as you never know when a cushion or a chair might need a freshen up. It is always a joy to give a favourite fabric a new home.
From here, we picked out the sunset orange, rose pink and chalky blues that flow onto the valance and little desk chair by combining them together using workshop fabrics. These are all by Clementine Oliver, whose wools we use regularly due to their gorgeous selection of sumptuous colours.
Taking this ethos and using it at home is simple. Of course, when you make changes at home it isn’t usually an entirely new look and design every few years, it tends to be smaller changes – a new item of furniture, a fresh lick of paint or swapping out the curtains.
For the headboard, we used the wonderful ‘Chintal’ fabric by Jane Churchill. A wildly happy fabric which combines a mixture of print and embroidery to create a gorgeous geometric design inspired by an array of vintage tiles. ‘Chintal’ is a multi-coloured fabric, but by carefully picking out those soft blues, pinks and contrasting pops of orange on the headboard, it looks as though it was always there and it immediately freshens the scheme. As the room is small, it was important to choose a fabric that was the right balance between vibrant and calming. We used a contrasting pink wool depth, which lifts it from the soft walling behind.
After being at home for the past few weeks, I have found areas of my own home that I hadn’t thought of before and have given them a fresh new lease of life. The design tweaks could be as small as changing up the cushions, arranging new pottery you may have hidden in a cupboard, or even simpler – using colours from the spines of books to add a pop of colour to a space. Take a look at our post on ‘The Dos and Don’ts to Improve Your Home During Quarantine’ for more inspiration.
The changes can be small, but I promise you they will be mighty.
