Family Room makeover and Lighting Majestic

Our house is slowly starting to take shape. Now that we have weathered our first winter and almost unpacked all the boxes, it feels like home. We have decorated several rooms:

The Guest Loo

The Kitchen

Dimples’ Room

LBG’s Room

and this weekend the finishing touches were put in the Family Room.

The Family Room- part playroom, part office for me, part snug- is off the hall but leads to the sitting room so is a bit of a through room. It has a chimney breast that backs onto the Aga in the kitchen, built-in bookcases and is badly lit: there are only two downlighters, one of which channels Hitchcock Movies and operates intermittently with intent to unsettle. The wall lights are picture lights which, though beautiful, offer frustratingly little light when you are trying to complete a jigsaw puzzle on a winter evening.

So I was thrilled when Lighting Majestic offered me a lamp to lighten a dark corner. I had the perfect place. And Lighting Majestic had the perfect lamp- the Elka Table Lamp. It’s base reminds me of the stag horn I found in the meadow (which still needs cleaning up) and of the stag wallpaper all our guests are so fond of in the next door loo. The shade is big and cream and the effect of the lamp- set on top of a junk shop find bookcase- is too fill the biggest dark corner we have with a lovely warm light in the evening. The service form Lighting Majestic was faultless, the product is fabulous and the ideal lighting solution. The lamp shines across the children who play with their toys below, or onto us as we sit in the over-sized armchair doing reading homework.

The walls have been painted (Farrow and Ball, Skimming Stone), as has the woodwork (Farrow and Ball, New White). Our existing furniture- mismatched as it came from various rooms at the old house- has been given a new look with loose covers from Plumbs– a hit and miss experience, but which do look lovely. They co-ordinate rather than match precisely. The curtains- an eBay find- replace the roller blind that was there before, and offer far better thermal insulation. Cushion covers came from Charity Shops, Homebase and eBay, as did my desk. The pink Eames-style office chair– which is supportive and swivels so good for work but can be used as additional seating when friends come- is from Milan Direct and was found by DH.

And- as the chimney is draughty and we don’t yet have the budget for another wood-burner- we have blocked the chimney with a chimney balloon and filled the space with wood that DH cut himself. Not only is it a  fabulous feature, and appropriate to our location,  it was very cheap for us to do and really helps with insulation.

So now in the evenings I can draw the curtains, turn on the lights and snuggle down with The Girls to watch Crufts feeling warm and snug.