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- [00:02]
A
Welcome to how to Decorate from Ballard Designs, a weekly podcast all about the trials and triumphs of decorating and redecorating your home. I'm Caroline. I'm on the marketing team. And I'm Taryn and I'm a product designer.
- [00:13]
B
I'm Liz. I head up the creative team.
- [00:15]
A
We're your hosts. Join the expert team at Ballard Designs for tips, tricks and tales from interior designers, stylists and other talents in the design world. Plus, we'll answer your decorating dilemmas at the end of each episode.
- [00:25]
B
We love answering your questions, so don't forget to email us@podcastallardesigns.net now, on with the show.
- [00:34]
A
Okay. This week we are delighted to welcome London based interior designer Nicola Harding to the show. Her work includes everything from high profile restaurants and boutique hotels to the homes of musicians, artists, and even royalty. Her style blends traditional charm with rich atmosphere and unexpected touches. And today we are thrilled to be discussing her debut book, Homing Instinct. Nicola, welcome to the show.
- [00:58]
C
Thank you for having me. Thank you so much for having me.
- [01:02]
A
It is morning here. We've all got, like fresh cups of coffee, which I think is perfect because your book is so cozy, so layered and textured and everything one would expect from, you know, that classic English feel. It's layered, it's comfy, inviting, but you throw a little. You throw a few curveballs in there, which I'm excited to talk through.
- [01:26]
C
I think a home doesn't want to be too predictable, does it? I think little moments of mischief, of the unexpected keeps it exciting and hopefully, you know, personal, that it feels unique and relevant to whoever's living there.
- [01:41]
A
You have such an unusual path into interior design, which I think would be a great place to start. You talk about it in the introduction to the book, so maybe we can start there because I know that that will be something that our audience will really enjoy hearing about.
- [02:01]
C
Well, I've sort of fallen into interior design a little bit by accident. I think it's born out of my obsession with home. The daughter of a helicopter pilot, I moved around a huge amount growing up and I always hankered after a sense of belonging. I really wanted to feel held by a place and that a space not only kind of reflected who I am and who I wanted to be, but would help me manifest the life that I wanted to lead. And the place that really spoke to me most deeply was my godfather's house that we would visit him and his husband growing up. They were teachers in a school in Yorkshire and they lived in this Wonderful, slightly tumbling down house that they packed the rafters full of things that they'd collected, some things that they'd collected during their travels, during school holidays, and some things that other people were tossing out and some things that are incredibly precious, like all manner of stuff, but also people, waifs and strays who, for whatever reason, might have fallen out with their own families. They would gather together and there was just this real sense of warmth of things and people being loved and looked after and celebrated. And that definitely created a sense of belonging, a sense of ease, a sense that everyone could be the person that they wanted to be. And so I guess, yeah, that's what ignited my fascination with the alchemy of what makes a home. And maybe that's not things being too perfect or too deliberate, but celebrating an element of happen, chance, which I suppose happens naturally in English interiors, because there's this sense of collecting, collecting over time. People perhaps pass things down through generations in a way that there hasn't been such a chance for people to get into the habit of in America. So you get these kind of wonderful accidental combinations that create a sense of ease because it doesn't feel overworked. So, yeah, I guess that's where it started, was that. And then I was lucky enough, whilst I was at university in Edinburgh, to do a deal with my dad, persuade him to give me the money that he had saved for my. To put towards accommodation whilst I was at university, towards renting. And I used that as a deposit to buy my first flat that was, you know, there was no central heating. There were two bedrooms. I kind of reconfigured it to squeeze a kitchen into three cupboards that I knocked together so I could create an extra bedroom to fill the flat with friends to help pay the mortgage. And I scoured local antique shops and started trying out different colors and filled the flat with friends and made them eat whatever I conjured up in the kitchen. And. Yeah, and that feeling of home was born.
- [05:31]
A
And then. And then you went into garden design.
- [05:33]
C
And then I went into garden design. So, yes, I. I had lots of jobs when I was at university, all sorts of things. I even learned to fly as part of the university air squadron. But one boss that I had, who's still a friend said to me that you're going to spend more time with the people you work with than anybody else, your friends, your family. So go into an industry where you. You like the people who work there. And at that time, garden design wasn't fashionable. It was full of all sorts of Fascinating people who were intensely passionate about what they did. And that really attracted me. I think the other thing about gardens is that they look their best 10 years after you leave them, rather than 10 minutes. And that appealed to my sense of place and atmosphere that I associated with interiors, that actually things take on a life of their own and the people who live there breathe a spirit into it. And I was lucky enough to work with an amazing garden designer called Arnie Maynard. And we worked together for about six years and traveled all over the world doing some incredible gardens. And I learned a huge amount from him. I think, among other things, you know, how to imagine big, how to combine classical rules with whimsy. And, you know, he uses sort of handsome structure to define a space. For example, topiary or, you know, clipped hedging peach trees. And then layers in the sort of blousy planting with elements of whimsy and mischief in the form of perhaps sort of modern sculpture or a bench painted an unexpected color. And those principles, I guess, are what I've drawn into my interior design, where there's a sort of classic basis which I think is reassuring, but then there are these, and a sort of handsomeness that comes with that sort of masculine strength which you might see in the way that the rooms are laid out or joinery and the scale of things, and some handsome materials, textures, but then a sort of more feminine, blousy elements layered in and sort of fabrics and accessories, and certainly plenty of whimsy that might be in the form of art or unexpected accessories.
- [08:19]
B
Yeah, your work is so beautiful, and it's such a sophisticated take on play and comfort. And I'm wondering, how do you know when enough is too much? Because I wouldn't say that your work is maximalist at all, but it definitely is very full and lived in and comfortable. But how do you know how much of one style to bring in to a room? Because you're mixing some modern shapes, you're mixing some arts and crafts, you're mixing some big, you know, tufted, rolled, armed chairs that are traditional. That balance is just really remarkable.
- [09:04]
C
Oh, I think it's. It's such fun to have all these different elements to play with. And for me, it's very instinctive. You know, I do it by feel. I haven't trained. I haven't actually worked with another interior designer. I mean, I've been lucky enough to rub shoulders with all sorts of incredibly talented people. But rather than designers, they're more antiques dealers or curtain makers or art dealers, and wherever I can possibly learn from them. I've been very curious and eager to pick up whatever I can. I think that, you know, those unexpected combinations of things are what makes a space interesting and makes a space feel, you know, authentically connected to the people that live there. Because it's not prescriptive. It's not a perfect formula. It's just something that feels right to them and their personal stories, what their past experiences have been, what their interests are. And, you know, really, my job, there's something of a matchmaker in it, because a lot of it, you know, a lot of it is listening and unpicking what makes them happy and why and how they want to live their life and hold their families and share their home with their friends? And then it's thinking, okay, what are the ingredients that we can begin to bring together that will be distinctly perfect for this individual, this family?
- [10:40]
B
I think that's really interesting that you are talking about how someone moves through the home, because reading through your book, you talk about some spaces that you've totally flipped the script on the floor plan, especially in where the kitchen lies in the home.
- [10:59]
C
I think that getting the layout right first is the bit that unlocks how a home works for family or an individual. And, you know, in this country especially, people are living in houses where people have lived in them for hundreds of years. And the way that we live has changed a lot in that time. So whereas in the past, the kitchen might have been a sort of small room at the back where somebody else was doing the cooking, now, you know, it's an activity that we want to share as a family or with our friends and be occupy a much more sort of premium, premium space in the building. So, you know, but, you know, it's. That's not always the right answer for people. Some people, it still makes sense to have a little cozy room where they can leave all the washing up and, you know, spend their time elsewhere. So it's unpicking how people live, how they want to live, you know, And I try to get away from asking clients to tell me what their house. What they want their house to look like, but how do they want their house to feel? How do they spend their time when they think back to when they were younger and they were imagining what it would feel like reading to their children, reading bedtime stories to their children, or entertaining friends at the weekend, or waking up on a Sunday morning, or coming home from work after a difficult week, you know, how did they want to feel in those moments? And then it's my job. I Guess to sort of think, okay, what are the magic ingredients of creating a lived environment? That's like a magic spell that can give you that feeling.
- [12:47]
B
My favorite kitchen that you've done is the space in Notting Hill where you brought the kitchen to the front of the house, and you've put some really comfortable chairs right at the window. So you've made it more of a cafe in some instances.
- [13:08]
C
I know exactly what you mean. And it's funny because that's when we were doing the floor plans and, you know, the clients and I were chatting it through. You know, those two chairs next to the window look a bit uncomfortable on this floor plan of this large room. And they sort of challenged me on it, and I was like, no, you know, I really think, you know, you've told me how you live, and that's your, like, being in the same room, but not necessarily, like, doing exactly the same activity at the same time together. And if we have these chairs here, then someone can sit and read while someone else is cooking and someone else is at the table. And also, it gives us a chance to have this lovely lamp in the window that will catch your eye as you come home in the evening and welcome you into the house. And sure enough, you know, I still, you know, have, you know, ongoing bits and pieces that I do with the family, and those chairs have been the absolutely favorite piece and were the ones that got worn out through love first. So I think, you know, I really love finding the opportunity to create a place rather than creating a space, you know, a place where you want to be. And, you know, those things aren't kind of what the shape of the room sort of dictates from a kind of obvious symmetry kind of way, but it's more about human led. How's that room going to be experienced by the people and how they want to live in it and use it and then creating moments to do that, you know, in a photograph, what often looks best as a big vista, you know, and people are attempted to sort of create a situation where you can throw a front door open and see right the way through. But actually, from a feng shui point of view, I don't know how good that is for the energy to sort of rush through the whole property. But also, you know, when you're there, we're always drawn to corners. You know, in restaurants, it's always the corner seat that fills up the first. We want to feel protected and held. We don't want to feel exposed and vulnerable.
- [15:15]
A
Okay, you. You mentioned starting with the Layout as sort of, you know, the necessary first step. And I'm curious, like, what kind of exercises you do to work through layout challenges? Like, are there questions you ask yourself? Or, you know, do you do lots of different drawings? Like, how do you, I guess, work through the needs and then the space and. And figure out how to make the layout better?
- [15:43]
C
Yeah, so it's kind of lots of questions about how people live. You know, how many people tend to eat a meal, and is that just sort of grabbing something on the go at the kitchen island, or is it actually sort of sitting down? How often do they really entertain? Do they do their own washing? Do they have someone help them? Do they have dogs? Do they have loads of school bags? Are they into sport, the sports kit? Um, are they a morning person or an evening person? You know, do they, you know, enjoy watching television and hunkering down and all those things that they might feel, like, ashamed to admit to that? Actually, what they like more than anything is eating supper in front of the telly, you know, kind of dig all of that stuff out. They like to do big shops and bring home loads of stuff, or actually they just buy things a meal at a time. Because all of these, you know, golden nuggets of information are so crucial to understanding how to piece a house's layout together to make it fit that family or that individual perfectly. And then it's thinking about, okay, all those things, what are they actually happening? What time of day and relative to this building, where is the light at those times of day? So where is it relevant? So if you're watching TV in the evening, then it would be madness to make that the room which has the best morning sunlight, when actually you really like to have a cup of coffee somewhere in the morning. And, you know, maybe that actually enjoying the natural light is right for that time. So it's overlaying what their different needs are, sort of transposing it onto the house and thinking about where the light travels around so that you've got the right activity happening relative to the right level of natural light and then sort of flowing from that. Is my choice on paint colors, because for me, that is how you join the dots or, you know, the paint colors enable you to sort of dial up the natural qualities of the room and quieten anything that, you know, isn't a sort of winning characteristic.
- [17:57]
A
Can we talk about paint colors? Because you choose the most gorgeous, lush, but also surprising paint colors. I mean, and I'm curious where in the process you pick the paint color, is it towards the beginning. I mean, you're. You mentioned just now that you're maybe picking that soon after you pick the layout. Or is it. Are you pulling fabrics first?
- [18:22]
C
Yeah, no, for me and I, it is back to front. Because I think how you're meant to do it is to choose the rug first or maybe the piece of art, and then the paint colors flow from that. And, you know, wherever there is something like a piece of art that is a real driver, if that's something that the client is passionate about, then they'll take that into account from the beginning. But I think that paint is such a kind of magical toolbox of opportunity. You know, if you've decided to decorate your house, you've almost certainly already decided to paint it. So what color it is is no extra cost. So it's this wonderful free thing that's kind of at your disposal. And. And so, yes, once I've kind of figured out what space should be used for what, and then I will put in a furniture plan, because I think you need to stress test it. Okay. Like, if they are a family of five and like to sit together watching television, you need to make sure that you've got enough really cozy spots to sit in the room where you're going to do watch the television. And, you know, as part of that process, I'll be thinking about lighting, because I think that is also fundamental to creating atmosphere. And then it's about paint color, you know, and using combinations of colors, because that's really where the power of color comes. It's not an isolation, but it's in the degree of contrast with the colors that you pair with it. So a pink, a soft pink on its own is very calm with a, you know, soft white or a soft brown. It's equally calm. As soon as you put in a splash of yellow or a splash of red, then suddenly it' dynamic and energizing. So, you know, it then comes back to again, how is this person gonna use this space? How do they want to feel in that occasion, in that moment? How can I use color to create that feeling?
- [20:15]
A
Sometimes I felt like the color, the accent colors were so just not exact, not what I could have imagined. And that was so delightful. Right? Because there was always a little accent of red. You use red so much and. But then, you know, teals and pinks and like, it was never a real scientific look to it. Right. It has this very kind of whimsical, playful feel. And I guess I'm curious, like, when you've got a room kind of at 80%, where are you thinking? Like, okay, what I need an accent color. What's this going to be? And how are you, like, picking what that accent is going to be?
- [20:58]
C
I think sometimes it's sort of judging it. It's like, is there enough contrast here? You know, if I need to change the energy, how can I use an accent of color to either dial it up or knock it back a little bit? So I think I'm always coming back to that question of how does the room want to feel? How can I kind of manipulate the ingredients in it to sort of really sort of crystallize that feeling that I want to have? I mean, I take inspiration from, you know, having worked a lot in gardens, you know, nature's the absolute master. And it's so interesting to see what plants grow happily next to each other, because there's something about that intrinsic natural ease that works, you know, and it's the same, you know, light in different areas in different territories makes colors behave in different ways. And in this country, we have quite bruised skies and the natural plant palette are quite bruised colors, sort of muted, dusty tones. And that's what works really well in our light. Whereas if you went to the tropics, you have a much clearer, brighter light. And the plants that grow naturally are these kind of hot, clearer, brighter colors that work really well there. And if you think about Greece, you know, and you think of those sort of whites that have evolved naturally in that place, and they work so well, if you took that white and put it in a London flat, you'd be sobbing into your. Your cozy armchair quicker than you can say, whoops.
- [22:43]
B
So it's really starting with the light that you have.
- [22:46]
C
Yes. In your space, I think. The natural light. Yeah. And how that is relative to the volume. Because if you have, you know, a low natural light but a huge volume, then you might choose a slightly different. If you have a small volume and also just how much you're going to be in the space. Because if you're going to be there a lot, like, I'm just designing my new house in Bristol at the moment and thinking about how I treat the kitchen, where I'm going to be a lot, and I will. And it does have quite a lot of natural light, so I will use a lighter color palette, but the room directly above it, I will use less. And so I'm going to use a much richer palette, even though it has the same amount of natural light, but.
- [23:29]
B
It'S a smaller space.
- [23:31]
C
No, it's. It's a Georgian Townhouse. It's a Georgian townhouse. So it's all layered exactly the same. So they're exactly the same rooms but used for different purposes. Okay, come and visit. I would love to.
- [23:46]
A
Have fun. Can we talk about pattern a little bit? Because I love the way you pair patterns together and I'm a big stripe lover, but not as much as you, because you are like the stripe master.
- [24:02]
C
I love this card.
- [24:03]
A
I love you. You pair, you pair sometimes like tickings with other small scales. You've got large scales. I mean, talk us through how you're building out your, your pattern and fabric palette.
- [24:17]
C
So I think to me, when a pattern has a graphic quality to it, which a stripe does, a check does, or even like a sort of graphic print, that sort of repetition, it becomes almost like a neutral. You know, it's this sort of quiet thing that your eye can pass over in a way that if you have something figurative like a floral, then your eye stops because your brain tries to work out what it is it's looking at because it knows it's being told something. And so, you know, the stripes and checks for me work as these sort of sort of non pattern patterns to create more of a texture than a pattern. And then so I would use those more liberally, playing with different scales. And you know, if you use different colors, different versions of the same color, then again it's kind of not creating too much chaos. You've got movement without it being too hectic. So yeah, again, it's a bit like color. It's thinking about contrast. You know, each of these things feel so different according to what they're placed next to. But a number of stripes in a similar color placed next to each other can actually be relatively calm. Whereas, you know, lots of different stripes in lots of different colours would be thoroughly overwhelming. I think also thinking about the type of color, whether that's paint or in a fabric, for me, I always come back to colors that feel rooted in nature. You know, we all know that nature restores us and color's like a sort of shortcut to mainlining that power. But as soon as a color feels synthetic, then that's thoroughly undermined. You know, that's actually quite taxing on our senses. And so, you know, finding paints that have a high level of natural color pigment and finding fabrics that have organic dyes, and by organic I mean vegetable rather than necessarily specific organic are much easier at to live with and more restful. And you know, also the fact that there's potentially a little bit less stability to the color than there would be if it was synthetic, gives an unevenness to it, which gives a depth which you see in a lot of vintage fabrics, which I like using as well. And that softness and romance, again, creates that sense of ease and the sense of a space having evolved over time rather than being just very much of a moment, as as soon as a place is of a particular moment, you know that moment will pass. And perhaps the appetite for that particular look will also pass.
- [27:08]
B
You also talk a lot in the book about finding the spirit of a home. And I wanted to find out how you go about that and what are some things that you're looking for when you're finding the spirit of a home.
- [27:25]
C
So I always start with listening. You know, I think if there's one thing that I can bring to the party, hopefully it's listening, and that's listening to my clients, but it's also listening to the building and the place, the setting in which the building sits. And, you know, as soon as you start to dig, there's story after story of, you know, why that building was built there, who lived there, who designed it, what was their intention, how has it changed over time, what's happened in the local area? And all these kind of layers contribute to the sense of place and rooting that sense of place to the people who are there. So that this effortless connection between both of them is, I guess, creating a sort of tapestry of all these different stories so that there's a meaning that is profound.
- [28:22]
B
Have you ever been in a space and just been like, I don't know what to do with this. This space is too crazy.
- [28:30]
C
This space is beyond me? No, I haven't. There have definitely been times when, you know, it's taken longer to get there, but usually there's something, you know, one of the hardest spaces, I think, was actually a church that was being changed into a restaurant. And those two things felt very odds with each other. And I guess a church naturally has such a profound sense of place that to shift it from somewhere where one wants to be sort of quiet and reverent to where someone. Where we want to encourage them to be a bit more irreverent. And creating those sort of cozy moments within a sort of vast volume was tricksy. But we got there in the end.
- [29:23]
B
How did you do that? Yeah, churches are awe inspiring right by nature. And I think just the sound, yeah, you want sound to echo in a church, but you don't want that to happen in a restaurant. How did you deal with all of that?
- [29:40]
C
So it was coming back to that central philosophy of creating places rather than spaces. So I guess it was trying to sort of descale that volume by creating cozy corners. So we created sort of built in seating. I think somewhere that does it very well is the Woolsey in London, which is a wonderful restaurant built in what was originally, it's been at times a bank and a car showroom. And they sort of did a similar thing where if you go there now, and this is what we did, was that there are sort of moments of built in seating bringing the light levels right down so that you're creating pools of life light where you want people to be drawn to, rather than flooding the whole space with light and creating sort of twinkly moments that have, yeah, much more of a sort of sense of intimacy rather than the big, big, big bang.
- [30:41]
A
I loved the Italian project and I would love to talk to through that one because it. First off, it's big, so there's. There are just so many spaces to talk through. And. And you played, you know, you kind of went in a lot of different directions. There were some more monotone neutral spaces. Then you have sort of these beautiful natural greens and blues. And then there were these pockets of red which I. Red is not a color that I feel like people use that often. And so. And you did it so adeptly and I don't know red. I. I feel like people always talk about how difficult red is to use in terms of like how to pick a right. The right red. I mean, even trying to pick the right red lipstick for me feels like that is.
- [31:35]
C
That's probably the hardest.
- [31:37]
A
So I'm just like, how does she even pick all these different reds? Because there, it wasn't like there was a range of them, right. There was so many. Some that were more rust and then some that were more cherry. So just talk us through this whole Italian project because it was really, really like a wow moment in the book.
- [31:56]
C
Oh, thank you. Well, I think it's a good example about how the power of color doesn't need to be about how loud it is. Is that actually, you know, some of those rooms that were much more kind of a neutral palette, if you look closely, there's quite a lot of layers of different shades of white and sort of near white. And that creates a sort of depth without it needing to be bright colors. And most of those rooms that aren't high degrees of contrast. What I've done is I've LED tones of similar colors so that whilst you have sort of moments of intensity. It's not overwhelming. I think it reflects the surrounding countryside where you've got the most incredible sort of colors coming through in nature, in what grows there, but also the way the light changes through the day and the color of the earth in different areas. I think the reds. Yeah, like when you say the word red, you imagine a kind of London phone box or post box, but there's none of that red anywhere to be seen. They really are like the sort of Tuscan earthy tones, the sort of terracottas through to kind of, you know, shades of rose and really sort of deep dusty pinks. And so again, it's coming back to that thing about colors that feel natural are really easy to live with. They don't feel overwhelming, they feel nurturing. And yeah, really did what we've talked about, about seeing how the family were going to use the spaces, what time of day, where the light was at that time of day and using color to play to the building's strengths and to sort of quieten some of the less good aspects. You know, that whilst it's quite an extensive property in terms there are lots of spaces, the rooms aren't huge, you know, so, you know, and it was the most gorgeous family who have actually become great friends. So I felt like a real true privilege to have the chance to work with them on it.
- [34:12]
A
How many like paint swatches did you use of some of these red wall, wall like this red wall color in the. I guess it's sort of like a den with sort of like a built in looking sectional maybe sofa.
- [34:26]
C
Yeah. So we, we designed a, A, a modular sofa to fit into the space perfectly. And yeah, the walls are in a sort of, you know, a pinky toned, dusty corally red. And then the sofa fabric, there's a couple of different colors that are similar layered up. And then the cushions again are sort of tonally and the thickness of the weave varies. So it's sort of, you feel enveloped by this color but lots of different shades of it. Sorry, what was your question now?
- [35:06]
A
How did you pick a paint color?
- [35:08]
C
You asked how many, how many colors? I should pull this information off our schedules. Actually I'd love to know how many paint colors, but yeah, usually at the start of a project when the painter receives the paint schedule, there is a few deep breaths need to be taken as we explain to them how many colors there'll be and they sort of look at me like I'm completely insane. But by the end, you know, they are like a passionate colorist who is sort of fascinated by all these different shades. So it's a fun adventure. And there's usually a conversation from the client. Do we really need another shade of blue? Yes, trust me.
- [35:53]
A
So when you are picking the actual color for a room like this one, where it's so saturated, do you have an exact shade in your head that you're like, I'm trying to get to this color. Like it needs to be just the right, you know, kind of earthy terracotta, or are you sort of pulling lots of options into the room and just seeing what sort of like works on the walls?
- [36:19]
C
So it will start usually in the. I mean, when I'm. I'm always carrying loads of paint charts around with me. Um, and as soon as I've been to visit the property for the first time, my brain will be starting to sort of think about the different layouts and the different colors. And, you know, other people when they fall asleep maybe are sort of like watching sheep jump over hedges. But I am always wandering around rims and trying on different colors and different configurations in my mind. And I find it very easy to picture a space in my mind and revisit it after I've been to it once. So then in the studio, I can be looking at paint colors and I have boxes of like, boxes of dark blue, mid blue, light blue boxes of all these different colors. So I'll start pulling out sort of different paint cards and playing with combinations and seeing how they go. But you know, while I find it very hard to remember everybody's names, paint names I find strangely easy to remember. So I can sort of dig, dig something out. I kind of know. Oh, I know that that's going to be an interesting touch in this space.
- [37:38]
B
I want to talk a little bit about your furniture line and what that's evolved into and how you got interested in building out your own furniture.
- [37:51]
C
So a bit like sort of falling into interior design. The furniture design has kind of grown out of opportunities that I found in front of me. So we know garden design turned into interior design, Designing people's homes turned into designing hotels. And designing hotels really has been part of what has pollinated the homewares business. Particularly in Covid. We were, you know, finding, you know, with a hotel you need batches of things. So whereas a residential project I can find, you know, interesting antiques or artisan made pieces. For a hotel I might need 20 bedside tables or a run of 30 wall lights. And that's harder to find in that way. And I just found that to find things that Were that met my high design ambitions with the sort of durability demands and the price point that was workable for a commercial project. There just weren't options out there. And when we were installing hotels during COVID and, you know, shipping containers were getting stuck on a Suez Canal because a ship had wedged itself in place, it just really brought home to me where things were being made. And because I have over the years built up this incredible network of makers, I thought, I really want to take matters into my own hands and make things that I can stand behind wholeheartedly and know that they are made with the integrity that I want to be able to assign to each of my projects. And. And so everything is made in workshops that we can get to in a day. All our upholstery is made in England. All our fabrics are woven in an incredible historic mill in England using organic cotton. And there are some things, like our ceramics that we make on mainland Europe. Again, family workshops that I can get to and back in a day. And they're all pieces that have grown out of a particular need. So, you know, knowing that I need a wall light that can angle in a certain way so that it works next to a bed or a floor light that's just the right height that again, you can angle to read well or to pool light on upholstery. A bedside table that has somewhere to store books. Because for the longest time I've got a pile of books next to my bed that I think I'm somehow going to absorb via osmosis rather than getting through to actually reading each one. So I wanted to create a bedside table where there was room for a pile of books as well as a drawer for goodness knows what, and a dining table where you can squeeze lots of people around it by designing it so that the legs are set in from the edge so that you can fit lots of chairs around or have it against a window bench. And in fact, we've created a dining bench so that you can have that sort of bonquette advantage but without having to create a built in piece of furniture. So, yeah, everything that we've done has sort of been led by something that we know we need and use time and time again. So I guess our sort of mantra has been that everything be beautifully useful.
- [41:30]
B
Yeah. And every one of those pieces that you make has a little bit of your stamp of that mix of traditional and modern and arts and crafts and whimsy and really fun, really fun work.
- [41:43]
C
Thank you. Well, I think the sort of, you know, the arts And Crafts movement was born out of this sense of sort of human first and also marrying the sort of being able to see the trace of the human hand, you know, celebrating craftsmanship, but bringing some of the efficiencies of the machine. And how do you blend those things together? And they. Gordon Russell, who was part of the Cotswold movement and the Arts and Crafts movement or sort of followed after the Arts and Crafts movement, developed this idea of batch production so that you can have some of the efficiencies but also still celebrate the craftsmanship.
- [42:34]
A
I want to talk about the book a little bit in. Just in. In general, and, you know, I guess how you pulled the projects and how just the experience of writing the book was.
- [42:46]
C
Oh, I feel incredibly lucky to have had the opportunity to write the book and that Rizzoli approached me to be able to reflect on my most favorite projects from the last 15 years and revisit and reconnect with many of the homeowners and photograph them and remember the myriad of different craftspeople and tradespeople and dealers and all sorts of people who have, you know, contributed to the projects in different ways was a real privilege.
- [43:25]
A
The projects in the book probably were, you said, up to 15 years ago, you know, and they. They would have had to have been completed before you got it photographed and printed and all that. So how do the projects that are currently on your list that you're, you know, you're working on now, how do they differ from maybe some of the things that are photographed in the book and, like, how. How is your.
- [43:45]
C
Your.
- [43:46]
A
Your, I guess, client work evolving?
- [43:50]
C
Well, I really enjoy learning a huge amount with each project that I do. And actually, there's nothing I like more than a brief that is completely different from something I've done previously. And, you know, learning from the other professionals involved, learning from the client, from a collection that they might have put together. And so each project, you know, I want to be very different from the one before. Projects that we're working on at the moment include an incredible art deco villa in Berlin, working on an old palace in Lisbon in Portugal, a Bauhaus building in Amsterdam, an incredible garden. I mean, we're actually working on the garden as well, but an incredible house in Wimbledon in London, where an architect who worked on Buckingham palace also worked on this house and what else? And then an insane Queen Anne house in Barnes, also in London. So, you know, the architectural styles are all over the place, and so the interiors need to speak to that. And so, yeah, doing the research and that kind of invariably takes me in different directions.
- [45:13]
A
What about the colors? What kind of colors are you using in some of these projects?
- [45:17]
C
Literally all sorts. I'm craving doing some projects that are actually really pared back in terms of color. Like whilst I really enjoy color, I don't want that to be what everyone sort of thinks of me for, you know. And so actually having the opportunity to do some projects which is all about kind of layered whites, which is, you know, to some degree what I'm doing in my own kitchen, I'm really enjoying that. That sort of. How do you bring the depth and interest in. In other ways. So, yeah, all sorts of colors. What I'm trying to think what have been some of my favorite recent color combinations. Yeah, I think the sort of, you know, bringing in the kind of very faintest sort of custard tones and sort of mocha kind of cafe au lait with different shades of white is probably one of my favorites just now.
- [46:23]
A
And even those descriptions are delightful. I'm not sure I would have ever called any, any paint colored custard, but that sounds, sounds fabulous.
- [46:34]
C
I should say Big English. Yes.
- [46:38]
A
It's not off white.
- [46:40]
C
Yeah.
- [46:43]
B
Pizza. Boring. Beige.
- [46:45]
A
Yes, for sure. For sure.
- [46:46]
C
Grayish.
- [46:47]
A
Well, well, the book was just a delight, honestly. And it's so cozy and comfortable looking and just surprising and just everything that you could possibly want in in a book and went great with a cup of coffee or I also read it late at night in bed. So it was a really beautiful book.
- [47:11]
C
Thank you. I'm so happy you enjoyed it. Really pleased you enjoyed it.
- [47:15]
A
I know our listeners would enjoy it too. So can you tell everyone where they can find you, follow you and pick up the book?
- [47:22]
C
Well, yeah, please follow me on Instagram at Nicola Harding and company. Also our Nyx brand, Nyx by Nicola Harding. And yeah, get our book on Amazon or any of the bookstores that you guys have in the States. I'll actually be coming to the States a couple of times in the coming months. I'm going to be at Dallas Design Week where I'll be doing a couple of events including at Brooks Thomas Showroom where some of our stuff is. And I'm coming to Round Top in March and also LA by design. So yeah, please, please come and find me. Yes.
- [48:06]
A
And anybody who loves layering and color and pattern or yes, they have to.
- [48:11]
C
Pick up your book.
- [48:12]
A
It's a. It's absolutely stunning.
- [48:14]
C
So thank you. Thank you. Thanks, ladies. Thank you so much for having me. It's been such a treat to meet you all so nice to meet you. Likewise. Please, please come and see us in our studio. And if anyone's coming to London, we're an open house and we'd love people to come and see what we're doing here. Very welcome. Anytime. I'll put the kettle on.
- [48:40]
A
Thanks, Nicola. That's our show. And that's our show. You can find all of the show notes on our blog. Howtodecorate.com podcast to send in a decorating dilemma, email your questions to podcastallarddesigns.net so we can help you with your space. And of course, be sure to follow us on social media.
- [48:57]
B
Alardesigns don't forget to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts so you never miss an episode. And please leave us a review. We'd love to hear your feedback.
- [49:05]
A
Until next time, happy decorating.