Bright & colourful 50's terrace - home of Kirsten aka @kikiloveshome

ART & DESIGN

Posted on: Sep 13

This week I’m taking you to a historic market town in Hertfordshire called Berkhamsted. Here we are visiting 1950’s 3 bed terraced house which belongs to Kirsten. I love this bright home where Kirsten is expressing her creative personality with colour and I love the mix of contemporary art with colourful furniture and antique pieces.

In Kirsten’s own words:

I live here with my partner Steve, cat Georgie (who pretty much rules the roost) and Steve’s 3 boys stay every other weekend. When I first viewed the house 10 years ago (I hadn’t met Steve then), there were many reasons I fell for it but the views at the back of the house looking out over fields was a massive selling point for me. I never tire of those views and the ever changing skyline throughout the seasons.

What inspires you when decorating your home and what has drawn you to your style?

When it comes to my style I think I’m still very much finding my feet when it comes to décor and I don’t think I have a particular style, I just bung things together and hope for the best, but I do love colour - whether that’s paint, wallpaper or accessories and it’s just been a slow process of decorating each room when budget allows. I’ve always loved interior design and even as a teen my bedroom was a very important space for me to express my creativity. I have been very much influenced by my parents over the years, my Dad is very creative and he painted the most amazing tree mural on my bedroom wardrobe doors when I was a teen and my Mum is a very stylish house proud Dane, so we spent many holidays in Denmark perusing their fabulous home design shops. Also one of my favourite places to visit in Denmark is the beautiful Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, which is set in stunning surroundings on the coast….well worth a visit if you are ever visiting Denmark!

Would you like to share a few tips on how you choose art for your home?

Instagram has also inspired me a great deal, I’m relatively new to it and couldn’t believe how many fabulous interiors accounts there are and also how lovely the community has been. I have found so many amazing artists through Instagram, @lush_eclectic being one of them. I just love art - the colours, the stories behind the piece, the emotions in the art and especially the emotions they provoke when you look at the artwork. I tend to buy work that just makes my heart sing (cliché I know but true).

Do you choose art to go with your home décor or other way round?

I always buy art that I love, never to match my décor, and I never buy it knowing where it will go in the house, which is unfortunate as I am rapidly running out of walls now. My partner often says that the walls will probably fall down if I hang anymore prints up! Looking around I do seem to be drawn to paintings of women, I love that defiant look in the eyes of strong badass women, or a quirky tongue in cheek portrait that makes people want to stop and stare at it, not knowing whether they actually like it or not. My 2 most treasured pieces would be a painting that belonged to my Danish grandparents that holds very special memories for me and a stunning print by Louise Dear that my partner bought me for my 50^th birthday. We visited her gallery and workshop in Brighton and spent 2 hours chatting to her which was amazing.

How do you choose a frame for the art and where you get your frames ?

When it comes to framing prints, if they are a pretty standard size then Ikea and The Range can’t be beaten on price and if they need to be made to measure, I sometimes use a local framer, or Easyframe are good value and quick to deliver. When I find a lovely charity shop frame, I can’t normally resist it despite not having a print for it as yet.

How do you arrange your wall galleries?

My gallery walls are definitely more luck than anything, I love a mixture of styles all thrown together. I did once put all the pictures (and a couple of plates) on the floor to see how they looked, moved them about a bit until they looked good together and then took a photo of that arrangement, so it was a kind of plan for getting them on the wall that worked quite well. Other times it’s been more organic, just adding prints as I find them.

Any other tips when it comes to styling art in interiors?

I’m definitely no interior stylist, I just buy what I love and worry about where it will go later, then have a faff about with the art, putting it around the house to find it’s ‘home’. I do move some pieces around every now and again, which then makes pieces feel like new again (and is fun to see how long it takes my partner to work out what’s changed in the room!)