My longest romantic relationship is with the colour red

I hope you all had a good Valentine’s Day on what is frankly the least romantic of all the forced ‘holidays’. The closest I came to some Valentine’s Day action this year was getting my breasts felt up by the nurse late on Friday afternoon. A story for another time.

I’m not bitter though. No really, I’m not! (Shakespeare comes to mind here: “The lady doth protest too much, methinks”). But I’m not protesting. I’m just saying…

Valentine’s Day isn’t real is it?

I had to work really hard to refrain from posting a picture of myself on Instagram holding a bunch of flowers, to a soundtrack of that Miley Cyrus song, the one where she sings about buying herself flowers. It was tempting. Because it can all feel a bit silly can’t it? And if you’re longing for a romantic partner, as many people are, I imagine it can feel very lonely and sad seeing all the happy couples clinking champagne glasses on socials.

I was fortunate to not feel that way this year. Probably because this Valentine’s Day was one of a very small handful where I’ve not been in a relationship since about 1997! So being single is all a bit of a novelty and not something I’m sad about, V Day or not.

All it made me do was think about my enduring love affair with… the colour red.

A bedroom in my home with the recently acquired charity shop side table - in red of course - balancing out the more trad wooden/upholstered bed. For what I bought and how much, see this post.

(I wrote about the literal red thread in my homes here on the old Life Unstyled blog five years ago if you’re interested in more of a backstory and some old shots of my homes from the late 90s and early noughties).

From an interiors/culture point of view, Valentine’s Day is one of two times of the year when red has its moment, Christmas being the other notable one of course. I had unintentionally been posting about my love of a pop of red in interiors in the week leading up to the big day of romance, initially because of a small table I bought for a fiver at a charity shop that added the contrast I’d been seeking to my bedroom interior.

Contrast is something I’ve always been drawn to in interiors (I’ve written about it in all my books) and red just happens to be my colour of choice a lot of the time. But like all good things, it must come to an end and sadly I sense the beginning of the end of a relationship. This time I blame the trend cycle for contributing to the demise of my love affair with red.

For Valentine’s Day, all the retailers like to pair it with pink, whether it’s for balloons or boxes of chocolates or cards. Red and pink can be a strong choice for interiors but I think it’s best when grounded with some natural elements to avoid it being too bumble gum or juvenile.

And of course Christmas is when red partners up so perfectly with green. I’ve always been a bit annoyed that Christmas ‘owns’ that colour scheme because it’s one of my favourites. But ultimately you have to go with what you love regardless of perception, so I’ve decorated with these colours for years. I prefer earthier greens - less forest, more sage - so I like to think my home doesn’t scream FESTIVE! If you look here at the home page of this newsletter, you can see evidence of my hopefully subtle love of red dotted throughout the images…

I’m one of those people who overdoes something when I like it. A new song gets played on a loop until I’m sick of it. One particular meal gets cooked until I never want to see/smell it again, let alone eat it. And in my home I can sometimes repeat one thing I love to the point of over saturation, and often it’s a colour. I’m now at the point where I have to stop myself from buying or painting anything else green - see my exterior windows, interior pantry door and kitchen windowsill, green bathroom sink, the skirting and door in one bedroom. It’s quite a lot for a 3 bedroom bungalow unless I want to become The Green Lady of Brooklyn. (Fabulous as she is, for me it’s a no).

After 25 years of my love affair with red, I think it’s time to do the same there as well. Red Chinese cabinet - 20+ years old; red velvet armchair - 25 years old. (These two are what started it all years ago!); red lamp shades; red side table; red and green vintage floral curtains and most recently - and in an effort to not always choose black for my electronics - a red JBL portable speaker.

It probably doesn’t help that as the trend cycle speeds up and visibility of trends is more easily accessible, the market for one particular thing gets very quickly saturated. Fatigue for that one particular interiors (or fashion) look happens really fast these days. Even if you don’t want to be influenced by trends, if you’re on social media - or if you ever go in a shop - good luck trying!

Working in the industry that I do, there is this feeling that you always need to know what’s going on. You have to keep in the loop! You need to know who’s doing what in interiors! You have to keep on top of trends!

I’ve always naturally rebelled against this, not wanting to know what’s going on externally in the design world in the hope that my internal design instincts will work harder and seek out originality.

But every now and then I venture out into the world of press shows and trade shows and other PR events thinking “I should know what’s going on”. It’s usually fun to connect with others in the industry and see what brands are up to, but rarely do I leave these events feeling particularly inspired and if anything, it reaffirms that I made the right decision to look inwards instead of outwards.

I’ve said this before, but in part it’s probably because I’ve been around long enough to have seen trends come and go so many times that not much of it feels fresh anymore. Once in a while there will be a stroke of genius from a designer, but it’s getting less and less frequent. I do think it’s sometimes good to get out and see what others are up to, but it’s equally - in fact more -important to work on tuning in to what you like, what you want your home to look and feel like in the coming years.

Red spotted out in the wild this week

Red and pink done well at a recent Habitat Spring/Summer press event. The soft blue/green wall and natural wood cabinet warm up what could be too strong a combo. Prior to this event I’d spotted a vintage low backed chair in the New York home of John Derian in this article and fell in love.

LAMP LDN, spotted last weekend when I was in Peckham with my son. It’s cute and it’s eye catching and they clearly have some very lovely, well sourced things. They were probably doing the whole scalloped edge design and bold stripe thing before the big brands hopped on board and ruined it for everyone.

The Shakespeare pub in Margate, spotted on a recent night out. That tomato red contrasts so well with the raw walls and warm wood tones. That soft blue is a really nice alternative to green with red and has got me thinking.

Me last week. Earth tones contrasted with just a pop of colour showing up in my outfits as well as my home. Second hand red Louis Vuitton Speedy bag that may or may not be real and I’m fine with that.

And of course a couple of my new wallpaper collection come in red. I designed them last year and I just had to. Red wallpaper will not be for everyone but it will be for some. But there’s also a soft green and a brighter green, a rust and a royal blue, a denim blue and a plastery-pink, and BLACK!

Have a wonderful day and thanks as always for reading or listening! x