Four Years Later

I’m the kind of person who, in moments of quiet, is always looking towards the next thing. I can live in the moment when things are actually happening, but in the quiet in-betweens, I’m always skipping ahead. I’ve come to accept this about myself, but it means that sometimes I need a forced reflection — something that makes me look at what has already happened and how far I’ve come.

This house is no different. I’m forever looking at the next project, the next thing I want to change or add or update or move or plant. I almost always lose sight of how much we’ve already done until I see a photo from years ago and it shocks me. Is that MY house? Anyway, we moved here four years ago this month, so I thought it would be fun to look back.

People always ask if we’re renovating the house. Not really? We’ve done some things like insulating the walls, replacing some windows etc, but largely the changes have been what I think of as redecorating. Pretty simple changes like paint and light fixtures can make such a huge difference, and that’s what I really love to do.

So, inside, we redecorated the dining room first, then boot room, living room, laundry room, study, kitchen, central hall, upstairs hall, bedrooms, bathrooms, powder room… basically all of it.

Read on for the before and afters!

In the dining room we swapped out the light, painted and added wallpaper for a very different feel:

In the study we painted and added a real stained wood ceiling to warm the space up.

Someday we’ll really redo the kitchen, but in the meantime I used paint, cabinet hardware and some strategic styling to make it more in-keeping with the rest of the house.