Restoring the Old Girl

The Dr Frankenstein guide to decorating
There's many an uncertainty when it comes to home restoration, renovation or decoration, but one thing I know for sure is it's going to cost us an arm and possibly a leg too.
But as all former Girl Guides know (or sisters of former Girl Guides anyway) the secret to success is to be prepared.
I've been collecting little decorating ditties for months now. I know that short of handing over one of our children to the bank, we are going to have to use our current resources to add the finishing touches.
We aren't short on furniture, quite the opposite. I'm going to take a paintbrush some of the more ordinary pieces. The furniture in the house is mostly dark and dank. I want our house to be full of shocking colour, but on a fairly neutral white and grey background.
I'm showing you some of the decorating bits from my 'Look Book'.  As you'll see, I'm not really following any particular style at the moment, and there's going to have to be a lot of refining to get everything to flow. I've taken bits of this look and bits of that, but some of it is going to have to be sacrificed. I can't live out every decorating whim in the one house.

My husband and I are huge fans of this diorama style wallpaper, although, from the reaction of people we've shown, it's not a look that is widely appreciated.

 

You've got to love a formal garden. Fortunately, hedges and creepers take more elbow grease than coin.

The bedroom above is from the book Flea Market Style. Love paper lanterns, $2 or not, they're just pretty.

Don't worry. I'm saving this look for  when I get my holiday house in India.

Painted furniture.

The little pink chest of drawers gave me the idea to ultimately use our old clawfoot bath in the garden to grow herbs. It's already a vile, lolly pink.

Next I have to go room by room, on paper, and detail what furniture I'll use, the colour scheme, etc. It fills in my time, and scratches an itch, while I wait for the actual work to start!