It was brilliant white with blue eaves and window frames, and lots of wild shrubs in the front garden. Over time we painted the white and blue in off-white and cream, and repainted the royal blue door in high-gloss black. We removed all the shrubs and defined the garden border with boxwood hedges. We then planted standard iceberg roses around the front garden...
Below: After
The gold silk damask duvet, dust-ruffle, and pillow cases were all home sewn, and the crown and bed-head were self gilded. Needless to say, we will be getting professionals to do the painting at Willowbrook; and I can't wait for a bedroom with a flat ceiling and walls of equal heights!
Then there was the upstairs study, which was the custard yellow bedroom of another daughter.
Back downstairs again, there was the dining room. This was an original room from 1915 (dated from the newspapers found stuffed in the framing as insulation when we tore the room apart). It was weatherboard construction which had been covered with scrim and then coated in anagylpta, and then painted several times. When the wind blew in the right direction I swear I could see the walls bellowing from within. In its last incarnation it had been left a terracotta colour, which is what we made do with for a while...
In the big renovation of 2008, we tore all the walls, floor and ceiling out, and re-lined them with Gib-board...
We had the ceiling re-plastered with a period cornice moulding and centre medallion, banished the ugly hanging candelabra, and strung up an empire-styled basket chandelier...
Modern as the gray under-paint was, we went ahead an painted the room a Wedgwood blue. This has been our practice run for the Card room / China room at Willowbrook...
Still ridiculously over-stuffed (my need to hoard not curtailed by a mere lack of physical space)....
We immediately painted the bathroom in order to shower without fear of migraines. But no matter what shade we chose, we couldn't hide the fact that it was dated...
So we had the ceiling, floor and four walls ripped out, rebuilt, water proofed and tiled with a beige marble. We chose a nice new bath, loo and vanity (and tried to make the most of the modest space with which we were challenged.
All of this was made harder and doubly expensive when we found out that the first building company had done such a sub-standard job of rebuilding the bathroom that the tiler was not prepared to tile it. The building company, disagreeing with the tiler and a second building consultant, refused to fix the job, and we had to pay a second company to tear down their work and complete it to a professional standard. But I think it was worth it...
Back in the garden:
Just off the drawing room was a small cobbled space...
We thought we would convert it into an outside extension of the drawing room by creating a little courtyard. This was pleasant by day...