Louise Misell Interiors: Adding Warmth and Interest into a Unique Family Home

This week’s instalment of the Project of the Week series features a warm and colourful family home design by 2024 SBID Awards Finalist, Louise Misell Interiors.

Louise Misell Interiors was asked to prepare this unusual family home for the family to relocate to, with the clients wanting to add warmth, a cohesive colour palette, and bespoke and unique touches throughout. The team reconfigured layouts to make sense of the home, and decorated, added bespoke carpentry, window dressings, furniture and lighting, and a one of a kind chandelier which was designed in house. The studio also completely renovated the main bedroom ensuite and converted a garage into a home gym.

What was the client’s brief?

The client’s brief was to add warmth and interest to the home, with touches of the unexpected and pieces which would make the home unique. They were seeking a cohesive colour palette, with a range of wood finishes to be used throughout the home and have a particular fondness for living edge wood. Our studio touched every area of the home, including a complete renovation of the main bedroom’s ensuite, creating a playroom, and turning a garage into a home gym. We also designed many bespoke and unique pieces of carpentry, and a showstopping one of a kind chandelier for the double height hallway space.

What inspired the design of the project?

The design of the home was led by the client’s taste for something a little quirky and unique, and inspired by the shapes and forms already present in the home. The previous owners ran a carpentry business and had used wood in interesting applications, which our clients loved and wanted to expand upon. Our approach was to use what was already present as inspiration and add some rich colour to the existing natural wood palette, and to streamline some of the shapes used to avoid the home becoming visually too busy. The pieces we added were functional and safe for a young family to use, but we wanted each piece to add its own style whilst blending beautifully into the home. Our clients loved blues and greens so we used varying warm tones of those two colours throughout the home but felt that the central hallway and mezzanine space should be decorated in shades of terracotta, to add contrast and to welcome the family warmly into their home.

What was the toughest hurdle your team overcame during the project?

Our clients were relocating from California and were bringing nothing with them, so we needed to decorate, furnish and add window dressings and lighting before they arrived. This was just after lockdown restrictions had been lifted, so it was a challenge to make sure that all pieces arrived and were in place within a tight timeline of four months. This was when furniture lead times had risen dramatically and could be over a yearlong – there were a lot of phone calls to our suppliers! Once the family had moved in, we continued to work on the home, so the challenges didn’t end there. After we converted the garage into a luxury home gym, we discovered a leak coming from the existing ensuite above, which threatened to damage the whole space below. Luckily, we managed to act fast and avoid disaster, but it did mean the decision to renovate the ensuite was brought forward, and we completed that part of this project early last year.

What was your team’s highlight of the project?

The highlight of the project for us was the installation of the bespoke chandelier. This was designed in house, and we asked Mullan Lighting to make it for us. They are located in Ireland and have never seen the house, so we had to make sure the measurements were correct! It was shipped in smaller pieces, but when assembled weighed over 50 kg, so we engaged a structural engineer to make sure its weight could be supported. We had to install it in stages as the ceiling height required scaffolding to reach, but as the chandelier was being installed, we removed levels of scaffolding to make way for the chandelier itself. The whole thing took some planning, but the piece is stunning, and we are very proud of everyone who helped to make it happen.

Why did you enter the SBID Awards?

The SBID awards are known for having entries of a very high standard and are very well respected in our industry, and their commitment to promoting the work of talented interior designers globally is admirable. We felt it would be an honour to enter the awards and were absolutely delighted to become finalists and to see our project alongside some very impressive work.

What has being an Award Finalist meant to you and your business?

Becoming an SBID award finalist has meant so much to our studio – to be recognised by an industry body with a reputation for excellence has boosted our visibility and reassured potential clients that they will be working with a studio of a certain calibre.

Questions answered by Louise Misell, Owner of Louise Misell Interiors.