THE BOOK

The idea of publishing a book has always been in my mind, and I want to make it a reality for you all. A book that will inspire to evoke the interior design of the past, show you how to create those spaces and how to entertain in the rooms you've created.

I want to create a comprehensive guide for those of you who might find yourselves lost on the world of design. The contents will be very simple:

I will show you a little bit into the history of who I am and where I come from stylistically, how do I decorate and approach interior design and my own personal design physlosophy. How to create a colour palette, a mood, and how to get inspired with history to create a theatrical. romantic and extraordinary space that speaks about who you are.

This won't be a rule book, but more of a guide of how to live, decorate and entertain with your own generational layering.

I want it to be a beacon of light for those of you lost in design but who love history, heritage and have a flare for the whimsy and want a full cinematic experience in your spaces. I want to make you all dream every day.

Are you ready for " Make, do and Ben: a guide for extraordinary living"?

GENERATIONAL LAYERING

I don't believe in stark design or minimalism, that's not for me. As human beings we've never had a time in history where we didn't use ornamentation or a time when we didn't accumulate. I want to show you a way of decorating that doesn't involve declutering, but editing your heritage and curating it to the best of its aesthetic potential. I will make you dig in the attic and bring down your great grandmothers chair and give it pride of place once again in your space.

I don't believe in just using one style, but a layering of different styles that would have grown organically through time, as we might see in a. magnified example in the great country houses of this land. But why not apply this own principle to a normal every day terrace house?

HISTORY AND DESIGN

My design style is closely related to my love and study of history. I like a flavour of this things that we find familiar and comforting, almost like creating a stage set of feelings that build upon through time. I want to evoke the sense of theatre and make you reminisce onto that cup of coco your grandma used to make, the way your grandpas study smelt of pipe tobacco or the way your mum smiled back at you from the kitchen sink on a Sunday after doing the dishes together.

I want to bring elements of design of the past that will evoke your own happy memories into your spaces, and keep your firmly grounded into your heritage, lifestyle and memories of those you've loved in the past.

A romantic notion? perhaps.

But I don't think that there can be higher praise in an space like when someone says " oh I remember, my grandma had one of those beryl tea sets" and then remembers so that conversation entangles into the story of that cup of tea served in beryl ware, creating a human connection and evoking a moment in time that expresses pure and utter happiness.

ENTERTAINING AND COOKERY

Just creating a space is not enough to create a sense of lifestyle. Every space I create has a purpose and a meaning, and would like to show you how to give purpose and meaning to your spaces too.

Whenever anyone visits my house, they marvel at the way we entertain and set up the spaces where we host.

There's nothing more evocative than a nice bouquet of flowers, or some well thought hors d'oeuvres to entice conversation and build up appetite. The art of entertaining is like the art of seduction, the secret is all on the build up.

Think about how you use space day on day, what could you improve on, what would you like to do with those spaces.

Are you an entertainer? do you gather friends at home, our would like to.

Do you know how to sit them to the table a la anglaise? to entice conversations, or do you prefer a more severe and elegant affair?

I would love to show you how I entertain and how I present the house to visitors to tell my life story through objects and interiors.

CRAFT AND DIY

Through my expertise in textiles and proficiency in other areas like light carpentry and DIY, I can show you that your wildest dreams can become true and on a limited budget.

Nothing that I have presented in my own home is overly expensive. Instead, I plan In my head and see what are the needs that must be met and find an end to those means. I always find a way to get what I desire for a fraction of the price.

If its a canopied bed that I'm after I don't do retail, the antiques and bargain hunt is where the secret is at.

I'm a firm believer in repurposing and reutilising existing stock, and environmentally this makes sense as resources are finite. I never purchase the shiny and brand spanking new restored furniture if I can afford it. But find an alternative that needs a little bit of love and work, sometimes a polish and some light mending is just the ticket and it costs just one fraction of what you imagined it would have.

The same goes with diy, you. might think that the answer to you kitchen refurb is to go retail and have it designed, but your local diy centre sells wooden planks that can be cut to size if you pre plan accordingly. And cabinets built this way can cost up to a 4th of what a commercial fitter and joiner would charge. It's just a matter of measuring and being proficient with a drill and you can have solid cabinets that will last for generations and widstand fashion fads and changes.