Colour and Cloth: Great Interior Design Challenge

I love comfort in the home, and no-where more important than the Living Room. Comfort is diving into cushions and in my living room I have 14 and counting!

I don't really understand the concept of having 'a good room'. Rooms, especially 'Living Rooms' are to be lived in. Somewhere you should feel comfortable to kick off your shoes and throw your legs up on the couch/sofa/chaise longue. A space where your friends should feel comfortable to also kick off their shoes and relax! I've had my sofa for 8 years and I can't believe its taken me to now to actually do something more colourful with it. I mean, its brown!!! I think I have turned into my parents!

So while brown hides melted Dairy Milk smudges, it is also quite, lets be kind here, not very exciting. Below I have tried to disguise it with a stripy woollen throw from Flaxmill Textiles.

In Belfast we have Titanic Film Studios where Game of Thrones has been based for Season 1-5. I have been sewing costumes for Seasons 1-4 and we often get remnants and small scraps of fabric.

So I decided to brighten up the brown and make new covers from GOT fabrics. Printed silk velvets, brocades, gold embroideries. Velvets are perfect for sinking into on a big sofa...very sumptuous and luxurious!

Testing out the best colours to match up with the colours in the throw.

Brown and out

Patching up velvets to make a big cover. Duck filled cushions....bliss!

Even the smallest scraps can be patched together.

Joffrey notices that now he's a goner, I have used his coat to make a cushion!
Image Credit Helen Sloan HBO

Mum crocheted the throw over the arm of the sofa. More on my talented mum coming soon. She's my inspiration.

All the cushions have different fabrics for the back so can be plumped up either way...so many options! So many colours!

Now to sit down and sink into my sofa and listen to this fantastic wee tune from the Celtic Shores.

'Can Ye Sew Cushions' by Jean Redpath. Love it!

Till next time

Christine x

An eating space that always ended up being a workspace. It became a stressful room and meant that as my living space is open plan, I could never fully get away from work. It became less a place to eat, and more a space to sew. Something had to give.

In a small space you always need to think creatively. By hanging chairs on the wall this kept the floor area much clearer. However the length of the table blocked the feng shui flow out to the back yarden. It was time for a change...

In January I moved my big dining room table upstairs into the 'spare room' and it became my cutting table for sewing and making patterns. I asked the builders across the way to give me a hand up the stairs with a oak table.

This left me with a gap of where to eat in the dining room. Large scale dinner parties were out of the question unless they became 'TV dinner parties', but I don't have a TV.

I did manage to think around the lack of a 'big table' by throwing a party with 3 smaller tables, it ended up very Parisian, with white table cloths, roses and tea lights.

Margaret, Colin, Shan and Patrick enjoying an evening in Paris / Belfast in September.

Inspiration struck last week when I was clearing out cupboards and discovered the 2 end extensions to the already 'big table'. These have only been used about twice in the last 9 years, and I needed the space they were taking up inside the cupboard so I set to work taking them apart and remaking them.

A girls best friend, my trusty drill/screwdriver combo. Taking off all the wooden batons.