Kelly Hoppen reveals 12 ways to make your home look expensive on a budget – including the rug trick Boy George loves
INTERIOR design guru Kelly Hoppen knows how to create plush living spaces.
The former Dragons’ Den star has worked with celebs including the Beckhams and has created glam interiors for hotels and superyachts.
But she also loves a bargain and says there are ways of adding luxury to your space without breaking the bank.
This is no doubt music to the ears of the one in three homeowners planning to renovate interiors this year.
“Luxury isn’t about how much you spend, it’s about how you feel,” she says.
“It can be very easy and affordable to add a touch of luxury and comfort to your home. It’s all about finding different ways of looking at things.”
Here, Kelly gives Emma Lazenby her brilliant tricks for making your pad more plush.
- From September 12 the new Marks & Spencer x Kelly Hoppen exclusive homeware design range is in stores and online at marksandspencer.com.
Love layering
RUGS are a brilliant place to start if you want to quickly change a space. A great way to have fun with them and add texture is to also layer two together.
You might already have rugs that are either too big or too small, but layering can put them to better use.
When I was styling Boy George’s house, I placed one rug over another, slightly to the right, and it instantly gave an eclectic feel.
People sometimes panic about rugs, but layering makes it easy to adapt them to your space.
Be clever with cushions
CUSHIONS are fantastic if they are positioned well. It’s common for people to put them across the back of the sofa – left, right and in the middle.
But one of the ways I’ve used cushions in my new home is to put them against the side of each sofa arm instead. It creates a completely different look.
It’s also quite nice as an arm rest when you sit down.
I’ve tried putting a smaller, flatter cushion in a different colour on top of a larger one, which works really well too.
Turn books into art
BOOKSHELVES and bookcases can be arranged in a cool way by taking the books that you don’t really need or want to look at – we all have those – and turning them the other way around so you see the paper and not the spine.
Then you can pile them up at different heights and place accessories on top. It can create a really artistic-looking space.
And if you have ten or so random books that happen to be the same colour, you can turn those to have their spines facing, piling them horizontally and placing them between the paper-facing piles.
Get a wonderwall
IF you are renting your home and cannot paint or wallpaper your walls, or if you do not want to commit to anything permanent, buy a large MDF sheet, wallpaper it and put it up against a wall.
This would not be the whole size of the wall, but you could have it in the centre and push it up against the wall with your chair or sofa to keep it in place.
It then means you have a whole new backdrop with a different texture.
You could move it to another room if you wanted to, or even paint it a different colour as the seasons change.
Mix it up with marble
THERE are some amazing tiles out there right now and you can get cheap marble off-cuts that work really well for creating both kitchen and bathroom splash-backs.
My top tip here is to mix marble with more matte tiles so you can play around more with patterns.
Just make sure you stick to the same colour tone.
Make a splash
WHEN you move into a new place, it is often the kitchen that can feel a bit icky, with dated walls and tiles.
But a really good and easy way to freshen up the space is putting up a metal splashback panel over the oven.
You can get these in stainless steel or even bronze.
They are easy to keep clean, create a different texture and reflect light around the kitchen.
Stack it up
ANOTHER trick with books is to stack them on your floor against a wall. If you are like me and you have a lot of them, but not many bookcases, you can pile them up neatly, with the bigger ones at the bottom and the smaller ones at the top.
I’ve grouped together books of similar colours and every so often I will put a little sculpture on top, which gives an artistic look.
The large ceramic vase from my new M&S home design range (£29.50) would work perfectly here.
This is also a very cool way to create a small table next to a chair or sofa if you can’t afford to get a new piece of furniture. Just place a dish or similar on top and it looks really cute.
Go cosy with throws
IF you invest in just one thing for autumn and winter, buy a throw. It’s the easiest ways to make your home feel really cosy.
Place throws on the edges of your sofas and chairs and your space will instantly feel more comfortable.
And they don’t have to break the bank. I love the neutral throws in my M&S range (£35). They feel so luxurious.
Ramp up your lamps
LIGHTING “up” from a floor lamp behind a chair or a plant will add a cosy atmosphere to any room.
It’s a great way to subtly spread light around a space.
Lighting is so important in the home and it’s good to think about it in layers – where you have your low, middle and high lights.
Table lamps and ceiling lighting give your “low” and “middle” light, while floor lamps cast “high” light towards the ceiling, which is important in the darker months.
Mash up your styles
I LOVE combining traditional with modern and it is very in vogue right now.
Never throw away old furniture that might have sentimental value.
Whether it is a chair or table you have inherited, or an old leather sofa your partner brought into the relationship, do not dismiss these pieces – or get divorced over them.
You can make them work in your environment by making small tweaks, like adding a nice throw or a couple of cushions.
Dare to be shady
WHEN you’ve chosen a colour to paint your walls, go for a different shade of it for your skirting boards and doors.
It’s called tonal painting and can be much more fun than opting for white on your woodwork.
Whether you’ve decided on grey, pink or green, just find other shades of that paint that can fade into one another.
Let there be light
IF your bed is right next to a wall, hanging a mirror there will reflect the rest of the room and make it feel wider, while giving you something else to look at.
Putting a mirror on a wall right opposite a window will create lots of light, which is always a good tip for smaller, darker rooms.