21 Mar 19

The Great Indoors podcast S2 Episode 6- Show notes

Kate Watson-Smyth and Sophie Robinson recording The Great Indoors podcast at Sophie's house. Discussing many design dilemmas and design crimes. Budget home updates, children's rooms and Instagram ready interiors. #sophierobinson #interiordesign #podcast

Hello, today is another podcast day- not just any podcast day but the last in the current series. That’s two series’ under our belts already- where did the time fly to, and a massive thank you to our sponsor DFS for supporting us all the way! To close the series we chose to talk about whether Instagram is the new version of ‘Keeping up with the Jones’, followed by a topic that lots of you have been asking us for, our ideas around budget home updates. Then finally, completing our ‘how to design a room’ series we take a look at children’s bedrooms. You can listen to the podcast on any platform, and the links to all of those are here. Do make sure you give us a rating and a review if you are able, as it really does give us a boost in the podcast charts that ultimately helps us find new interior design loving listeners.

A look at my home as it appears on the Instagram grid and what it looks like on any typical day!

Is Instagram the new version of “Keeping up with the Jones’s”

Kate and I had great fun with this one as we are both avid Instagrammers and regularly post pictures of our ‘perfect’ homes on Instagram. We are aware that the grid favours beautifully styled images that are coherently posted in a flowing colour palette. But come on, it’s not real! I shared how I have recently had some fun posting pictures on my #instasham home and the comments have been really encouraging. (The hashtag was instigated by top interiors influencer Katie from @comedowntothewoods ) Here is the instasham evidence in my own home! I strongly believe that a house is for living in, and not for providing the grid with beautiful images. However, Kate declares that, as her children are teenagers and she has a hyper tidy mad husband, her house is always picture ready. So there is hope!

Painted kitchen cupboards in Antibes green by Annie Sloan

Budget home updates

Who doesn’t love to save money and when it comes to decorating your home the savings can be huge! Kate and I, for once, agreed that a tin of paint is the most affordable and transformational way to make a huge impact on your interior scheme. From painting walls to floors, even furniture, rolling out a new hue can give your space a new uplift. Annie Sloane, among many other brands, offers chalk paint which is readily slapped onto furniture without the need to prep the furniture first so it makes it a very quick as well as an affordable DIY update. Following on with the theme of DIY, we agreed that taking care of the work yourself can be a great way to save money. You can update what you already own, junk furniture or hack a shop bought piece of Ikea. Instagram accounts we find particularly inspiring for budget interior inspiration are @grillodesigns and @muckandbrass and @patirobins

The home of @grillodesigns is full of DIY and budget ideas with no skimping on style

How to design the room- Children’s bedrooms

Both Kate and I agreed that the number one rule for designing children’s bedrooms is to get them involved with the design. Kids love designing their own spaces and it’s great to start encouraging them to think about how colour works, how it affects their moods and what their favourites are. I encouraged my son Arthur to choose the colours of his own bedroom, which he did, from the Little Greene paint chart. Which was my way of giving him a limited edit. He went straight for the Atomic red, on “ALL FOUR WALLS MUMMY”. That’s my boy! And then picked Gentle sky for the ceiling. These are colours I would never have picked or put together for myself but I hope you can agree they look awesome!

My son Arthur chose Atomic red and Gentle Sky for his bedroom from the Little Green paint chart

There was of course absolutely tonnes more ideas, tips and advise discussed on the podcast, which you can find out about here. While you are there, please do give us a star rating- you can give us one each time you listen you know! And then if there is the opportunity to leave a review, we’d just love one of those too.

See you in Series 3 which will follow on in two weeks time! We’ve got some very exciting new content for you…Eeek! Thanks to our sponsor Dfs and to our producer Kate Taylor. And of course to my co-host Mad About the House.