Beata's challenge was then to furnish the three-storey, five-bedroom house from scratch, keeping it true to the personalities of the owners. 'We didn't want it to be obvious they had used an interior designer, so I created a layered look that appears to have been built over time.' The owners' large and varied collection of art added an important visual texture to the decoration. What I can say for sure is that if you persevere and put some effort into it, you will find that creating a real sense of home will bring you comfort, joy, and excitement. I believe that if you are happy in your home environment, you will feel a sense of fulfilment and well-being, and your home can become what I think all interiors should be: truly life enhancing. Beata Heuman is the founder of Beata Heuman Ltd., an interior architecture and furnishings studio. Regularly featured in leading publications such as T Magazine, Elle Decor, and British Vogue, Heuman was named to AD's Top 100 list in 2020. She resides in London. The overall effect is intoxicating, and the owners are understandably thrilled. 'It has been an amazing project,' says Beata. 'Having the opportunity to be this creative is very unusual'.

Then, if I try to analyze her design style, it's really just: take a bunch of things that don't match, throw them in a room together, add a few things for scale and balance, make sure something has a scalloped edge, and the room is done. So is it genius to do this? It makes for comfortable rooms that reflect the owners, or is this something we've all just been doing all along and somehow Heuman put a new spin on it and made it trendy? Even in less isolated circumstances, home is a powerful thing for children. Not only is it the dominant place of a child’s existence, but our senses are heightened when we are little. Everything is new and in Technicolor, and impressions are felt deeply. Childhood helps to form our understanding of what home is and what we might want it to be; allowing our inner voice to be heard is invaluable when trying to connect with what home means to each of us. I have gone from growing up in rural Sweden to living in the vast city of London. There is generosity about how the English live, and how they welcome guests into their homes. It feels relaxed and open, and there is a worldly air about the place. This is definitely something that has affected my view of home and how I would like to live, especially as my interests, needs, and priorities shift as time goes by. That said, the thing that strikes me is how little has really changed. The core remains within, and it still influences what I seek when it comes to the environment around me. The older I get, the more strongly I feel it. It is not all that I am, but recognizing everything I still have in common with the child I was is to me one of the pleasures of getting a little older. All rooms ought to look as if they were lived in, and to have so to say, a friendly welcome ready for the incomer (William Morris)rounded up because I'm painfully conflicted. ;-) Is Beata Heuman a genius? Every room screamed Beata Heuman, yet some I absolutely loved (and could move right into and never redecorate ever again) and some I loathed. How is that even possible? I'm assuming that's because these rooms really reflected the personalities of the owners more than it seems at first glance. The rooms I loved were probably the ones of the owners who has similar tastes to mine. These delights are nothing, however, to the sheer sensory pleasure of the interior - a highly original space, unapologetically theatrical and oozing energy. 'The owners are both artists. They have quite wild tastes and they love strong colours,' says Beata. 'I was told by the wife that her childhood dream was to have a house with a series of rooms each with its own distinct personality - Chinese, Japanese, American and so on. That would have been too much, but I did want to give the house variation and changes of mood.' This inversion of the usual dynamic - clients requiring encouragement to embrace bold decorative concepts - was an early characteristic of the project. 'It is one thing looking at something and thinking it is cool. It is very different living with it,' says Beata. 'I wanted the house to be fun and uplifting, but also comfortable and not too "full on".' And then, many of the "bespoke" pieces just looked like what DIYers have been popularizing on social media for ages now -- paint a vintage piece, add some trim to plain curtains, build a headboard. Charge a fortune, LOL! I'm just not sure, but is it then easy to get the look for less?

Beata Heuman: starts off "you will not always agree with me, and I wouldn't expect you to...this book is about individuality and striking a chord." I live here with my husband and our two daughters, aged two and eight months. Both my husband and I sold our flats to buy this house, and we moved here before our first daughter was born, but knowing we would make it into a family home. As with our projects, most of the pieces and detailing in the house are bespoke, from the Art Deco glass ceiling in the kitchen, inspired by the grand cafés of Scandinavia, to the daybed we designed that’s upholstered in Joseph Frank fabric and the dodo egg lights in the kitchen. Like anything worthwhile, it will take time and effort to work out what home means to you, and even longer to build an environment that is a true reflection of who you are. In this book, I hope to help make the process a little less daunting. You will, of course, not always agree with my reflections, but when there is friction, it might help you to find your own answer. You may also opt to downgrade to Standard Digital, a robust journalistic offering that fulfils many user’s needs. Compare Standard and Premium Digital here.What we remember about rooms is the atmosphere, the mood. Unless rooms are personal, they have none of this.” (Billy Baldwin) (p. 156) All the colors sing together; their strength is determined by the needs of the chorus. It’s like a musical chord.” (Henri Matisse) (p. 218) Beata not only quotes Matisse but has incorporated several Matisse-style shapes and prints in her patterns – pp.80, 131, 199, , 237 If you do nothing, you will be auto-enrolled in our premium digital monthly subscription plan and retain complete access for 65 € per month. Almost everyone believes that there is something deep and mysterious about [interior decoration] or that you have to know all sorts of complicated details about periods before you can lift a finger. Well, you don’t…decorating is just sheer fun: a delight in color, an awareness of balance, a feeling for lighting, a sense of style, a zest for life, and an amused enjoyment of the smart accessories of the moment.” (Dorothy Draper) (p. 236).