Tags: tulips, springgarden, lockdowngarden, covid, roses, wildflowers, butterflycakes,

Monday 27 April

Six weeks in and with glorious weather lockdown has at times the feeling of an endless summer holiday albeit one without the sense of an actual ending, or what might lie on the other side.

Getting to grips with how the new normal will be for work; winging it and re- invention seem to be the order of the moment. The publishing industry is mothballed, but I’m ploughing on to complete my new Pure Style book with Vanessa Courtier my long time collaborator. As my potential publisher says, it will be easier to sell a finished book once things get moving again. I`m enjoying the focus and chance to research.

Tags: tulips, spring, garden, lockdown, pandemic, athome, bluebells, lilac,

 FROM MY GARDEN BOOK NOTE BOOK:

Winter is the time to plan and dream. And over the first one at Palace road I read up on  gardens and gardeners, great and small to get me going on the new garden I will dig with the help of Tommy and his gang later in the year. Alexander Pope’s advice to the Earl of Burlington – that the gardener consult the genius of the place could certainly apply to my back garden as much as to the 18 century earl’s sprawling acreage . The genius in this place is its spacious and leafy,suburban proportions. Where to start?

I rough out a basic plan and thoughts in a notebook. I envision the garden as
a series of outdoor spaces: a journey for the senses, a mix of the formal and
informal , with places to sit and eat or contemplate on a blanket under a blue
sky. Three sections emerge: a patio, a central flower and herb plot divided by
gravel paths and planted at the corners with wigwams of beansticks, and the
grass area at the end with the old apple tree and garden room,. The brief :to
keep it simple, functional, and beautiful. Simple in the sense of layout, functional
in not having time consuming plants, and beautiful in terms of texture
colour and sensuality. Possible obstacles to dash my plans: the unvisual prospect
of a trampoline - at the time my children were begging for one.
I also look with increased focus at the cottage gardens and allotments
on which I will base my ideas. The forerunners of sweetly cobbled or
brick paved front gardens brimming with little clumps of the season’s first
snowdrops , near me, and of my own childhood back garden for that matter,
go back to the Middle Ages, and earlier when green fingered monks tended
flowers and herbs in cloister and courtyard gardens. Enclosed by a wattle
fence, hawthorn hedge or stone wall.

23rd March

As the country closes down,  loo roll is like  gold bars  and birdsong takes over from the roar of aircraft,  it`s a race against lockdown  to  ren novate  the gravel paths between the flower and herb beds.  Gavin and and Karl are my right hand  garden team  digging out the existing gravel, now thick with weeds and earth spillover after the most torrential  winter  I have known , and laying down a permeable plastic membrane on which will be spread a thick layer of pea shingle gravel. This should be more weed repelling than previously because the plastic butts up against the earth border of the flower beds.

Tags: spring, garden, tulips, lockdown, covid-19, simple, style, growing, coronavirus, everyday beauty,

Yesterday the garden became a little Venice as the storm rain poured down and created watery canals between the central beds. To say it was sodden was an understatement as I took refuge in the office and tidied up the computer desktop rather than the garden prunings.

This morning the ground has swallowed up the excess water but the grass still feels like the unstable mud flats you get at low tide by the river. Squelchy, but at least the narcissi are poking through , the little clump that is well over 10 years old has sprouted again and is about to burst into bloom. This time last year the buds were shut tight and the plants half the size in height. It’s been another exceptionally warm winter , as we all know.

Very excited to come across a pot of narcissi actually flowering; they’re bulbs from inside that I put out after flowering over a year ago and forgot to dig into the ground. Love the accidental surprises that the garden yields.

I skipped swimming to garden but it’s another form of exercise, sweeping, cutting, loading up the wheelbarrow and trundling it to the heap behind the fencing at the bottom of the garden. After an hour, plus aching arms from stretching upwards to prune wildy unwieldy Madame Aflred Carriere rose (a glorious puff of white petals later on in summer) it’s time to lay down the choppers and have a break.

 

Tags: spring , narcissi , garden, tidy

Tags: springgarden, tulips, blossom, pink, ecogarden, londonreatreat, countryinthecity, simplegarden, outdoors,

Tags: spring, garden, hazelsticks, simplegardn, springcolours, wigwams

The tulips are giving a good show. Somehow they  have escaped the gnashing snails that slithered in with  the winter wet. Have got a little confused with the varieties as surprisingly I`m getting some re-shows from last year, and even the year before, I think. I know, because there are a few violent red imposters  which I swear I never ordered in the first place, but  which have somehow bedded down confidently  with at least two seasons of  unwelcome visits. Anyway I`m not complaining about the other pink ones that have come back, and am especially pleased with the one or two frilly `black`  parrots` that have popped up.
 My overall  tulip  favourite is  the raspberry ripple/beetroot coloured `triumph` variety (see above)  - like something from an old Dutch master still life.

Tags: tulips, pink, spring, garden,

  Last month, on a trip to visit my son,  I was bowled over by Victorian and Edwardian architecture in South Yarra`s blossom scented streets    A kind of Melbourne`s Notting Hill with hipster overtones (plenty of beards and foodie haunts), South Yarra would be a place I would happily do up (quick not many left) a pretty unmodernised weatherboard villa.

Filigree detailing in an Italianate style decorates the balconies and verandas built to provide shade from hot summer sun.

I haven`t seen so much picket fencing  since  my forays to Long Island in the US.

Simple  door furniture detail

Corrugated iron roof: classic and practical Australian  style

Victorian bench seating at the Botannical Gardens.

Victorian style beach huts at Dendy Street Beach, Brighton.

Tags: Melbourne, simpledetail, spring

Last week while I was feeling the breeze in  Barbados  and reconnecting with  long lost Bajan Cumberbatches  (an extraordinary story of which I will write later ) the garden was busily bursting forth in an explosion of tulip colours.  On the plane home, I was yearning for the Bajan sea colours which are of unspeakable beauty: gazing from the verandah each day at a glassy expanse of  dark blues  on the horizon,  then ultramarine, and in the shallows, luminous turquoise flecked with white froth.  But  after  battling  against the  early morning commuter flow at Clapham Junction and dragging  my  wheelie bag up  and down the hill,  my mood  lifted as soon as I saw the floral  beauty by my very own back door .

NB  I planted the bulbs randomly and so not quite sure what is what, but know that that the varieties include: Lilac Perfection, Violet beauty, Fringed fancy frills,  Lily flowering China Pink, Triumph ( the white and beetroot coloured ones) and blue parrot tulips, from Dejager
Crocus and Rose Cottage .

Tags: spring, tulips, garden, simple, pink,

The week in December that I spent almost double  pushing  several hundred tulips and alliums far into the ground to prevent squirrel digging was all so worth it.  Each morning, coffee in hand, I`m outside inspecting the day`s new blooms.  The tulips are first , and I can almost see them growing as vivid pink and raspberry rippled flower cups unfold in the sun on smooth lime green elegant stems .

Tags: spring, tulips, garden, purecolour, alliums,

The Saturday Olhao market is in itself a wondrous gem. Yet amongst the  makeshift counters and shady awnings it`s the one-offs ,a simple woven  basket of glossy fresh white  eggs  or  a bundle of roughly tied  herbs from the seller`s garden that are the most special, at least, for me. A posy of wild flowers, dunked haphazardly in a  plastic washing up bowl is  everyday, yet artful and intimate,  far from the  supermarket `mixed seasonal  bunch` .  The creators of Olhao`s  market couture tend to be the beady eyed older ladies  whose stock is less plentiful, and bountiful  then some  others, but they sure know how to make a few oranges rock on a bed of shiny green leaves.

Daisies, and snails.

Buy a bundle of bay leaves - so good for flavouring meat and fish stews.

Petite piri piri peppers are packed with fiery energy. Be prepared. NB And are even more dangerous if you  buy them in  jars  dried and crushed.

Tags: Olhao, spring, market,

I still use the Elna  sewing machine my parents gave me for my 21st birthday many moons ago. And now my own daughter is 21,  it feels good to   run up a birthday cushion.  I use remnants of vibrant fuschia pink cotton velvet by Manuel Canovas   left over from a shoot. This should  make a glamorous shot of colour in Gracie`s attic student house bedroom, I think. My skills at embroidery are wanting, but I can do simple running stitch  to make a  personalised label.  And it`s good to know that I`m passing on the sewing bug because her friends have  clubbed together to give her a sewing machine, too.

And as with every birthday in our household there`s chocolate cake . NB  21  Candles were lit  and blown out later.

Tags: home cooking, pink, spring, homesewing,

  Spring nettle soup, home made granola, blazing fires, chairs to fall back and doze in and gorgeous  beds make Ett Hem in Stockholm  a  luxurious home from home.  I am hooked after spending the weekend in this intimate 12 bedroom hotel designed by Ilse Crawford.

   More  design inspiration at  Svenskt Tenn  where I tip toe through  Josef frank`s tulip prints.

 

Rugs the colour of Swedish summer berries and woods by Mart Maas-Fjetterstrom, see below,  in the window of a small shop not far from
Ostermalms food hall.

  Stockholm  foodie highlights:  classic herring plates  and crayfish toasts at   Lisa Elmquist  in Ostermalms  food hall  and the snug  Hip Pocket ( check out the simple patterned  blue tiles ). We are also  elegantly barside  at       Mathias Dahlgren   another  Ilse Crawford project,   where we feast on  modern arrangements of  tartare of fallow deer and salted whitefish roe ; grilled Swedish quid and cucumber, and fried white asparagus and black morels. Delicious.

Try here, below,  for daily bread

I recommend Skansen outdoor museum, with Swedish houses from every period, see 18C summerhouse below.  Disarming to be greeted at the door of the 1930`s house by a woman with shingled hair  boiling very smelly potatoes on the stove and  bemoaning the price of servants. Living history. 

Can`t believe how many kms we`ve covered- at last 15k according to the  distance app. Stockholm is a brilliant city for discovering on foot.  I`m not sure whether the experience would be so comfortable in winter. We have a taste of it with flurries of snow  at  Skogskyrkogarden woodland cemetery. The layout is stunning and contemplative: towering pine trees, grass and simple headstones . See one of the chapels below.

Tags: Sweden, Stockholm, spring, simple, comfort, domestic bliss, colour,

Up with the lark. 4.30am actually. Ring at the door bell. Dog barks loudly and wakes me from dream where a shoot is submerging the house in folds of paper. Stagger downstairs and peer through the knobbly glass door panel. Vague outline of  man in motorbike helmet. Panic. It`s a smash and grab raid?  "Who is it ?". ``Pizza". "Pizza, pizza who? "  I say.  "It`s paid for " he says, and hands over  a box from a thermal bag. "  " It`s 4.30, I didn`t order this, and it`s stone cold"  I say, and stagger upstairs.  Someone has messed up at pizza HQ.

Wish  the  `instant` of nocturnal fast food delivery , could be applied to building work.   One thing leading to another is what building is all about. The  attic bathroom project would have been  done and dusted but for this week`s discovery of a wasps` nest,  parts missing,  and paint colour  mixed with the wrong base. Plus the soggy fallout from the unfortunate incident in  the downstairs bathroom when X and X removed the lavatory as part of the panelling job, and flooded the ceiling below. `You`ll have to get in your plumber` they try.  Hmmmm. "You did say X and X  were competent at removing bathroom fittings" I remind the contractor.  And on, and on  it goes.

Oh well. There`s always the garden. My touchstone of sanity. Spring is at least a  month earlier than last year and we are  soaking up the scents of bluebells and frothy blossom like  parched drinkers.  Best job of the week has been raking  bag of grave  in the relining of  the pathways between the parterre beds.  They look refreshed, almost like clean linen. 

  Unsurprisingly, I`m longing for the weekend. I think that spring lamb will be on the menu for our  Easter feast. This recipe with roasted artichokes and spring greens is  from my book .

Tags: spring, colour, garden, homecooking,

Take a photo of your favourite Pure Style-inspired spring feast.

Tags: competition, spring, recipes for every day, home cooking, simple design

Spring is springing and the first tulips are blasting colour in the garden. The snail and slugs are in retreat and all is well. 

 Party of the year in Battersea Park for Bertie`s sweet 16 walk and birthday tea.  Everyone was there.  Regrets were sent from Khan who was  sad because the vet  said he must rest his leg. He sent love. The weather  was perfect. There was  much frolicking and ball playing. For the most part the guests behaved impeccably, apart from Rosie who  slurped melting ice  from the champagne bucket and Lola the black pug who ate too much birthday cake and delivered it back on the rug. The party boy managed to stay the course and tottered home  happily across the grass as the sun dipped beneath the great  chimneys of Battersea Power Station .

Much to be inspired by in the coming season of blossom and light evenings.  I have my eyes on Gallery   Libby sellers  for  eye provoking  design in a  curated environment;  Ben  and Winifred Nicholson`s very domestic take on early  20C art and life at  Kettles Yard ;  creamy Welsh goats`  cheese logs  from Mootown sold at Sunday market in Herne Hill; and my first bath in the new attic bathroom which will be opened for shoots as soon as the last lick of paint has dried.

Here are pictures of the latest blasts of colour in my  garden, shot this morning soon after the fairy mist had lifted and the sun  had broken through.

Tags: tulips, spring, colour, garden,

This is a  brief  Pure Style update as  much sorting and clearing for  new bathroom in the attic. And I`ve been weed bashing  outside for many a happy hour in the soft bird twittering spring air. 

Colour combination of the  week is a bedside  gorgeous pink rose left over from shoot in a turquoise coffee cup.
 And look, more fabulous  pink in a floaty wrap around dream skirt made for me from birthday present fabric by Tessa Brown.

Daughter, Georgie is taking over the kitchen in a very pleasing way with  delicacies like this Paul Young sea salt chocolate and pecan tart. A comforting slice or two much needed after car break down on the M3 and subsequent lightening of purse .

Tags: Pink, spring, home cooking, chocolate

Daughter can`t get to job and  assistant stuck on bus for two hours. Poor show, striking Tube people and your big brother  boss B.Crow last seen sunning hairy belly on Rio Beach.  But this, and ongoing flood/mud/rain/wind/gloom story  brightened by lone survivor of my  roses, a brilliant John Clare bloom. Also, cheering thoughts of  the  toasted pistachio gorgonzola tagliatelle taste sensation at Zucca a few weeks ago and, look here, chocolate brownies baked by middle daughter for her younger sister`s` birthday tomorrow.  (From Felicity Cloak`s Perfect, and they do taste, just that).

  Inspired by a yellow  Habitat chair on a shoot a couple of months ago , I  thought you`d like to see my  paint update on a chipped and worn chair in my office.    Off I  go  to the paint shop to see if I  can recreate the same  lime green/acid yellow colour  that reminds me of  all things springlike  e.g see  the   angelica flower head I  shot in an Algarve meadow last year. I pick `Tarragon Glory` from Dulux  and it works well. I cheated and bought quick drying emulsion  which, of course won`t wear as well as an oil based eggshell, but I do rather prefer matt painted finishes all round.

Tags: roses, , winter, paint, spring, yellow , home cooking

My garden has moods and textures that change with the time of day, the quality of light, and whatever the  elements are supplying.
  
On a late afternoon in May the garden is a visual intoxication of light and shade: low long beams  track the brilliance of the tulips, the green gloss finish of the grass, and the bees that dangle and dodge on the highways of rays.

Like a sleek well fed cat sprawling  in the sun, the garden seems to exude a kind of contentment which washes over me as I weed, plant or sit by the shed thinking  about nothing in particular.

Late afternoon  tulips in the sunshine curl and unfurl  in a siesta of translucent languorous petals.

The alliums shimmer and fizz in purple brilliance,  edible  pompoms for feasting bees

I want to eat it up, the deliciousness of the garden;  it primes the appetite for taste and smell for the visual and the sensual.  This is the time of day to sit under the blossom of the apple tree in the dappled shade and  eat meringues, cream and raspberries.

NB the wallflowers - especially the lipstick pink ones, see below - are spectacular this spring!

  Garden Mood 11
 On the other hand, or perhaps I should say something more garden-like like spade, or trowel,  the dullest no-show-of -sun-day, gives the garden  a rather wonderful saturated matt quality, like a fabric or a Hockney landscape.  And all  the  colours  and textures of leaves and petals seem to advance and intensify  against the grey canvas of sky,  see pictures  below

 

  Beetroot ripples and stripes of  a `Triumph` tulip,  below

Silvery green grey Globe artichoke foliage is on my  list to become a Pure Style paint colour

  Over the last day or so  my moveable feast of a garden is more a green and purple scene  of alliums, nodding and swaying in the breeze as the remaining tulips wither and shrivel .

A grey day, but  the rich colour  of Mr Campbell`s bluebells almost sings in contrast.

NB Mr Cambell`s bluebells are the descendants of those that were  flowering  here in the garden when  the previous owners Bernard, and his parents did all the things that people did  before technology, like taking  afternoon tea in the shed,  or sitting  in deckchairs in  Flannels waiting for Cook to ring the bell for luncheon.

Tags: Pink, garden, spring, colour

Sunday morning market in Estoi a few miles inland from Olhao.  It`s hot by 11,  I need my hat (a pleasant need it is too)  and the breeze carries a richly textured  smell of churros frying, horse dung and spring flowers, from the sprawling market site on the edge of the village. Everyone is here: gypsies in black waistcoats with black flat caps and thick beards; farmers from little fincas dotted about the countryside; children; dogs; lovers; groups of men in hunt of jamon and beer from one of the many food stands.

In contrast to the  piles of bright kitchen plastics , ribbons and trimmings, and rails of trashy print dresses, the salt cod bachlau and garlic stall is a sea of cool whites and is the one I  head for first of all.  Slabs of creamy fish and bundles of papery white garlic bulbs streaked with purple, are  assessed by customers who will later cook up a rich fish stew with these staples of the Portuguese kitchen.  I like to slice raw salt cod very thinly (after rigorous soaking to get rid of the salt) and serve with thin slices of orange for a simple tapa.

 

Tags: Olhao, spring, garlic, market

Took these pictures a week ago, and didn`t want to leave it too long before I uploaded to show you all how exuberant  the tulip show has been this year. The combination of cold and rain this winter seems to have encouraged particularly lush grown in all areas of the spring garden: the bluebells are bluer and the forget -me- nots  more  luminous and  pale blue porcelain-like than ever.

I had  moments of heart in mouth when a shoot came and the child models used the tulip patch as a football pitch. Only lost three specimens  (see salvaged Match Point tulip example above) but it`s an  aspects of house hiring  that brings out the rant in me. 

  There`s the excitement of the apple tree coming into blossom at least a month late, but oh so worth it for the froth of white and pink petals which may be  a harbinger of plump golden apples if frost stays away. 

Writing now from Olhao where the final whitewashing, brushing up and dusting down of the house is in progress. Really pleased with a junk bench  stained in glum brown varnish  that after  sanding and painting white  reveals its  good looks. That`s the fun of  tracking down old junk  of trying to visualise its potential. Heading home tomorrow  and hoping that  weeds and snails have not taken over.

Tags: spring, tulips, flowerpower, pink, colour

The Japanese arrive as  the cherry blossom froths in next door`s garden.  It`s a shoot for   Mrs Magazine    Japan`s oldest womens` publication.  I am Mrs Pure Style cooking with herbs from the garden and sharing my recipe tips with the enviably porcelain smooth face of Mrs Magazine, actress and singer,  Miki  Imai.
Some things are  lost in translation, but  east and west  over tea and  lavender shortbread have a mutual feeling for the simple and beautiful.  Photographer  Okemi Kurosaka neat and  efficient as her glossy black fringe snaps until the shadows are long and we have picked  the bones clean from very English spring lamb cutlets with rosemary and garlic.

  Chive pesto also goes down well on my Japanese date: chop a handful of chives  and process  in the hand whizzer  with pine nuts, garlic,  olive oil,  grated Parmesan , salt and pepper.

Loading up Richard`s  van for delivery to Olhao. I have my first holiday  tenants soon, and want them to enjoy crisp  sheets and soft pillows, floaty cotton  awnings, and lanterns.  Seems mad to to be sending mats, chairs, folding beer tables  two thousand miles south when you think  items as prosaic as these might  be found locally. They can... and they can`t if you`re picky, like me and get get stuck  on wanting  what feels/looks right  not what is  simply available.  Fussy yes, but  would you want stacking plastic loungers  at Pure Style Portugal? .

Not so much flat calm, but rippling : wavy black and white  linen/cotton for another take on the stripe theme

Together with   the  unfurling of the garden`s first tulip, I receive  green fingered excitement  from  the forthcoming Chelsea Fringe  alternative garden festival.  Masses of events: sign me up for  a walk on London`soldest nature trail at the Horniman museum and the drawing and sketching classes on Hampstead Heath.

Lunch break. A gorgeous painterly arrangement of salads and salmon by location caterer,  Laurence  Mash has just landed on my desk. The crew downstairs is enjoying the tastiest and most  visually appealing  shoot grub that has appeared in my kitchen for a very long time.

Tags: spring, homecooking, tulips. Japan. location shoots

Clumps of grass between the cobbles and pantiles sprouting wild flowers show  winter  in Olhao was as extreme in rainfall as in the chill we endured here.  So releasing to peel off  wool layers and sun bathe under  blue sky spring busy with  swallows, tweeting sparrows  and swooping  nets of silvery homing pigeons . We trundle to the market and load the  Rolly Rolser with armfuls of wild flowers, eggs, asparagus and oranges.

So good to eat with  sun on the  face sea in the air. This demands something celebratory like buying a net of amejoias boa  for  clam and tomato pasta.  I shower and soak the shells in the sink, picking out any  broken ones.  They feel smooth and cool, with a promising weightiness like solid chocolate eggs.

I chop tomatoes, garlic and fry until soft. Some pepper, dregs of white wine from last night, and then the sauce is ready for the clams. Steam under  the saucepan lid, shake frequently and after seven minutes or so the clams  open like buds in a speeded up film to reveal  tender flesh and juices with a  fragrant shellfish taste 

We spoon clams and sauce over bowls piled with tagliatelle, although spaghetti or any other long type will be right.  This is an athletic dish: twirling  strands of dripping pasta around one`s fork, sucking the last bits from the  shells.  It takes me back to being 18 and the spaghetti vongoles of my first Italian summer.

Tags: Olhao, spring, market, homecooking,

The wind continues to cut like iced knives, but at least there`s some green shooting going on in my shed. These are the sweet pea seeds  I planted last autumn, and I`ve been pinching out the top leaves so that side shoots are encouraged to grow. Look at them stretching towards   the light.

Good Friday.  I make hot cross buns from the recipe in my book. My version only requires one proving of the dough which means they`re heavier than buns made with two.  But less fuss to make, and  delicious  toasted and spread with butter.  The mighty mxing bowl, my favourite , is part of an order  to replenish stocks of house kit that has worn out or gone too far gone to repair. The last bowl met a shattering end on the kitchen floor.

A clump of self seeded violets  in my vegetable patch is  visual treasure. The flowers are edible, too.

New  white towels, are almost as exciting.

A  friend back from Fogo  has saved my toes from  more destruction by chilbain with a gift of  slippers  handknitted by islanders

Hoping that this won`t be the last of the rhubarb!

Tags: spring, natural fabrics, homecooking, garden,

 It`s all  bare branched silhouettes  against grey and being  stung by wind chilled with the remnants of Arctic  icebergs.
Where are the  greening buds and bursts of blossom? 

If spring is on hold outside,  at least  I can feast my colour starved eyes on what`s inside.   Egg yolk yellow  Bennsion linen  and  pink rhubarb stalks  are a mood enhancing  combination,  visual  SSSRI.  I  spread a length of the cloth across the table for a  lunch of  roast lamb and the  rhubarb baked and fragrant,  topped with crumble. 

 Who isn`t fantasising about  the feel of  spring  grass under  bare feet?  The  seasonal upset  is  confused more so  by my  client Country living who is shooting all things autumnal and mellow fruitful  at my location house.  Good to see  that they use the  Quince border , see below.

If the  tulips in the garden are all but a few  tentative leaves,  it`s good to find buckets with tight pink and purple buds at
Brixton  market.

 Sending out more samples  of  my Colour Band  borders : wrap,  stick, label, and pack. Good to keep moving  in this  draughty old house. Am most reliant on    hand cream and  bedsocks at  night.   The cat , of course, has got it sussed  stretched like a chocolate coloured  draught  excluder  across the  radiator
 Warm  enough places  to discard  my top layers  are the cinema  ( Side Effects, a gripping thriller and Arbitrage   cyncial, grim, ) the sauna,  and my father`s nursing home where for once the airless fug seems  bearable.
.

The potted hyacinths  are visions of the spring pinks that I hope are closer to emerging from  their  earthy beds  for next week will be April and the park gates close at 7pm.

Tags: spring, scent, flowers

The psychoblurb where blue equals down, miserable.... blah blah blah is daft, really. When I get the blues,  it all feels rather ragged London pigeon grey. Rippling cobalt blue sea or a  first day of spring blue  sky can only help to lift my mood.   So pleased to see on the  Style Court   blog  that although the Pantone  colour of the year is Emerald green, there`s much to get excited about blue, too. How about the new blue and white ceramics exhibition at the Boston Museum of Fine Art,  the cobalt blue cover of the new Anthroplogie spring collecton  or  Cornflower  one of my new Colour Band borders - see above ?

 More highs:  his little pot of grape hyacinths is just as I found it at the local flower shop perfectly co-ordinated with blue plastic pot  for 1.50 and, so far, 10 days of indoor Spring beauty.

  Cobalt blues on old Portuguese tiles,  a street feature in Olhao  as everyday as grilled sardines .

Funny, isn`t it  that this gorgeous sludgy blue in my sitting room is called Parma Gray?   At night it feels snug, along with the heat from the new Morso  woodburner.  (Yes, yes, yes, pluck me from the  Periodic Table of the  Middle Class Handbook ).  During the  day this colour is serene, all very period Dutch domestic interior, like being in a scene from the Girl with the Pearl Earring.  Nothing depressing about that.

Tags: colour, spring, blue, paint, bulbs, colour band

  Digging and musing,  I think about a man I know and his mid life delusion: leaving home for an  ex-council bedsit,  smoking, the Affair.  They say that  clinging to the death throes of youth is a temporary fix - like Botox.  What if the  energy could be channeled into something really productive .......like gardening?   Clubs  even where you can ` Dig for  a new lease of life`  Nurturing a pumpkin patch  could be so much more rewarding than  lusting over Janet in Accounts.  And  pumpkins make good soup. I stab the bramble roots  at the thought of the colossal parking fine I paid after yesterday`s visit from the bailiffs. How so I didn`t see the previous warning letters?   It`s not unusual for  stylists on shoots to help themselves to my stuff for props in a shoot  scene. Parking tickets lost in a Day in the life of  British Gas or Moshi Monsters Christmas. Or is it just a case of me throwing  them in the bin by mistake?
 Fresh air, light, space. ... suburbia is the place to be.  Screened-out I can tour the  last  rose buds, pick a green tomato, (see above)  and fennel (see below) for fish, or   check  on the sweet pea seedlings in the shed to revive me.   How I used to pace from room to room in our last flat high above the City where one fragile weed on the roof top opposite  was the only spot of green. It`s only a bus and a tube ride away from the bright lights.  Recent highlights: more al fresco swimming at the Oasis in Covent Garden followed by clams and razor clams  at Barrafina as fresh and garlicky as they could be outside of  an Andalucian beach bar; Tim Wright`s figurative paintings  in Shoreditch  and  last night`s treat  a groovy basement bar The Social with  readings   by Faber Man Booker  authors, Adam Foulds, Deborah Levy and Sarah Hall .  



Wouldn`t it be fun to create paint colours for each season.  Autumn  references of  golden yellow, ,orange, earth brown  are here, leaf confetti at my feet.  And all in a morning`s dog walking across the dew grass in Brockwell Park.  

Tags: colour, flower power, garden, scent, Simple, spring, white rooms

  I can`t stop clicking away at my tulip beauties.  At least this is a wholesome  no-strings infatuation . Nip outside. A break in the Tulse hill monsoon.  It feels heavy, cool. Grey, a monotone sort of day. But the tulips are swaying and fluttering like floral clubbers in a riot of pinks, whites, and purples. I crouch at their level, and aim at my favourites: beetroot and raspberry rippled `Triumph` and `Rems`  look almost good enough to eat. Keep the camera steady- with  right elbow resting on my leg.  It`s good to be down here at bee level and close enough to count the beads of rain drops  on waxy  curled and feathered  petal cups.  Some of the  white Parrots are  flopping,  on the road to petal decay and an even  more langorous laid back beauty. It`s May and, bother, way past my season for thick black wool tights. Something must be done because I`m a bare legged sort - and like the feel of sun and air on skin.  But maybe I`m going to have to wait a little longer until the barometer rises and  the rains of  the  ` wettest drought ` subside. There was everything from fuzzy  black and white film of  prim couples dancing at the festival of  Britain in 1952  to  the first Habitat catalogue,  and spriggy Laura Ashley wallpaper  at the  V&A`s British Design 1948-2012. (Where was the iconic Ercol windsor chair or Robert Welch`s cutlery? ) This was an inspiring and informative show.  ` Ooh I`ve never heard of him ` before exclaimed the  young architectural student behind who was  admiring carpet designs from the legendary Sixties` interior  decorator  David Hicks.  







 



 

Tags: flower power, spring

  I know there were  head shots two or three posts ago,  but can`t  resist showing you more frilly  and voluptuous tulips from the  garden . They give me the kind of visual and visceral  pleasure  I was yearning for after the clinical,  blokeish  spots, pickled animals, and pharmacy displays at the Damien Hirst show, Tate Modern.  It`s funny to think that  Hirst`s  £50million diamond  skull and £30,500 plastic version in the gift shop are as hyper inflated, as the humble tulip was  during  the period of Tulip Fever in Holland.  One  `Semper Augustus` bulb could be exchanged for several acres of land  until  1637 when the bubble burst and prices plummeted.   Art,  bulbs, anything,  can be engendered with hyped up value when rich and gullible go together.    







    Now for the technical stuff.  I  spotted a mistake in  the Hot Cross bun recipe  in my book.   It should not be  1  tablespoon  milk,  but  170 ml tepid milk. Sometimes we just miss these typos.   And , like the red faced  filler of the over flowing  bath at home last week (a mini  Niagara descended upon the room below)  I offer my apology.. Here`s the recipe: 450 g plain flour 55g caster sugar pinch mixed spice l and half tsp dried yeast 75g raisins 55 g candied peel 1 egg 170ml tepid milk 55g unsalted butter melted for the cross 80g plain flour 2 tbsp caster sugar 100ml water for the glaze 2 tbsp soft brown sugar 2 tbsp milk l tbsp marmalade Sift the flour into a bowl and add the sugar, mixed spice, dried yeast, raisins, candied peel and grated orange rind. Beat the egg with the milk and add the melted butter. Tip the mixture into the flour and stir. Turn out and knead on a floured surface for 5 minutes. Divide into 12 buns and  place on floured baking sheets. Cover with a damp tea towel. Leave in a warm place for about 90 minutes until almost doubled in size. To make the cross: Mix the flour, sugar and water until smooth. Put the mixture in a piping bag and pipe a cross on each bun. Place in a preheated oven , 180C for 20 minutes. Cool on a wire rack. To make the glaze: Simmer the sugar, milk and marmalade in a pan for a few minutes until syrupy, stirring all the time. Sieve the syrup to remove any pieces of orange rind and  pour  over the cooked buns.    



    Mixing everything in, above,   and,  below, risen dough buns decorated with crosses    



    Hot cross buns for tea - doesn`t have to be Easter to make them. I split them in half and eat  toasted with butter and jam.    

Tags: flower power, home cooking, spring

  So much  texture and nature to devour and fill the senses with, here in the Lake District.  I can  happily spend the whole day investigating lichen the way it is spattered across rocks, trees, and walls, like organic and earthy paint palettes. My son wants to take me up Hellvelyn.  Sounds good. I need some leg stretching.  How long will it take, envisaging a couple of hours hard walking?  Looking back I suppose I didn`t process the reply.  



  I pack the camera in my rucksack hoping for some more lichen moments and yell a breezy goodbye .  There are eight of us in assorted jackets and  hiking boots. Who`s got the whistle and compass, the water proof trousers? I`m looking forward to this - getting out in the fresh air.  Replaying it  from the comfort of my pillow I feel quite nauseous to think  I had considered  my Spanish riding boots - with the slippery soles. When we pile out of the cars at  Glenridding  I ask where we`re heading and am pointed in the direction of  distant  snow laced  peaks. The penny drops. My stomach does a vigorous revolution . How am I going to get up THERE? The first  vertical ten minutes up a winding track are excruciating. Will I simply pass out and die, here- at the beginning?   `You all right mum?`  `Yes, fine I just need a couple of biscuits and a defibrillator.`  By the time we`re up on  Birkhouse Moor which is relatively flat, by hill standards, the summit disappears in an assault of  angry cloud hail and sleet. We take shelter behind a wall  and I`m not the only one who`s probably hoping that it will get so bad we`ll have to turn back. But no, it`s clearing and the sun`s coming out. Already reeling at the thought that this is a seven hour-all-in excursion, I`m not prepared for the next bit of news. That knife edge ridge with the  plummeting sides, looks hairy.  Glad we`re not going in that direction. ` Mum thats Striding Edge and  the way to the top`. I lose all sense of time, climbing and clinging to the rocky and sometimes snowy  ridge which falls away to  sheer  slopes hundreds of metres below. Panic, vertigo ,quivering  hands and legs have to be supressed.  Or.......    What am I doing here?  "Living in the moment Mum,  look at the view, this is amazing`  `When will we get to the top`? I  whine parent child  roles reversed.  I can`t look anywhere but the rock face. To cut a long and dry mouthed story short-  we all  make it to the summit - all 950 metres (3,117 ft) above sea level,  and  the third highest peak in England.   The prizes: a sense of acheivement, elation, wonder at being out in a wild and beautiful environment and,  very Pure Style , jamon and rocket sandwiches.  PS the descent at Swirral Edge is not particularly pleasant either,  but afterwards it`s  a walk in the park all  the long and windy knee- assaulting way to the bottom. Very large glasses of chardonnay finally still my shaky legs. If you want to put life into perspective - have a go at Hellvelyn  

Tags: holiday, spring

We have fled  the urban beat to Wordsworthian daffs, wide skies and contours of the lake district.  A buffeting wind and skylarks twittering above the bleak brown fells are mental liberation . We walk the limestone `pavements` , strange grey layers of rock gratin  ( `O` level  geog`  textbook  stuff) and trace the course of glassy streams, low for this time of  year. Marked by classic drystone walls  ,and decorated with lichen and moss the texture of soft buns, fields of spring onion green roll up and down, over and over.  Ewes and lambs are the only crowds here.  Bleating and baaing as sheep do.



  The Easter Egg hunt is a mad dash by adults and under fifteens alike. Even the dog spots a shiny foil wrapped egg and gulps it down in one.  



  So good to spend long hours with book: Jeanette Winterson`s Why be happy when you could be normal ? and Julian Barnes` A sense of an Ending keep me engrossed by the fire .  



  I`m happy that  bank holiday Monday is sodden  because it means a trip to  Blackwell  by Lake Windermere . This An  Arts and crafts feast, especially the tiled fireplaces .

Tags: holiday, spring

 



  Raspberry ripple, ice cream and raddichio leaves, that`s what my  fuschia pink and white  streaked  `Triumph` tulip petals look  like.   And how that pink would look so good as lipstick - Talking of which , I`m aiming for the gorgeous violet blue  Lancome shade that might just usurp the old faithful Barry M  colour 52.  I will let you know.  



  Post dog walk I  couldn`t resist  two pots of muscari -  grape hyacinths  , another  floral thing that looks like something else. With their lime green leaves and blue blue  bobbly flowers a crowd of these little bulbs so sum up spring.  



  Don`t you just love the look of white eggs ? I don`t hunt them out especially but when I do have a box or two (these are ducks`) its pleasing to put them in a dish on the table-  a simple study in edible and  natural decoration.  



  Nameless kitten latterly known as Chanel, is now plain Coco.   It sounds like  chocolate  and after all she does look like  a rather deliciously dressed  truffle .  

Tags: flower power, spring

 



  Mopping up a trail of the teenager`s  false tan splodges (the new floors really are tough) is my friday night  treat, this,  and finally  putting the house back together again after it`s  paint and brush up. There`s  time to post these shots from my short break to Olhao  a couple of weeks ago. Spring is springing here on the Algarve.  The fizz of candy floss almond blossom, flapping storks and grilled sardine smells are my kind of exotica.  The house is stone cold but a small discomfort  when you can  step out first thing into the street all sunny and blue. My thoughts are ferry and beach  and this is where we head  to sprawl on the sand and,  even swim.  I skip like a child in the shallows. It is bliss, like an icy  rinsing and sloughing-off of winter.  



  We eat one of our   typical Olhao beach picnics: crusty buns  filled with chicken and coriander. Handfuls of dried figs and almonds are also perfect picnic finger food.  



  Waiting by the pier for the ferry home I watch seagulls bob around looking for an opportunity,  and fisherman swill out their boats and grease engines. Their  ropes and nets are organised in artful heaps.  Old ways can  survive in the  age of plastic.  



  The Saturday market   is also a  stylist`s dream,  so vibrant and rich in its everydayness.  See below bunches of herbs tied with string, bundles of wild asparagus,  clementines, and thick wedges of pumpkin laid out like a Melendez still life.  This bustling outdoor visual and edible feast is so much a  part of  Olhao`s heart and soul.  



















   

Tags: flower power, holiday, Olhao, Simple, spring

  The best thing about Valentine`s Day is Rachmaninov`s Piano Concerto No 2 on Radio 4. I almost fly the A303 in fifth gear to the same crashing bars and waves of musical emotion that  speak the stifled passions of Celia Johnson`s and Trevor Howard`s lovers in Brief Encounter. Back in town,  there`s more romance with couples holding hands and cellophane wrapped roses.  



  I can`t ignore the scuff marks on the walls and  the wet dog paw  effect which make the white floors  look  pallid and under the weather.  Everything is in need of a lick of white paint and a  good spring clean.  So decorators Bob and Keith have set up camp  with paint pots, wads of sandpaper, ghetto blaster, and saucer of used teabags.  I am on my knees, housemaid-style,  scrubbing the kitchen floor to get it prepared for  coats of white floor paint. Everyone`s saying, "Mum, how can you have white floors in the kitchen (we have plain oak boards) they`ll get dirty ?  "We have them everywhere  else" I retort and think, but don`t say (Idov quite a lot of this) that  apart from Lina on Saturdays  I am the only one to have a one to one with the floor mop.  



  Ten degrees warmer than  last weekend.  It feels like summer in comparison and so I have a little wander in the garden.  The wallflowers, globe artichoke and  agapanthus  lie in limp and soggy  frost damaged clumps.  But alliums, tulips  and blue bells shoots are pushing through and the fennel`s delicate fronds have proved to be astonishingly hardy.  



It`s mild enough and motivating enough to unwrap the  willow sticks with which  I  will  make twiggy wigwams to support the beans. PS  My 13 year old godson and I laugh at the slapstick in Comedy of Errors at the Olivier.

Tags: colour, get crafty, Simple, spring

  Suffused in pools of light and shade this May afternoon the garden seems to take on an air of secrecy and serenity. It is my place of shelter and repose from the roaring traffic and sirens on the South Circular, just two streets away. I turn on the hose and give everything a good drink (drought conditions continue, and gardeners are being asked to create mud pools so the house martins and swifts can build their clay like nests). The arc of water plays like a silver stream over the last tulips, rosemary, alliums and clumps of purple chives. It leads my thoughts to a piece I have read about Islamic gardens, and how we owe a huge debt in the West to the Muslim ideal of paradise. This is encapsulated in the design of the Persian `chahar bah . This enclosed garden has a central fountain which flows into water rills which represent the four rivers of Paradise. Famous examples include the Taj Mahal garden in India and the Court of the Lions in the Alhambra, Granada. In his book` Gardens, An Essay on the Human Condition`- the academic Robert Pogue Harrison argues that it also provides a key to understanding Islam in the modern world. He suggests that where paradise is imagined as a garden of perfect tranquility our incurable Western agitation takes on a diabolical quality. It would be wonderful to have world peace and understanding through gardening.  



   



  On a personal level, working in my garden takes me away from just about every mental annoyance that happens to be swirling around. I enter a calm non judging head space when having to concentrate on the delicate and precise task of lifting fragile radish and bean seedlings into position for the next stage of development. My senses are energised: bad or dull feelings float away with the smells of damp earth as the hose plays across the beds, and I feel more in touch with the elements as my legs are lightly tickled by lavender that has spilled voluputously over the brick path.  



  The Constance Sprys, are in themselves a vision of petally paradise, tumbling luscious pink blooms over on both garden fences. Not only visual balm, but with a scent that is so light and sweetly fragrant that I feel I want to drink it .  



  Then there are the equally fabulous frilled and frothy pink peonies, (below) the ones I lifted and divided from my childhood suburban garden after my mum died. It is reassuring that she lives on, in a way, through this yearly renewal in the garden.  



  I`m always coming up with ideas for Pure Style this and that - one dream is a heavenly little hotel with a walled garden and bright white bedrooms. If there was to be a Pure Style scent, of course `rose` would get a first look in, but I have to say that if anyone could help me bottle the delicate vanilla fragrance of my wallflowers this spring( see below) I am sure we could be on to a winner, too.



   

Tags: colour, flower power, garden, scent, Simple, spring, white rooms

I wake  early with the encouraging limpid blue of an English Spring  sky.  Since  I`ve been away in Olhao  the apple tree has blossomed in a candy floss of  fluffy  pale pink petals.  



  The morning  sun warms the  worn red  brick paving  tiles and spills across the newly opened array of tulips. I can`t remember planting quite so many gorgeous varieties.  (Not that surprising  because when I did so, the garden was coated in a thick white icy coat of snow and it was all I could do to force the bulbs randomly into snow rimmed earth holes before it all became too cold and unpleasant and I had to scurry inside, toes and fingers numb.)  It is so exciting to watch this blast of petally colour unfold.  



See above  from left to right:  Spring Green;  Black Parrot ( a straggler  from  bulbs  that I planted three years ago ); Lilac Perfection.  



The purple and white striped `Triumph` tulip reminds me of the purple and white colourings of red onions; it has to be the most stylish  of my tulip flock.



  Hardly have the bags been unpacked and the weeds attended to,  then our spring jaunt continues with a large family  get together in Suffolk. By now the air feels midsummer balmy and the weather people are in high excitement  about the early heatwave that is hitting northern Europe. Whilst  I am ambling along dewy lanes,  alive with cuckoo song , lilac,  and wild asparagus (see above), a subdued  text from our tenant in Olhao describes great winds and rains  and a request for wet day  activities  in the area.  Wow, we had a narrow climatic escape.  



We visit Walberswick, rather like an  English east coat version of  the Hamptons, on Long Island,  all beautiful picturebook, wisteria-clad houses and cottages with immaculate picket fences. There is a village  green with swings, well behaved  children and a horizon with simple beach huts. We crunch along the pebbly beach and some  of the party, plus the dog, embrace the unseasonal warmth and swim. Of course, the sea is still winter cold and we drive home with the heater full on to keep hypothermia at bay. I negociate a detour to Wootton`s  nursery which has everything from agapanthus to old fashioned cottage garden plants, and the most amazing selection of auriculas (see above) all massed together in a light white greenhouse.  I come away with a box of cat mint and  lavender for the potager beds,  blue geraniums for  ground cover,  and an exquisite lemon secented old perlagonium  called  Mabel Grey which  I shall keep in a pot to sit  on my desk through the winter.  



Sufffolk (and going over into Norfolk) is also very blissful with its  wide flat watermeadows  around  Harleston and Beccles,  where cows swish their tails in the shade of  ancient  willows and the river Waveney is cool and meandering. We  bike past hawthorn hedges frothing with white blossom and look over to into fields where  hares leap across the furrows.  The county`s vast field aspect can be overwhelming, as are the electric  yellow swathes of rapeseed.  Sometimes I catch the whiff of a  more industrial and stinky smell than anything with more rural connections.  There are clues in the  anonymous green lorries thundering past gnarled  greening  oaks to what is probably  hidden away landfill. We eat well on Suffolk honey, the new season`s asparagus,  cod landed at  Lowestoft and rhubarb for pudding.  The  Ship inn at Dunwich  serves the best fish and chips  of the week, and is also a only a few minutes walk to the beach , where it is said  that  divers can  hear  the ghostly clang of    church bells that succumbed to the sea.



Arriving back in London through steamy streets where the thermometer is hitting 27C,  I am almost bowled over by the riot of colour  (see above and below)  that that has taken over the garden.  All  the tulips are now full and voluptuous on leggy stems.  I watch their cups open up lazily  in the sunshine and   close  in the shade as as if  to keep warm.  



  New this year to my bulb order  are   `Silver ` parrot tulips (see below right)  which when they first came out weren`t in the least bit silver, more  bright raspberry ripple.  Now that they`ve matured, the pink has faded a little and is rather fabulous.  



 

Tags: colour, flower power, garden, holiday, scent, Simple, spring

  I wake to the mass twittering of sparrows and a distant bell. The  air is sea salty, the breeze warm and the sky is bright morning blue.  Olhao.  We’re here again for the spring holiday with a case full of books for revision and fabric to make cushions for summer. Breakfast is toast with  soft springy sourdough-like bread which they slice for you from the café on the corner. I have a jar of orange flower honey from which I spread a thick coating onto a slice  along with curls of  butter. We eat outside in the quintal and  squint at  the sun which is glowing with promise for the day ahead. Oranges are so good and fresh here; so much sweeter and  more intensely orange flavoured because they`re not long picked from a tree. We squeeze juice with the 13 euro  juicer - a definite qualifier for what I think is a `best buy`- and pour it into  small glass tumblers. So much more of an enjoyable experience than opening up a carton.  



  I throw  black jeans,  sweater and thick  socks to  the back of the wardrobe and  feeling expectant for a first of the season session at the beach pull out last summer`s  floaty cotton dress,  sandals in which to brave winter feet,  and straw hat.  I’ve been through quite a few hats here, one or two have blown into the sea whilst on a boat of some sort; one was washed away by a rogue wave, and another  met its end with an uncontrolled puppy. The fading terracottas,  yellows, and  greens  of Olhao’s crumbling façades  are balm to my tired city eyes. Most luminous are  the  pale cobalt blue  lime washed walls that give the buildings a mediterranean  seaside flavour. My friend Piers mixes blue pigment with white cal (lime) to create this timeless effect.  



  At the Saturday  market the senses are hit with the aromatic smell of mint and the fragant  childhood  summer smell of strawberries. Wrinkled men with flat caps look after stalls  groaning with oranges, pumpkins, broad beans, and peas. Cages with live rabbits and uncomfortable looking hens are clustered by the sea wall.  I  want to take to take it all home, all of this colour, and sensation. We settle for  eggs, a bag of plump  peas shelled by the vendor, a bunch of  radishes with pink roots slashed rather stylishly with white,  more sweet oranges  and a kg of plump and richly coloured  strawberries for the picnic.

Tags: colour, holiday, home cooking, Olhao, scent, spring

The garden is growing growing growing. The warmth and sun of the past week has kick started the spring juices and the little beds in the parterre/potager are greening and filling out fast. The tulips that started as a flop of leaves have developed slender stems with tight buds. The first to flower is the variety Lilac Perfection (see above) in fabulous bowls of fuschia pink petals.



This natural beauty in my backyard is a kind of antidote to all that’s commercial and mass market: ads that make us want more even though we don’t need whatever is being pushed, or the TV mush of American teen soaps and celebrity dining shows. This, and my desire to live more simply and without so much fuss is also where I am at with my Pure Style philosophy. I think I must be on the right track when I read that my design hero Terence Conran has a buff label on his desk with the words ‘Plain, simple, useful` and says that we should apply this attitude to everything we own and use. I am also a fan of John Lane’s Timeless Simplicity - in which he explains how to live more creatively in a consumer society.



It quite a revelation, to see that it’s not the first time there has been a reaction to the consumerism in society. Go and see the V&A`s exhibition Escape into Style, `The cult of beauty: The aesthetic movement 1860-1900’ which is about the late nineteenth century revolt against Victorian industrialism by artists and architects who wished to create a new ideal of beauty in wallpaper, painting, architecture, textiles and poetry. NB: Although it`s really all about middle class family angst - and a rather too close to home portrait of it too, I recommend the film, Archipelago, to see some truly mesmerising visuals of the natural beauty on the wild and windswept island of Tresco in the Isles of Scilly.

Tags: books, colour, flower power, garden, Simple, spring

The new greens are in season. Whatever else might be thwarting my daily progress, young bean green shoots and fresh bright spring green grass are reassuringly sprouting and budding outside the kitchen window. I can’t resist bunches of  ‘muscari ‘ grape hyacinths (see above) delicate blue flowers on equally delicate lime green stems. They are packed fresh from the fields in a box propped up outside the florist with the logo, Cornish flowers on its base. At £1.25 a bunch I am surprised that by lunchtime the sales woman says that I am the first to buy some of these vibrant and colourful pieces of spring.



With its potent link to nature, green is one of my favourite colours to have about the home. (Have a look at the exciting greens for faux suede by Designers Guild). Its presence as a decoration tool can be as minimal, as a flash of a lime green painted flower pot to brighten up the bedroom, or as all encompassing, as our lime green painted loo. The latter idea is a very good way for me to incorporate a rich green colour in a house that needs to make its living being painted white almost all over!  And I have also managed to make way for some muted greens in the tv room and garden shed as the shoots are very keen to use them for backdrops to simple and natural still lives. As soon as there’s a day with the faint burn of spring sunshine my thoughts turn to picnics. I like to head for that south facing spot on the tussocky slopes that frame our walks along the Somerset valley on visits to my father. Feta cheese, basil and cucumber is one of our favourite fillings in hunks of sourdough bread that come freshly baked via our local corner shop.

Tags: colour, flower power, garden, home cooking, interiors, Simple, spring, thrifty decoration, white rooms

The kitchen needs an update. Not only is the paint peeling off the drawers, but one of the white cupboard doors refuses to shut, the sink blocks and the cooker is ailing and working at half speed. Then there’s the location element to think about. I’ve been told that I will get more kitchen shoots if I have an ‘integrated ‘ dishwasher (the dishwasher door is faced in a panel to match the other fitted door fronts). You see it’s not very ‘lifestyle’ in the advertising world to have kitchens with all the ordinary workaday things on show. I must say it’s never bothered me that the dishwasher is on view, but then I have always rather resisted the concept of a fitted kitchen that might be fabulously organised and clean, but looks completely clinical and soulless.  



  Here’s the plan: I won’t be starting all over again, that isn’t my thing, and neither do I have the funds. I am very fond of the existing white tiles, now rather worn wooden worktop and recycled white shelf. After all, these are the simple and textural details which make my kitchen feel personal and look individual.  I need some new units, but where to get them? I can’t face the flat pack experience of Ikea. After trawling the web for cheap kitchens I come up with a surprise -  Magnet, which appears to have  undergone a wonderful metamorphosis.   ( Ten years ago, no, even two years ago, design sensitive souls would not have been seen dead with  one of their  mass market models. ) Thus I find myself at the local showroom, desiring a very pretty pale duck egg blue range (see the  finished effect in my kitchen  above and below) that is simple, classic and looks great. (Except for the chunky handles which you don’t have to have because there are plenty of other shapes to choose from. )  “How much is your  limit ?  says the salesman hopefully,  "some of our customers spend £30,000”. He  seems a little downcast with my  minimal  budget for a modest  kitchen run of about 3.5 metres, but is  helpful ,  attentive, and comes up with a good price.



A couple of weeks later and the big  day has come, a breather between shoots, blog posts, and garden tidying, for the ripping out of the old and the installing of the new.  The most important thing is that I have lined up a builder type to fit it all. It would soon be like a scene from Dante’s Inferno if my husband and I attempted to grapple with rejigging the plumbing, fitting a new sink into the old worktop and marshalling all the Magnet components into place. Bar three knobs which haven’t arrived, and for which I have to dash out back to Magnet for replacements, all goes according to plan. It’s a tough job though,  sorting out the stuff I’ve unloaded from the old cupboards which now lies in untidy greasy swathes across the kitchen floor. I wade through and dispose of half empty packets of flour, corks, old chopsticks and other kitchen junk that no one else in the family would think to edit. The cherry on the cake is filling up the new pale blue duck egg drawers to look neat and housewifely (how long will that last?), and cooking a big plate of roast vegetables for lunch in half the time that it took in the old oven.  



NB: It`s noon,  and a Country Living shoot is filling the house with summer colours and ideas. There’s a handsome man in black cycling shorts dashing up the stairs with a handsome vase of summer petals and blooms from Scarlet and Violet and the bathroom papered in floral sprigs looks like a set from Lawrie Lees’s Cider with Rosie.  Even our Tulse Hill cat looks like a country cottage puss dozing in the sunlight on a pile of Cath Kidston towels. Eyeing the props, I have fallen for brilliant floral cushions from the Conran shop, pretty pleated paper lampshades by Elise Rie Larsen and painted metal stools with rough wooden tops from excellent online resource, The housedoctor.dk. NNB. I ate delicious flat bread, olives, and delicately fried squid at Morito, the latest offshoot of Spanish/North African influenced restaurant Moro in London`s  Clerkenwell.

Tags: colour, home cooking, interiors, spring, thrifty decoration, white rooms

Ha Ha! I am right on trend in my several-seasons-old canary yellow buttoned J Crew cardigan,  as the March issue of Vogue proclaims ‘fashion’s new love for colour’. Of course we all know it’s not really new, as fashion is all about an ongoing passion with colour in some form or other. But there is something particularly resonant about the  newness and vibrancy that Spring brings to everything. A sense, too, of optimism and possibilities - from the leggy amaryllis by my kitchen window (see above) about to unfurl in a whirl of striped pink and white petals, to the Spring pages of fashion mags  washed in bright shades of tangerine, raspberry and quince. (I look forward to the first swim of the season at the lido and have my eye on a hyacinth blue retro spot halterneck swimsuit in the Boden catalogue that plopped through my letter box last week.) When I haven’t seen my children for a while and we meet   after a fortnight  away or longer,   there’s a sense of seeing them as new people, almost like getting to know them all over again. That’s how I feel, in a way, when I hold the neatly bound sections of the new book, all ready to be sent off to the printers in China. Is it really three months since I turned in the final acknowledgements? I am excited, because I now see the book with a fresh eye. It’s not tiring to scan the spreads that I checked over and over  during the editing process. I hope it doesn’t sound puffed up to say it’s looking good!



  Feeling buoyant I am inspired to revisit a piece of half finished patchwork that has been lying in my large turquoise canvas remnants bag for the last year or so. It’s made up of blue and white pieces cut from various sources:  pairs of worn out children’s pyjamas and tattered jeans. There’s also a bit of floral Liberty print from a dress that I cut up because I grew tired of its shape. (Although quite expensive, I also like the idea of pre cut Liberty patchwork squares sold by the bundle.) Foot on the accelerator I motor along on the rather battered Elna Lotus SP that my parents gave me for my 21st birthday. The process of pinning and stitching, trying to  steer not only a straight path but  also fingers away from the dagger effects of the speeding needle,  are all good for freeing the mind of muddle. As good as digging the garden, or beating egg whites to frothy peaks. Once everything is sewn together I hem the edges of what is to become a kind of patchwork loose cover for the seat of the chesterfield. I say, loose, because the dog, and the cat, are very fond of this surface, and it would soon look very sad, very quickly if I couldn’t whip it off to be washed and revived. NB Must catch the British photographer E.O. Hoppe’s modernistic portraits (Vita Sackville West, John Masefield) at The National Portrait Gallery. NNB I made pheasant and pea  (frozen petit pois are delicious) risotto  last night, with the leftovers and  home made stock  from  a brace of pheasants  from the Farmer’s market. It’s good not to have to be a hunting shooting fishing type in order to enjoy the mildly gamey flavour, and lean texture of these  inexpensive birds.  

Tags: books, colour, flower power, get crafty, home cooking, homemade, interiors, scent, Simple, spring, thrifty decoration

  This feels like spring. A brilliant sunlight filled day and a plate of Daisy’s eau de nil and chalk white eggs fresh from her hens. I check outside and even the bare flower beds have little patches of brilliant green where the chives, and tulips are having a go at bursting forth. I know that the doom mongers say there’s plenty more foul wintry weather to come, but you can’t ignore the fact that it stays light until teatime. And as it turns dusky velvet blue, the sky has the luminous feel associated with softer, warmer and longer days ahead.      



  I like to bring the spring feeling inside even if it hasn’t quite got going outside. There are inexpensive bundles of daffodils, or pots of delicate grape hyacinths at Jayne Copperthwaite’s fragrant flower shop which she recently opened in Balham, south London. It’s my daughter’s 17th birthday weekend and so there’s every excuse to come away laden with bunches of blue hyacinths and sweetly scented white narcissi.          



  I prefer my flowers to sit in containers that don’t shout: simple glass vases, pint beer gasses even, or the white enamel bowls that I fill with bulbs and layer with moss.



  I lay the table with a suitably spring green cotton cloth made out of a furnishing fabric remnant from my store cupboard on the landing. Later at the birthday dinner, there are candles, pink fizz and large slices of chocolate cake. (I feel very short amongst the beautiful gazelles in high heels.) NB: Before I push Publish, I must say how really cross I am that the Government wants to close hundreds of libraries (481 libraries, 422 buildings and 59 mobile libraries are under threat according to Public Libraries News). As an 8 year old, it was a first taste of independence, wheeling my bike back from Earlsfield library with an Everlasting Toffee strip and a  bagful of books dangling from the handlebars. The shiny parquet floors and hushed atmosphere made the library seem all at once very grow up but somehow calm and comforting. Choosing books from packed shelves, rows and rows, was like being in a kind of sweet shop of words and ideas, and all the better because you could take them home for free. My current local library at West Norwood is a brilliant source of everything from thrillers, to the latest Booker Prize winner in a pristine dust jacket. There are mothers with young children getting their first taste of reading books, old people who come to read the newspapers, seek some companionship. Even the disruptive teenagers calm down in this airy, peaceful environment.  And in common with other libraries around the county, it is also a lifeline for the one in five people who do not have the internet at home and need their local library to look for jobs. The libraries must stay open.

Tags: books, colour, flower power, garden, home cooking, homemade, spring, thrifty decoration

Very very late in getting this post out,  but  my fingers have been  racing over the key board writing text  for the book.  Driven by a  surge of fear and enjoyment  I plug into Al Green`s   `Let`s Stay Together ` and try not to be distracted by   You Tube  comedy clips and the latest  updates from THAT  volcano. The spewings of which,  we were lucky to avoid returning from Olhao, where,  hooray!  the  room on top is complete and wonderful.  Filipe Monteiro of White Terraces is the  architect of this little white  gem. From   simple  white wooden beams   to  curved detail  on the stairs up to the roof, he has  cleverly  interpreted  traditional Olhao building features to make the structure look as if  it has been there for ever. And together  with his gang of men, Mr  Martinho  is  the builder from  heaven.



In Olhao market, spring is here with the juiciest oranges billowing herbs and plump `favas` broad bean pods. The fish market is full of fish because it`s Friday, and there`s the fresh ozone sea smell  rising from wet slabs displaying everything from the anonymous  `pescado`, 1 euro kg, so ordinary it doesn`t deserve a name,  to thick white fillets of corvina 16 euros kg. From their perches on cranes, and spires, the storks are gnashing their  great beaks in mating calls, sparrows twitter and the 11am  hooter whines like an air raid siren : the boats have come in.



In London the garden is  green and glossy, and the tulips are bursting out in bloom with more vigour than I remember. Maybe it was because winter was so long and so hard that all growing things seem to have extra reserves of energy to launch themselves into the new season.  Against all these signs of nature`s renewal, it is particularly sad and poignant to hear of the sudden death of mother, and brilliant   garden and interiors writer Elspeth Thompson.  What a great loss.  A fellow blogger, she was most encouraging to me.  At the very least she will live on through her evocative  words and thoughts.



I never quite know what will come up on the tulip front, and I`m really pleased that the black Parrot tulips from last season have reappeared. Watching them go through the budding bit  to  their unfurling into  a whirl of feathery petals the colour of dark beetroots is absorbing



Black Parrot tulips in bud and full frilly bloom



Unfurled `Blue` parrot tulips, look  like striped fruit drops from an old fashioned confectioner or even a head of salad radicchio.  Where`s the blue?!  and  when they are in full bloom the striped effect fades into an all over fuschia pink.



New to the garden this year, and from another really good value bulb order from Crocus the single late tulip,  Violet Beauty, is more of a slender, elegant thing than its  more wayward and feathery Parrot  tulip companions.

Tags: colour, garden, spring, white rooms

Only a few piles of dog eared admin remain before we can escape to Olhao and the new room on top. On the way to the post office, mimosa and forsythia are fizzing with yellow. It seems a little wasteful to be leaving behind the first budding and greening signs of spring but the draw of sand between toes and sardines are tantalizing too. And after more technology malfunctions (I won`t even go there) parking ticket angst, missed train connections, and near hospitalisation involving clogs on a down escalator, I`m ready to walk there, let alone fly .



Just have to get in a session of dough making for pizza (artichoke hearts, green olives and parmesan, is my current favourite) and other homemade creations (see here my sister in law`s divine rye sourdough bread) to illustrate my new book. The four legged paparazzo is enjoying the cooking sessions too, hanging around the worktop for crumbs, and helping herself to the subject matter of a flapjack shot when no one`s looking. It`s all go putting together the pages, and the deadline is no tiny speck in the distance anymore. But that`s good, too, because it means the weeks are slipping away until the backpacker daughter returns.



When I`m back first stop will be gorgeous fabrics at the V&A exhibition, Quilts 1700-2010. Might even get round to a spot of quiltmaking with pretty seaweed prints from the museum`s collection of archive printed cotton. Check out more print ideas from Printand pattern.blogspot.com and Liberty prints at knockdown prices in the new range for American chain store Target .



Spring garden notes: Divide agapanthus: I have an extended family of agapanthus plants that came stashed in a suitcase from Spain and are now packed tightly in a pot like chocolate fish in a tin, which is how they like it. This year, though, division is necessary to keep the plants vigorous and I cut them down the middle with a fork and plant the new half in a fresh container. Feed shrubs and climbers: I started with the standard roses, and have now worked in more compost and bonemeal around the shrub and climbing roses, and gorgeous pale lilac wisteria at the front of the house. Sow seedlings half hardy under cover: Nicotiana and zinnia seeds saved from last year are germinating in a tray on the windowsill. Sow less than think as a pinch of seed goes a long way. Prepare trenches for beans and `chitted` potatoes and dig in muck or compost (on another sea salty note, I remember my grandmother lined her bean trenches with seaweed and newspaper to conserve moisture).

Tags: colour, flower power, garden, home cooking, Simple, spring, thrifty decoration

Bother! I`d hoped to get my post out before the end of February. I am diverted from my laptop to equip the eldest daughter with `wedding ring`, door wedge, extending washing line and all the other stuff for the gap year female traveller. It is like losing a limb when she walks through Terminal 5 departures, but I can get in the bathroom now. And in the way that life sometimes seems to synchronise itself, my new book contract is signed and the deadline is just about the date she returns. Publication is next spring, but I`ll give you some sneak previews along the way. Some design notes:I won`t ever tire of gingham, it`s a really inexpensive way to add a spot of spring colour to the home: a simple pull on chair cover ,say . My temple is MacCulloch & Wallis who sell online as well as from a shop crowded with young fashion students in central London. Look out, too for enamel alphabet letters and numbers from Hyperkit, more timeless simple design. RIP Lucienne Day one of our great designers, known for her painterly and simple Fifties` fabrics. I also have a passion for the stacking Polyprop chairs that her husband Robin Day designed, and can still be picked up from secondhand shops and markets.



There are walking babies, crawling babies, sicky babies and back-up babies modelling shoes in the house, and so I escape to the garden. It`s looking spare (an understatement) but crocuses like bright fruit drops are pushing through. I prune the roses with vigour giving the 4 standards the equivalent of a military short back and sides. But they will flower well and spread without looking wild and untidy. They have a good feed with shovels of rich earthy compost from the bottom of the bin. It`s so cold I can`t be bothered to dig it in, but it`s raining so the nutrients will wash down to where the roots need it . The room on top in Olhao is nearing completion after the builders have ducked and dived the thrashing winds and rains of the Algarve`s worst weather in 30 years. It`s a whole new vista up here. In the distance, a band of cobalt sea beneath a grey blue sky, tv aerials, flapping laundry, a silver winding mesh of homing pigeons, the fizzing pink of an almond tree. And all with the Olhao soundtrack of dogs barking, bells, and the strains of a fado song on next door`s radio. NB The dearth of photographic evidence is due to further gadget malfunction, this time, my newly acquired i-phone, a marvellous invention, when it works The blues and greens of the seaside are exhilarating but no less than the rolling hills and valleys on the drive to see my Dad in Somerset: a mossy palette as if from a Farrow and Ball paint chart. And then there is more heavenly natural colour at the Van Gogh exhibition, where my rushhour Friday stress melts before the artist`s drawings and paintings of French gardens and vegetable patches



What with all the backpacking details I almost leave the marmalade making too late, but am saved by the last boxful of Sevilles at the local greengrocer. Soon the kitchen is a bittersweet aromatic fug and the mind only focused on the job. No wonder DH Lawrence said "I got the blues thinking of the future so I left off and made some marmalade." I read though that 80% of marmalade eaters are over 45. Don`t you think we should champion the young to get boiling and stirring? It`s such a pity that marmalade has that fusty old major at the breakfast table image.



I pot the marmalade in recycled jars that I save and store under the sink. Holding one`s golden efforts in a simple glass jar topped with a cellophane lid and decorated with a homemade label is pure pleasure; so, too, is a slice of bread topped with marmalade and a spoonful of creme fraiche.

Tags: colour, flower power, garden, get crafty, home cooking, spring, thrifty decoration

Horrors. Some beastly person took a chance in our side passage and nicked my bike. Simple. I had neglected to lock it. I take a walk outside and let the beauty of the curled and furled parrot tulips take the edge off my frustration. The feathered buds seem to have been dipped in blueberry juice, clasped together like the furled wings of some exotic bird. In fact, more birdlike, than the the parrots` beaks they`re named after. Soon they will unfold in a riot of undulating and frilly petals. Some will be white, others blue (actually a fuschia pink) and black ( not black, black, but more a deep burgundy black). I`ve got to get replacement wheels, immediately. Not a pretty sentiment for someone who`s always banging on about the evils of self gratification, but the cycle bug has bitten and I`m fretting that I can`t hook the dog`s lead over the handlebars and let her take me at a cracking pace to the park, or nip to the Turkish shop for a bundle of early mint. Justification swims around in my head for quietly siphoning off the family`s holiday money to fund the purchase, from petrol saving, to the health benefits that will stave off some horrendously expensive operation in my old age. I will make it up to them, I think , feeling like a wife who plays bingo with the housekeeping, on my way to Recycling at Elephant and Castle . And thank goodness, that in the third bike crammed aisle is a reconditioned classic sit up and beg, Raleigh, with my name on it. After a short test cycle under the grimy railway arches of one of London`s most gruesome interchanges (although developers have grand plans for it) the deal is done. Not the bargain rate I got in the wilds of Norfolk, but not a bad one either. I"m back in business,and doing more making up to the family, by tearing up leaves of Jonny`s father`s wild garlic to strew in a gorgeous soup made with leek and potato. This is the season for wild garlic, `Allium ursinum` or ransoms, and you can find it in any damp, shady woodland, or even a suburban garden, which is where mine came from. The flowers taste delicious, like garlic, too, and you can toss them in salads along with the leaves.



Living with all this white, is great because the location shoots that come to the house want a space that is light and airy, which is just the kind of feeling exuded by a white painted room. It doesn`t have to be a very specially mixed kind of white either, just a qood quality paint, in white. Dulux brilliant white matt emulsion is always reliable. I can`t resist new colour though, and have taken the opportunity to spruce up the wood panelled attic, now my son is at university, with Paw Print` a lovely muted stone shade from the environmentally friendly paint range by Earthborn.

Tags: colour, flower power, garden, get crafty, spring

Pedalling past marzipan scented broom and blazing white magnolias in Battersea Park each morning put my head in the right place, for 4 days hard study at the botannical painting course I attended last week. The freesia is not my first choice to put in water on the table (maybe because the modern hybrids are too uniform in shape) but I began to appreciate its structure and complexity as our teacher Elaine Searle calmly guided the group of aspiring plant painters to observe, sketch, and watercolour the specimens. The final painting now stuck up on my noticeboard, is far from brilliant but I`m pleased with my efforts. What`s best is that I`ve been given the tools to be more confident at painting herbs from the garden, the best escape from a dismal tasks like appealing against parking tickets. NB I must return the magnifying glass,needed for the course, and on loan from the local newsagent whose heavenly home cooked lunch time curries waft comfortingly around his shop. I`m so enthused by my nascent painterly skills I shall go out and buy my own lens even if it does make you look slightly odd peering intently at a lone tomato.



The sprouting seed nursery in the office is getting under my feet as the fledging plants make their break towards the light. I have transplanted the zinnias into peat pots, which can go straight into the ground later on, as I they don`t do well with too much handling of the roots. I have a passion for the riotous pinks and purples of this frilly late summer flower, which looks so colourful in the border and as decoration. The basil is brimming nicely and that will be next in line to pot on. I might even put the sweet peas outside next week, covering them with a bit of fleece to be on the safe side. CH Middleton an old school BBC garden expert from the thirties whose book An Outline of a Small Garden, I picked up for 3.00 from a junk shop suggests that the best way to get fine big flowers , is put them at least six inches apart in a deeply-dug and well manured soil, and give each one a good long cane or stick to support it; then as they grow, nip out all the the little side shoots as soon as they appear, leaving the one stem to each plant. In this way you will get very tall plants and extra fine flowers. I am also really hoping that the sprouting leaves of night scented stock will be successful. You hardly notice it during the day, but on a summer evening it entices you outside with its powerful scent. I shall grow it in pots near the garden table so we can enjoy its scent on one of those calm balmy nights which are possible in this country if the isobars on the weather map are wide enough apart. Out digging in more manure, and weeding last weekend, I noticed a garden regular, the blackbird with an albino patch, having a feast on unfortunate worms revealed by the earthworks. And sometime later the cat struck lucky with a mouse that she laid separated from its head at the bottom of the stairs...... to greet me first thing Monday morning. (Wild)life is tough on the flowerbeds in suburbia.



Thinking about the most delicious things I`ve eaten in the last 48 hours, the lemon cake was good, after our trip to Tate Modern to see Roni Horn`s exhibition, but not as good as the fork biscuits, made by my friend, Fiona .The recipe involves little more than flour, butter, sugar, lemon zest, and a fork for making ridged patterns on each round biscuit shape. I think they`ll be good for tea on Easter Sunday, and less sickly than all the chocolate that will be scattered about. I like to decorate eggs, and am excited with the acrylic colours I found in Green & Stone , one of the most fabulous art shops in London. See how easy it is to do on my Youtube Make and Do series.

Tags: colour, flower power, get crafty, spring, thrifty decoration

It`s been snowing blossom. Our suburban streets have been turned into bridal avenues of trees laden with white and pink scented petals. Even the faceless housing estates look more inviting with clumps of daffodils and flowering cherries planted in the communal spaces. Yesterday I was up early and staggering outside with a weighty bag of seed compost to get on with sowing. I tend to pick up seed packets on a whim rather than on a preordained expedition. I know more or less what I want, but like to gather together elements of my summer garden bit by bit. It gives me breathing space to mull over ideas. It`s not that I`m a procrastinator, rather that I enjoy the adventure of coming across surprises, like the chilli seeds raised by Latin American chilli lovers at the local community allotments. When I was visiting my father in Somerset a couple of weeks ago, I wandered into a typical country high street hardware shop brimming with tools, and, inspired by the equally well stocked racks of seeds ,bought packets of zinnias the colours were so irresistible. And summer visions of salads tumbled with leaves aromatic basil, meant that there was no alternative but to ditch smelly cheese, for two varieties of basil from the artfully packed range of Italian Franchi seeds at the local deli cum cafe cum veg shop. So back to the garden, and a balmy Sunday morning filling plastic trays with handfuls of compost and various seeds from little black specks of nicotiana ( heavenly scent on a summer evening) to peppercorn sized sweet peas. I soaked the seven year old sunflower seeds in water, gathered from our garden in Andalucia , and prized open the tough striped casings to remove the seeds. They look healthy enough, but I`ll know in the next 10 days or so, whether there`s still potential in them. The trays are lined up, like cots in a nursery, in my office by the window on layers of newspaper and an old door so when I water them it will not soak the floor. I sit writing, glancing maternally at the potential garden offspring beside me.



I like a bit of architecture in my garden. Not waterfalls, giant urns or grand gazebos, but wigwams. Wigams of willow sticks , that is, and I`m very excited to have discovered the English Hurdle company on the net, who swiftly dispatched two bundles of willow sticks which I have bashed into the earth with a mallet and tied together at the top with all purpose hairy garden string. These twiggy structures are placed at the four corners of the flower and vegetable patch (my informal version of a traditional potager) and will support the climbing beans and nasturtiums. Until this year I`ve used cane pea sticks for my wigwams, but the willow looks more earthy and organic, and although its more expensive, will last longer than the canes.



My son is back for Easter and wants to know where to take his girl friend for lunch. Somewhere suave, mum, he says. How did I raise a boy with such expensive taste? Maybe he`s winding me up but then, he is a child of the boom time when expectations were high. Without extending his student overdraft even further , I think there may be a solution more in keeping with these straitened times. Ok, Brixton market, might not be the capital`s most romantic spot, but at franca manca wedged between stalls selling yams and Rastafarian bonnets, there`s the romance of eating the most heavenly sourdough pizzas baked in a special Naplese wood fired oven. And it won`t cost them more than £20.00 to eat sumptuously, in the word`s of one reviewer `the best place to eat pizza in the UK`



Spring has sprung with many of the season`s new frocks decorated with pretty florals. I have always fallen for buds and blooms and they needn`t look girly if you mix them with blocks of colour. And just as you don`t want to look like a flower border so you should also use florals in moderation around the home - as accents rather than all over floralness. Sprigged prints on lampshades are a good starting point if you want to introduce some simple country style in a plainly decorated room.

Tags: colour, flower power, garden, spring