Hall way revamp part one

The final job with any renovation has always got to be the hallway. It’s the space that takes all the knocks as all the other rooms are transformed. The time has finally come for our red-and-white 1990 space to come into the 21st-century.

I envisaged a dramatic dark and moody space for the main hallway but I wanted the entrance porch to pop with bright vibrant colour, linking the outside and the inside. This neglected dumping ground is the entrance to our home, the first place people see and it needed to be a reflection of our style.

We had tided the front porch up at the end of last summer, the bright yellow door was a triumph but it belied what was inside.

My first port of call was Murals wallpaper, a brand I had worked with before on my My daughters bedroom. I sent them a quick sketch together with the measurements of the porch. They then sent me a photograph of how the design would fit in the space. I didn’t think that the first image showed the wallpaper off to it’s best effect and quite a large amount of the pattern was missing. It was no problem for them to reposition the design so that it fitted beautifuly. It was really easy to hang, the large pattern is really effective in the small space and the pinks and browns in the pattern tone perfectly with the rest of the hallway.

The woodwork is tanners brown by Farrow and ball. It frames the original etched glass door frame perfectly but the window above looked really sad and lonely. We employed a signwriter, Third Eye Signs to paint one of his signature prints there. It says EH UP and it’s yorkshire for hello. It’s a joyful, it makes me smile every time I come into the house and down the stairs.

I really wanted to tile the floor, but that would mean having to take off the door to make it fit. We decided that the easiest option would be to stencil it. The whole space was covered in plywood to give an even surface. This was then painted a base colour (We chose pale grey) . We used this Stencil from Royal stencils and painted over the top with pink ground by Farrow and ball . This tied in with the rest of the space because we had used this to paint above the picture rail and on the ceiling throughout the hallway. It was sealed with a few coats of floor varnish and Bob is your uncle. I’m not going to lie, stencilling it was very difficult, I would recommend that you always use the spray on adhesive to get clean sharp lines. However we are very pleased with the result, I really think you’d struggle to tell it’s not actual tiles.

There’s not much room for styling at all so the space was finished off with this Jaunty door mat from Next and a beautiful vintage coat hooks which I picked up in France last year. If they are lucky I may even let them hang their coats on it.

Here is the finished hallway, and next time I’m going to tell you how I guilded the staircase with copper leaf.