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Author Archives: Editor
More Beaton than butch
1. Somehow we decided the sun room aka back dining room would have coloured glass windows. This was partly because we had haphazardly collected old Victorian windows and now had to justify these fevered purchases. But the idea of a … Continue reading
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Courtyard Envy
Last weekend we ventured into the hills behind Napier. This is a zone that during all the time we’ve lived here we’ve never explored. We were lured by an open home – more than that – an open stately home of … Continue reading
Posted in gardening, inspiration
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Pressed between pages
1. This tea set, a lovely lively little early nineteenth century production, decorated with grape vines and fruit, came to us from our favourite source, Maidens & Foster, the local … Continue reading
How to make one room from two.
In wooden frame houses the blending of two rooms into one should be a very simple process. Why then do so many get it so wrong? Often when visiting a house, a proud owner will explain that ‘these used to … Continue reading
Posted in practical matters
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Decor Extremus goes to the tip
When I was a kid the tip, the dump, was a source of never-ending wonder. Since I am such an ancient, I should make it clear I am speaking of the 1950s and especially the 1960s. By this time everyone … Continue reading
Posted in auction finds etc.
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The Hero of our Home
This is William John Gempton. He came into our home via the convergence of two collecting paths – (1) my policy of rescuing handsome men from a ghastly eternity spent forgotten in a box in some secondhand shop and – … Continue reading
Posted in auction finds etc.
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Men about the house.
I have managed to persist in writing and editing a book while the house has been undergoing that curious species of madness known as renovation. I did this through the purchase of some earplugs costing less than $7. They’re not particularly … Continue reading
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Beverly Nichols and the Christmas rose
I am a big fan of the, now sadly obscure, writer Beverly Nichols, who if you can get in the groove of his somewhat arch queeny tone – is one of those fab interwar English poufs with an obsession with … Continue reading
Posted in gardening
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How to approach a dressing room
There is something robust and purposeful about this room that I admire. It is more than the architectural severity of the gloss-finished tongue and groove, the emphatic placement of the bank of windows, or the view through to the unquestionably … Continue reading
Posted in inspiration
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The co-ordinated trans-Tasman plaster ceiling project
A while back I blogged about the dilemmas of a Moroccan-style bathroom in a post YSL world. Well the concept for that bathroom is developing but as intimated a little more along the lines of Lord Leighton’s Victorian oriental fantasies … Continue reading
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Decor Extremus: 