I’m returning to the guestroom this week, to talk about how we designed the space. We wanted family and friends to be comfortable staying for a decent length of time which meant it couldn’t do double duty as an office or workroom.
It needed a generous bed, somewhere to relax and sufficient clothes storage for a week-long stay. The starting point for the colour scheme, which is more subdued (restful?) than the rest of the house, were the curtains which we brought with us when we moved across the road and the fabulous sketches above the bed by local artist Nish Designs.
Ideally the room also needed an en-suite. Because however wipe-clean we’d made the family bathroom there was no guarantee it would stay that way. I played with lots of layouts but couldn’t find one I was happy with. They all seemed to compromise the bedroom space too much.
And then inspiration struck us both at once – we could steal 30cm of depth from the middle bedroom (the dead space to one side of the door) to help create a metre wide shower room across the back wall. The space saved meant a kingsize bed could sit facing the bay, and there would still be space to walk round.
It helped to have an unobtrusive bed frame, and the Habitat Tatsuma fit the bill perfectly. Wall mounted EKET boxes make great bedside tables, and keep the floor clear and a 30cm deep PAX frame with two drawers provides a decent amount of wardrobe space, without crowding the room.
We even found room for a small television, redeploying our old hall console as a stand/ bookshelf. And using the rear wall rather than the far wall for our ensuite meant we got to save the house’s last remaining original fireplace (the others had gone before we moved in). Overall it’s one of my favourite spaces in the house – even though it’s the one I use least.
Last House But One 