House Guest: The C&TH Interiors Podcast

Episode 121: Schumacher’s Benni Frowein

Episode 122: Alan O’Rourke

Episode 123: Simon Burvill, Founder & CEO of Gaze Burvill

Episode 124: Benji Lewis, Interior Designer and founder of #ZoomThatRoom

Episode 125: Mark Boddington, Founder of Silverlining

Episode 126: Chris Dezille, Founder of Honky

Episode 127: Landscape Architect Marian Boswall

Episode 128: Bluebird of Chelsea restorer Martin Summers

Episode 129: Henry’s Townhouse owner Steven Collins

Episode 130: Interior Designer Deborah Bass

Episode 131: Hambleton Hall Owners Tim and Stefa Hart

Episode 132: Maker&Son

Episode 133: Paloma Faith

Episode 134: Sally Storey

Episode 135: Oliver Heath

Episode 136: Richard Parr

Episode 137: Vincent Pennetier

Episode 138: Lucy Clark

Episode 139: Jeff Abrams

Episode 140: Stephen Bayley

Episode 141: Camilla Riviere

Episode 142: Sarah Ross

Episode 143: Martha Freud

Episode 144: Annoushka Ducas 

Episode 145: Shalini Misra

Episode 146: Emily and Kate of Todhunter Earle

Episode 148: Jenny Weiss and Helen Bygraves

Episode 148: Sophie Garnier

Today’s House Guest is Sophie Garnier of Kalinko, a ethical homeware and interiors brand championed by Kit Kemp and many others who have been seduced by Burmese craft. After seeking adventure, Sophie planned a trip to Burma and on her return, urged her new husband to do the same. ‘We had only just married and it got tongues wagging that our relationship was already hitting the rocks, but it couldn’t have been further from the truth, I just wanted him to experience Burma and to fall in love, which is what happened to me,’ she explains. He did and came back announcing – somewhat to Sophie’s surprise – that he had found a job so the pair upped sticks and moved in May 2015. They were both captivated by local craft – rattan, woodwork and textiles, and launched Kalinko to connect the country’s artisans to a UK market. Their aim is to keep their industries alive, provide skilled work for talented people, and to fill homes around the world with objects that make a difference. ‘We don’t use middlemen,’ explains Sophie,’ so all purchase costs go straight to the people that make each piece’. Currently in the UK due to the military coup, and pandemic, Sophie emphasises that Burma is very much their home for them and their two children. Tune in for a fascinating dip into another world.

Episode 149: Toby Lorford

Toby Lorford, who is blowing the cobwebs off antique-buying. ‘Antiques bring history into an interior, softening it’, says Toby Lorford of Lorford’s Antiques and Lorfords Contemporary, who started his first antiques shop in Tetbury, Gloucs in 2003, with a view to creating a new breed of antiques shop and modernising the way antiques are sold. He now has two hangars full of traders and a company that offers a concierge service. Along the way he started his own furniture company, Lorfords Contemporary, thanks to chef Marco Pierre White (it’s a lovely story) and thinks that antique dealers should get together more to sing from the treetops about how it’s the ultimate in recycling. He has big plans for changing the way we shop…. tune in for more.

Episode 150: Louise Bradley

Louise Bradley is one of the UK’s leading interior designers. Her name is synonymous in the industry with bespoke luxurious design, and she is known for creating classic, contemporary and luxurious spaces. She chats about how the design industry has changed over the decades and how she has adapted and grown her business. She’s recently completed a new book: Interior: Louise Bradley… tune in for more.

Episode 152: Deirdre Dyson

This week’s House Guest is rug designer Deirdre Dyson. First and foremost an artist, Deirdre nearly had her career stalled by a headmistress who told her: ‘You cant make a living out of art’. Hence she left school without the necessary qualifications and worked as a secretary while compiling a portfolio. She talked herself into a place at Byam Shaw fine art school by doing shorthand for the head in the afternoons. By the second year she had a scholarship and also met her designer husband, James. Tune in to hear more about how she enjoys the restriction rug design imposes on her art,  spending lockdown on a boat in Guadaloupe and why Paris is a special place.

Episode 152: Tim Gosling

This week’s House Guest is the furniture designer and interior decorator, Tim Gosling. Both a highly prominent and eminent figure in the world of interior design, he is known for creatively combining historical and modern techniques to create bespoke designs. Tim has an incredible eye, and is intent on creating pieces that are both timeless and sentimental. A great raconteur, he chats about the significance of colour, his renovation project of his own 57 room French Chateau and even his stint on stage in a pantomime. He fascinatingly reveals that the spectrum of colour has changed and developed in history, and continues to do so, and he recants working with Graphenstone, a carbon neutral paint company, when renovating the Chateau. Tune in for more stories.

Episode 153: Jen Bernard of Bernard Interiors

This week’s House Guest is Jen Bernard, an interior designer and managing director of Bernard Interiors, based in Newcastle upon Tyne. she is reimagining the growing are of high-end residential care and she’s a leader in the field, and it’s fascinating to hear about the huge potential in the market. We chat about her aim in moving away from the stigma surrounding care homes and its typical institutionalised design; she instead creates an environment which is not only beautiful but appealing. Jen recently completed the Nightingale Development – a block of luxury apartments overlooking Clapham Common – in 2020. Tune in for more…

Bernard Interiors

Episode 154: Nicky Dobree

This week’s House Guest is Nicky Dobree, a leading interior designer who specialises in luxury ski chalets. She began by transforming her own chalet from its pine cookie cutter style, to one with a big Italian kitchen, big picture frame windows and contemporary furniture, and she is now on her 50th chalet. We chat about how she got into the industry, the difference between a typical house project and a ski chalet, and attention to sustainability when embarking on projects. Tune in for more…

Nicky Dobree’s James Bond Chalet

Episode 155: Francis Sultana

It’s an exciting year ahead for this week’s House Guest, the acclaimed interior and furniture designer Francis Sultana. His first hotel project opens in Capri in July (Hotel La Palma, part of the Oetker Collection) and his had taken on the custodianship of The Hunting Lodge, John Fowler’s gothic mansion in Hampshire – which Nicky Haslam recently vacated. He has no formal training, ‘Growing up in Gozo, I read House & Garden and World of Interiors magazines, and watched a lot of episodes of 80’s TV drama Dynasty; I was a sponge for information. I knew I loved houses from a very early age’. He’s on the international council for the design museum, is CEO of the David Gill Gallery, the Ambassador of Culture for Malta, and is working on Malta’s first contemporary art museum which will open in 2023. Tune in for more.

Case Study: Francis Sultana’s Georgian Home

Episode 156: Michelle Ogundehin

Former editor-in-chief of Elle Decoration and dubbed ‘interiors guru’ by The Sunday Times, this week’s guest is Michelle Ogundehin, writer, author, brand consultant and tv presenter. Her book, Happy Inside, of which designer Jonathan Adler says:  ‘Prozac, shmozac, Michelle’s book is the only anti-depressant you need – it’s my bible’ has recently launched. She is on our screens next week when the new series of Interior Design Masters starts on Weds 9th at 9pm, airing on BBC One, where guests include Matthew Williamson, Mary Portas and Guy Oliver. Michelle and I chat about filming the new series, how the future of interior design is shaping up and how she believes, along with good food and exercise, environment is the third pillar of wellbeing. Tune in for more.

Episode 157: Castello di Reschio

If you’re dreaming of an Italian getaway, today’s podcast is for you. Count Benedikt Bolza and his wife Nencia Corsini have created Castello di Reschio, a castle sitting at the top of undulating Umbrian landscape, a blissful escape. Just reopening after its winter slumber, the interior and most of the castle’s furniture is designed by Benedikt himself, a trained architect and utter perfectionist. He couldn’t find a coffee machine without plastic pods so he made one, he doesn’t like how technology affects our sleep so the mattresses have special magnetic toppers to repel white light, he doesn’t like corridors (they feel too ‘hotel-y’) so suites fan out from a central courtyard – every detail is researched and tested to make guests feel at home. Whether you’re walking the grounds, watching the horses exercise in the equestrian centre, eating freshly foraged delicacies, admiring Nencia’s artwork and flowers or having the knots in your shoulders eased in the former wine cellar’s spa, Reschio delights and charms at every turn. Tune in for more.

Episode 158: Tom Dixon

My House Guest this week is Tom Dixon, known as a restless innovator who rose to prominence in the mid-1980s as a maverick, untrained designer with a line in welded salvage furniture. While working with the Italian giant Cappellini he designed the widely acclaimed ‘S’ Chair and Creative Director at Habitat rejuvenating the brand while maintaining Terence Conran’s vision of enriching everyday life through simple, modern design. In 2007, he launched Design Research Studio, a design and innovations agency at the heart of Tom Dixon, now based at Coal Office in London’s King’s Cross, which operates as an office, shop, workshop and restaurant all under one roof. We chat about his love of making things, which includes food, hence his collaboration with chef Assaf Granit – Coal Office is their food and design playground, rich in material, style and flavour. He also has a wry take on his early designs: ‘After 20 years in the business, I still feel young and there’s a lot to do, it’s both fabulous and depressing that my stuff is now being sold in antique shops and occasionally a car boot sale’. Tune in for more.

Tom Dixon Designs New Private Wellness Club