Interior Design

More people today are renovating their homes retaining their traditional exteriors, giving their interiors a contemporary upgrade. Sometimes this type of renovation can leave a house feeling a little disjointed, however, the home I am sharing today, I think has been sympathetically renovated, with the perfect balance of contemporary versus traditional.  A contemporary open plan kitchen/living/family area separates itself from a more formal living room with a fireplace and traditional buttoned back sofa.  In one bedroom a chandelier combined with mirrored furniture adds a little opulence, while another contemporary styled bedroom is softened with a fabulous large buttoned headboard.  I love the mix of the weathered kitchen table teamed with contrasting contemporary dining chairs, a popular combination seen in many renovated homes. I love the eclectic mix in this fabulous home and hope you have enjoyed today's tour. All images are via  jjlocations , this home is a...

Recently I was approached by Interior Designer turned blogger, Ashley from "Simply Designing," asking if I would like to contribute a guest post for her "Colour My Home Summer blog series". I want to thank Ashley for this opportunity and excited to say that my post, "Using colour to bring personality into your home," has gone public today.  In this post I touch on colour psychology, also the impact of different tones of one colour, colours for small places and colours that make us happy. I would love for you to hop over to Ashley's blog to read the full post and really appreciate if you could leave some comments there :) Here are just two of the many lovely images in the post...... Read full post and see more images here. Image beneath: pale blue helps to create a sense of space in a small area...

From time to time I have featured Swedish interiors, usually they are smaller apartments, however at the same time their owners seem to utilise every little bit of space and  they often appear far larger than they really are so I wasn't at all surprised to find this small but creatively used space in Linnestaden. The apartment is only two rooms plus a kitchen and the owners have been very clever with their use of storage. These apartments don't normally have built in cupboards like we are used to in New Zealand so everything needs to be freestanding or on open shelving. Look at the clever way they store their shoes. I usually try to hide shoes away but I think this idea works perfectly in this small apartment. The majority of  Swedish interiors are white, however, I do love it when it is mixed with some texture such as the exposed brick wall which adds a little warmth as too much white can sometimes appear a little cold. The owners of this apartment have an eclectic mix of fur...

I'm aware Summer's long gone in NZ, but hey! the sun was shining today and I am still able to walk along the beach most mornings. One of the hardest things about returning to NZ after so many years in SE Asia and the Middle East was not having daily sunshine and that wonderful warmth I felt waking up every morning to the sun streaming through our windows.  Recently I shared a post on a lovely coastal interior which jogged my memory that I had started to draft a post in April about coastal themed interiors and had not yet finished it, so with a bit more work and a lot of searching of images I have completed the post and hope you will be inspired to bring some coastal sunshine to your home. A simple way to incorporate a theme into your home, whatever it may be, French, Country, Contemporary, Coastal, is to take the word and then make a list of words that spring to mind, a kind of "word association" game. Taking the word "Coastal", I created a short list of wor...

Most of my regular readers and passers by, are drawn to Lee Caroline by the images I post. Therefore, I have decided to create a regular post that is simply images, no words but the beauty of an interior, a piece of furniture, kitchen, bedroom or a vignette that shouts out. Contemporary, traditional or otherwise, images that may inspire us in our own homes. Most of my selection originate from Pinterest , however, where possible, I will track links back to their original sources. I hope you enjoy today's eclectic mix: Image sources:  1 | 2 |3 | 4 | 5 | 6 We hope you have a lovely weekend