LUCY HAMMOND GILES DECORATES THE COLEFAX & FOWLER MORNING ROOM FOR WOW!HOUSE 2024
This June, guests will be welcomed into the Colefax & Fowler morning room, decorated by Lucy Hammond Giles of Sibyl Colefax & John Fowler. Hammond Giles has created the scheme at the behest of the Colefax family of brands, of which the longest established decorating firm in Great Britain is part. “This year marks our 90th anniversary, and I was keen to create a room that pays homage to decorators past, whilst reflecting today’s taste and sensibilities. It’s been glorious digging through the collections. My scheme will cover the full gamut of the Colefax group, from classic traditional to clean and modern, while the decoration will include designs and details inspired by legends John Fowler and Nancy Lancaster, as well as the current directors,” explains Lucy. The name of the room itself provided the starting point: “a robustly pretty morning room, designed for relaxation and comfort. It will be simple and elegant, with all the detailing we are known for. The walls and curtains are to be yellow; a room wrapped in fabric sunshine, if you will! And a nod, of course, to Nancy Lancaster’s tour de force at Brook Street.”
“I’ll be using beautiful, historical Colefax & Fowler chintzes to bring the outside in. Contemporary plain linens by Manuel Canovas and Larsen will act as a foil to a Lancaster wing chair in very smart brown and white Eaton Check,” continues Lucy. ”I’m thrilled to be working with Kingcome to resurrect a marvellous sofa I found a photo of in the archives; most likely from Fulco de Vedura’s apartment – or Tom Parr’s, which was conveniently right next door. It has a gloriously glamorous provenance.” The room will be full of bespoke fabrics, including the John Fowler-designed Gothic Stripe, hand-blocked onto silk noile then cut out and applied to the leading edge and base of the curtains, “a couture detail we have used before and of which I was reminded of at the V&A’s Chanel exhibition,” says Lucy. A Brussels Weave rug in Northampton, based on a carpet found at Althorp, will be woven for the floor, alongside made to order furniture and antique textiles. “Taking full advantage of the Pimlico Road showroom, we’ll also be using our antiques and everything will be for sale there, once the show is over,” Lucy explains.
Founded in the early 1930s, Sibyl Colefax & John Fowler has been synonymous with the English country house aesthetic for nearly a century, with alumni including Veere Grenney and Guy Goodfellow, who are also creating rooms for this year’s WOW!House. “Morning rooms were the preserve of grand English houses. My version is a practical daytime room, less formal than a drawing room, somewhere I’d want to sit on a Saturday with a cup of coffee and a newspaper, with a desk for writing and a sofa on which to nap or daydream. It’s a room for solitary enjoyment, very much Virginia Woolf inspired. A room of one’s own, or perhaps one other person. It’s definitely not a room for entertaining. I designed it as the perfect refuge, the kind of space any of us would enjoy having all to ourselves,” finishes Lucy.
