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Mad About The House

Kate Watson-Smyth

Kate's philosophy? Your home should tell your story. It should make your heart sing when you open the front door.

Kate Watson-Smyth is a journalist, author and creator of the award-winning Mad About the House blog – a generous sourcebook for modern living. It’s a place to show wonderful things and their creators as well as packed with advice to help you how to decorate your own home. She’s also a dab hand at Make Me A Rug, so time for a chat to get some insider tips.

Kate's inspiration comes from anywhere and everywhere. She always pays close attention to restaurant loos as they quite often use amazing tiles and decor effects to make the most of a small space. She also finds that hotel rooms can be good too as they often have to fit a lot into a small space and, of course, fashion is always good for colour and texture. As Kate says, "what you see on the catwalk always works its way through to the cushions eventually and the time lag between the two is getting shorter."

Wool Pebble Stade carpet

"We are still a little wary of patterned carpet in this country but wool rugs are a great way to bring in lots of pattern in a way that seems less frightening. I think you can be very dramatic and bold with a patterned rug in a way that you can’t with a carpet. At least not yet."

Kate loves wool rugs and has them in every room apart from her sons’ bedrooms which are carpeted – partly for the noise factor. Everywhere else has white painted floorboards and rugs. In the sitting room, she has layers of old Persian rugs, she inherited (stole) a couple from her mother and they weren’t big enough for the space so she layered them to fill the space.

One of her sons is about to move bedrooms and take over her spare room. For his new room, Kate chose a Wool Pebble Stade rug with a Grey Thick Stripe border. As a 17-year-old it was bound to be more conservative than she might otherwise have chosen. He likes black and grey – those are the colours he wears so it was logical that was what he would choose for his bedroom. She did manage to inject a little colour with the border though.

Alternative Flooring at Home with Kate Watson-Smyth and her bespoke wool rug in her teen son's bedroom

Bespoke Wool Pebble Stade rug with Stripes Thick Grey border

Alternative Flooring at Home with Kate Watson-Smyth and her bespoke chunky wool rug with fabric border

Overall however, Kate's home style is changing and a lot of the grey is going. She still loves dark grey but she is moving towards softer dark colours such as plum and dark chocolate. There is something vintage in every room whether it’s old Persian rugs or chairs from ebay. In short, every room adheres to her mantra of "Something new, something old, something black and something gold." Although, it doesn’t have to be gold but it does have to be metallic or shiny to add a sense of luxe and to bounce the light around. she doesn't like too much colour but she does like it to be dramatic. She would describe herself as a monochrome maximalist.

Alternative Flooring at Home with Kate Watson-Smyth and her Quirky Spotty patterned Stair Carpet Runner

Quirky Spotty Damson whipped stair runner

Kate's favourite Alternative Flooring? Her Quirky Spotty Damson patterned stair runner. She has had this carpet on her stairs for nearly eight years now – since well before she started working with Alternative Flooring – and she love's it just as much now as she did when she first laid eyes on it. As Kate says, stairs are often the first thing you see when you enter someone’s home and they need make a statement. When you come home from a long day at work your house needs to welcome you in and make you happy. For Kate, a beige oatmeal twist is never going to make her heart sing. Spotty, on the other hand, makes her happy to come home every day. And we completely agree!

Read Kate's blog here or see her fab Make Me A Rug video below.