Ep 469: Faux Botanicals & Dark Paint with Abigail Ahern

29:39And I just wanted to constantly play and play and play upon this cozy feeling because now I come here and I travel a lot, but as soon as I'm home, I never really want to leave. I mean, it's just my happiest place to be and color's done that. So you kind of have to do, you're doing the opposite in each situation, right? Like you have the the white the opposite yeah in the in the dark it's the darkness so you had to add the softness where when there was white you had to add that sharpness so yeah you've totally and you could and of course you can do it the other way let's say you have a lot of paler walls you can absolutely have and add dark elements to add depth it does the same thing it's that contrast between the two colorways, the darker and the brighter that causes this really, and it sounds really weird, but in interiors, you always want to have a bit of friction and tension going on.

30:38And no one will ever come into your space and go, my God, the friction in this room is amazing. I mean, no one ever will because they won't know what you've done, but you need that friction to add that depth and to add that kind of magical sprinkling of, you know, it's almost like you can't work out quite what you've done but the rooms feel really amazing and that's all to do with this sort of underlying friction and tension going on do you ever use black black or do you use like dark brown dark blue i use brown i use black with brown in it so it's always got all of my colors i use at my house and in projects i've all got earthy warm undertones so they're generally on the warmer side of the color wheel because that gives me my cozy cocooning and grounding vibe.

31:30So it's never a perfect black. It's never a perfect black because that can also be a little bit harsh. So it's always, and also you see, this is why, because I started off with paint way before botanicals. I think this is why I needed the flowers to feel hand painted because all the walls are made, the paint is made from pigments of the earth. So it's not a flat color. So as the light changes, we're east to west, the colors change. So it's this nuance of color upon color, layers and layers of color, as opposed to a flat synthetic, this is the color. So it doesn't matter what time of day it is in this room, this color will continually change as the light moves around the house.

32:07And that's what you get when you use pigments that are literally made from the earth. Did you ever have pushback from early clients, like when you were just starting to go dark? Always, always. How did you make your proof of concept? How did you get that? Well, I mean, this sounds very rude, but the great thing about having your own business is that you can just constantly say, well, I'm out of here. Bye. Which is what I would do quite a lot. Sorry if I'm not. I mean, no, I'm joking. A lot of it, you know, funnily enough, it was always the guys that had the biggest problem. The women, I don't know, seem to want to.

32:41And obviously, you know, I've got a certain style. So people are coming to me because they want that style. But then when you're literally about to do it, it's like, oh, my God, it's not going to work. Look, it's good. So I'd constantly have to ferry people through the house so they could just kind of see the environment. And the biggest thing is about having confidence. So I would say, look, let's just start with the smallest room in your house, the smallest room in your house. And if you really hate it, I'll paint it back. I mean, I was never going to paint it back. I'd just lie again and say I'd paint it back.

33:12So they'd be like, okay, the smallest room in the house. And of course I knew it would work. I knew it. I've done this for years. I knew it would work. And it did work. And then confidence. Some people totally embraced it. Other people were more scared. But also the whole thing about interior design is you never want to push your aesthetic on someone if they don't like it. Because the whole pleasure about being an interior designer is that feedback you get where people don't, before you're on board, they can't even imagine what you could do with your kind of, you know, magical hands. So I always, like I would never want someone not to love my aesthetic.

33:46So I think it's a lot of it is to do with confidence. And I think when you break the rules, whether that's in floristry or whether that's interiors, most people's reaction is to push back and go, oh, I don't think so. I don't think that's going to work. And so it's kind of gently, gently, slowly, slowly. And then towards the end, I'm like, I'm out of here. Take me, leave me. So I was lucky that most people kind of liked my vibe. Well, I want to go back to the actual stems, if you don't mind, only because, again, we've been working with them and really enjoying them in the homes. So what would you say, what would you recommend for people who are purchasing, again, to do, you know, these arrangements at home?

34:25How many would, like, kind of stems, would you say, to make it a nice full? And then kind of what height, kind of vase would you put it in? That's a really good question. I think, I mean, this is, so in a way, I want to tell you the rules, but I also kind of want to say there's no rules. So if I was having my floristry hat on, I would say, in a vase, you should always work with odd numbers. The same principles go with interior design. Because when you put three stems in a vase, or five stems in a vase or seven stems in a vase, the arrangement makes your eye work a little bit harder in order to transition around that arrangement.

35:08And when your eye works harder, it automatically feels more intriguing. So ideally we want odd numbers. Because it's so easy with floristry to feel intimidated, I would literally start with going for literally the same flower. So that could be five hydrangeas in a vase. Now in my world, and it's very subjective, but in the kind of AA world, when you're using anything like a garden flower, you don't really want to see the stem in the vase. So it's all about anything kind of rounded and beautifully shaped. It's all about you're just seeing the heads toppling over the vase. When anything is a bit larger, like a branch or a meadow flower, it's all about the stem.

35:55So you kind of have to ask yourself, number one, what stem am I going for? Am I going more garden? Am I going more meadow? Am I going more branchy? And if you're going really branchy, which look amazing on consoles and in bathrooms, you might only want one branch in a bottle vase, or you might want three. But the rule of thumb is, if you go with odd numbers, it will feel a lot more elevated than if you go with even numbers. And like I said, with our stems, we've kind of done all the work for you. So you don't have to ask yourself, will this stem go with this stem? Because we've done that. The color palette works.

36:32There's all of this variety of textures. When you're mixing bunches, and if you're not floristry trained, don't worry, because nor am I, you want to mix textures like you would in interior design, right? You wouldn't have everything in a room that was super smooth. So you would mix like a hydrangea with a rose that's got a really beautiful silky petal. We've started to introduce real touch into our collection. So the stems feel incredibly waxy. And then you might put a branch there that doesn't feel waxy. So you constantly want to think about contrast. The palette we've totally nailed for you.

37:07You never have to ask yourself about that. But you can gather them. You can put them loosely. You can play around with heights. They arch. You never really have to get scared because I think once you start playing around with those, you'll realize how easy it is to create something that's really phenomenal when you mix really beautifully curated stems, which is what we've done. But also, I'm a big fan of taking one stem and literally repeating it, repeating it, repeating it in a vase. So the big thing is ask yourself, do you want something really overarching, in which case it's all about the stems.

37:42you go more bottle vase or something more rounded, you would go in a more rounded vase, ideally ceramic or maybe clay or, you know, concrete. So you're not necessarily seeing the stems. One of the things that I keep finding with foes is that, you know, everything, all the stems are the same length. And so how do you get, how should we be using our foes to kind of alter the length of them? Oh, that's so easy. So first of all, when you have all of our foes, obviously depending on what stem you're buying, are going to come in different lengths. The branches are going to be the same height, for example, as a hydrangea, but you can bend them.

38:28I never, ever, ever cut them because if you cut them, then you can cut them, but I really wouldn't. And particularly if you can't see, if your vase isn't glass, you won't see what you've done. Another thing I use all the time, if I want to raise the height of the stems in a vase, is I'll use tissue paper or newspaper, put that in the bottom, gives you a little bit of height, and then you put the stems on top of that to add to your height. But the big thing is that you can manipulate and play with the stems by literally, you know, not cutting them. You can cut them, but I think it's a shame because I've got lots of branches in my earlier days that I cut and then I'm like, oh, but that height is so amazing.

39:08And then in the winter, I want something really arching on my console. So I would bend them. I wouldn't necessarily cut them. And if you're not seeing through the vase, no one will ever, ever know. No, that's brilliant. So bending them and then kind of binding them. Yeah, I don't even bind. Honestly, I'm so laid back about it. I don't even bind them because remember, if you're putting them, you know, most of our vessels, yours too, don't have huge, great gaping holes in them. So you're only ever going to put like five or seven. They all fit quite snugly. So you don't even need to kind of tape them up.

39:39I mean, you can if you're super, super professional, but I'm so not professional. I just shove them in there, bend them, done. And the tissue paper or the newspaper will give you height if you want to just have things feeling a little bit higher and your vase is too, you know, you just need to add that little bit of height. But yeah, totally tweak them. And you want them to, you don't want them to sit up like this. You want them to constantly lilt an arch over. The more that you can bend them and lilt them, like you would see in Mother Nature, really, Mother Nature is our guide, that that's how you want them to feel in a vase.

40:14They should never just be like this. They should always be lilting. Okay, so we talked about your color palette, how that's sort of breaking the rules, especially when you started doing it, because, you know, I feel like now it's maybe a little bit more common. We're seeing it more. Are there other rules that you think? Zootopia 2 has come home to Disney+. Let's go! Get ready for a new case. We're going to crack this case and prove we're the greatest partners of all time! New friends. You are... Gary the Snake. And your last name? The Snake. Dream Team. New Habitats. Zootopia has a secret reptile population.

40:56You can watch the record-breaking phenomenon at home. You're clearly working it. Zootopia 2, now available on Disney Plus Rated PG. It pays to break. I remember there was a video you recently posted on Instagram where you were talking about chairs, placing them at an angle instead of trade-on. Yeah. I mean, there's lots of rules I want to break if I'm just doing. uh the biggest the biggest rule i want to break um is ideally uh actually there's quite a few so i have a bit of a problem with um focal points when i studied interior design you learn as an interior designer you should always have one focal point in a room and i get that and a focal point your eye goes to it la la la the only trouble with having one focal point in a room is once your eye has darted to that focal point, so that could be a big mirror or a painting or a plant or a flower, whatever it is, you're then done.

41:54And then your eye is like, I want three in a room. So I want you to come into any one of my rooms and your eye goes straight to the focal point. And then you turn, but hold on, there's another focal point over here. Oh, but hold on, there's another focal point over there. So you suddenly feel very mesmerized and you don't know whether to go here with your eye or here with your eye or here with your eye. So the space feels incredibly dynamic and intriguing. Whereas if you've just got one, you've seen it, it's beautiful and it's done. Whereas if you have, if you pepper three in, then it just feels so much more intriguing.

42:30So that's really key to me. The next thing is texture. I never want anyone to tell me you should only have four textures in a room. Like I want to overdose on texture. I feel that unlike pattern where you have to be a little bit restrictive with text I mean you can see like sitting behind me like it's crazy with texture you can just layer and layer and layer and layer and it will always just constantly build and the other thing I really hate is people get a little bit cross with me when I say ideally in a room and in a relatively small room you should have between eight and 10 light sources. And they're like, eight to 10 light sources, that's just too many.

43:13But when you introduce little pockets of glow, it's really amazing. And when people are coming to my design classes, my house on the lower ground, every room floats into every room. So one person said, will you please count how many lights you have down here? Because I really think that you'll be like three hours before you go to bed. So I counted and I had like 25. but they're little pockets of glow and I'm like no I don't turn them off before it doesn't take me five hours to go to bed they're all controlled by my phone but I think sometimes we're like okay let's have a big pendant and let's have a few lights around the side and that doesn't feel very atmospheric to me so lots of little pockets of glow I think make all the difference in the world that and the focal points are really key and then not lining up furniture or particularly sofas against walls.

44:05I don't have a problem with a sofa butting a wall, but I always want a shelf behind it or a little console behind it. So it's not just the sofa going straight up against the wall. You can do a little bit of storytelling behind it with like a little table or a vase of flowers or something that just, I guess the word I'm obsessed with is layering. Because for me, the more layers that you add to a space, the cooler the space. And there is a fine line between a space feeling incredibly chaotic and not relaxing and a space feeling curated and relaxing. And that trick is the same as in the floristry and our botanical world is I really restrict the number of colors I'm playing with in my space.

44:49So everything feels incredibly harmonious. So it's not jarring exactly like, you know, the color palette on all the botanicals. It's not jarring. Everything works with everything else. And then you can get away with adding a few more things into a room that you would traditionally do. Oh, I have another pet peeve. The ceilings, this is my biggest pet peeve. I can't believe I forgot this. Ceilings and woodwork in my world, always, no matter what the color of your walls should be painted the same color as your walls. Because I don't understand, like I really have to investigate who said that the ceiling should always be white and the walls should be a different color.

45:27Because for me, when your ceiling is painted the same color as your walls, your walls automatically elongate because you can't see where the walls stop and the ceiling begins. They feel so much grander than they really are. Whereas when you paint the ceiling white, and if you have a darker color or a warmer color, it doesn't matter, but you're literally making those walls feel stumpier. And who comes into a room and goes, wow, this white ceiling is amazing. Let me just sit and look at this for a few. Like, who's doing that? No one. Like, why are the ceilings always white? I don't understand. I don't.

46:01That's such a great question. And I've always wondered that about molding. Yeah. You know, people always kind of, the standard is a white, you know, baseboard and a white crown. Or baseboards. Who's coming in to go, oh, hold the conversation. I've just got to look at this baseboard because the white on this baseboard turns, nobody needs to look at your baseboard. You should have so many other beautiful things in your room. Nobody needs to look at a baseboard painted out in white, is my point of view. It's so funny. Well, you know, we get the question all the time is whether color drenching is, you know, a trend.

46:35No, because that's what I did with the Italians 25 million years ago. Everything went the same color. Ceilings, woodwork, skirting. So no, it's not a trend. It's been going on for years. okay there there everyone everyone there's your definitive answer it's not a trend it's not a trend we'll be here forever it will always you talked about lighting you have 25 sources i mean that's that's a lot but are there things in there that you mentioned the pendant and the lamps but what are the things that are the that are getting you to 20 because i know you're not having 20 lamps no i mean things that people haven't considered well candlelight always candlelight is really integral because you've got that kind of kinetic flickering, flattering glow.

47:17And particularly if you use beeswax candles, because they're yellow as opposed to white candles. So you're taking it one step further and you've got that warmth, which is just so, so beautiful. I use a lot of portable lamps, like little USBs or factory operated lamps that you can just plop all over the space. And I think the biggest thing about turning around a space with lighting is having lights of different heights. So we don't want all of our table lamps to be exactly the same height. And if they happen to be, the easiest trick is put them on a stack of books. So just vary that height because then the light will fall very differently in your space than just at all being at this one height.

47:57And that makes all the difference. So when I'm ever thinking of adding lighting to a room or choosing lighting, I want to make sure that yes, there's harmony between maybe the materiality of the lights, but some lights are going to be diddy and some lights are going to be medium and some lights are going to be a lot taller. So therefore, my light is not flat in a room. It's just these little pockets of really beautiful glow. But yes, candlelight is really, for me, integral, particularly in the cooler months, obviously, when we have less light. Do you have like a little charging station for your mini lamps?

48:30Because that is something, I have a couple, but I'm like always free to charge them. I know. It's really, I know. You must have a system. Well, it drives my husband mad. I'm so obsessed with lighting. Like if a certain light is not on in a room, it makes me so cross. And he just doesn't care about lighting. He would work in the dark. He just wouldn't turn one light on. So if I've been away and I come back and he's just working in the corner with nothing on, whereas I have lights on at certain times of the day because I'm so obsessed with it. But yeah, no I charge my lamp any portables I charge um during the day when I'm not kind of because for me when I relax that's in my lower ground floor which kind of overlooks my garden and that's when I'm going to use all these different light sources like I'm not lighting candles in my office or in the studio or taking portables everywhere so I charge them in the day and then in the evening when I come down I just pop them I put some of the portables outside I've had all the gardens lit I put candles on.

49:30So it's kind of this whole little, it's kind of like my decompression thing, really. Oh, I love that. So you come home and you sort of like light the house and get it all glowy and then you commence your evening. Yeah. And then I'll cook something and then the kitchen kind of looks out over the garden. And so that's all lit up. And then, yeah, so it just, yeah, I'm very obsessed with lighting. I feel like we all are on this you've got a good group of people here we're very very particular I walked out of a store the other day because the lighting was so terrible I literally was like everything looks dingy I don't care if the product's good I'm out of here I could yeah I know I think I think because we're all in the homeware industry we just know how transformative it's so transformative and it's one of the kind of the least expensive things that you can do to turn a room around.

50:23I mean, I won't even go to restaurants. I'll have to go, what's the lighting? What's the color? Like, I'm not an easy person to kind of be with. Like, is the, and it don't even get me on low energy. I'm like, no, I don't want to eat in a hospital. Like, I feel like I'm eating in a hospital. So I'm terrible to go out to supper with because I'm like, well, I need to just check out what the color is, what the lighting is. Nevermind the menu. Well, you could have a Michelin star restaurant with like a terrible lighting and it's true the food tastes worse yeah it does the whole and it looks worse and i feel like i look bad so i'm like yeah i know i feel gross and yeah i'm just imagining you going to a restaurant and pulling the little led light out of your purse and putting it on the table i'm fixing i should actually walk around with like a suitcase and like oh no problem don't worry i'll fix it like mary poppins love it yeah around here like because i have a dog and we walk out when it's in the winter and then someone like might just have one pendant on in their room and nothing else and you're like shall i knock on the door shall i say i mean you just want to knock on the door and go you need help i think you know some people are bothered by lighting and some people aren't but when you see how much it transforms a room it like when you just and how it makes you feel right because it like when you get the lighting right and for me it's that you know when you go to the most it doesn't even have to be an expensive hotel but a really beautiful hotel or a really lovely bar and the lighting is so beautiful you just want to stay there for ages and hotels and hospitality are really great about really thinking about lighting because they make you want it makes you want to stay longer drink more eat more you know so I just think we need to take our guidance from the hospitality industry who a lot are doing really great things with lighting okay so do you have any other we've talked a lot about lighting and moods and I think the branch is another wonderful way to mood do you have anything else you would add you know that really makes that whole coming home comfortable thing you talked oh you talked texture scent is important and quite often neglected.

52:41I think it's like under, like it's just taking rooms to a slight, like just elevating them to a slightly different level. So for me, you know, I'm very much about, I don't want an overpowering scent in a room. I just want this kind of undertone of a scent. And you know, scent is incredibly personal, whether you like floral scents or pretty scents or slightly more woodsy scents. It doesn't really, really matter. But I think that when you have a room that feels beautifully scented, it's just that extra layer, isn't it? And for me, you know, I'm sure anyone who loves their home, you just want to create the most magical space on earth that you don't want to leave.

53:23And then when you use scent, it just kind of just layers that top note and feels really amazing. Do you? Yeah. What scents are you loving? Well, there is this pharmacy in Italy. It's the oldest pharmacy in the world. It started in 1200 and something. And it's called Santa Maria Novella. And they have stores all over the world. And they have this potpourri, which is, I'm so obsessed with it. They sell it in a little bag and it's all organic herbs and spices collected in the Florentine Hills. And I decant it because you get it in a bag and it's way too strong. You need the tiniest bit. And I put it in a tea light holder.

54:12And then I put these tea light holders all over the house. And it smells like this Italian forest. And it's so magical. And their pharmacies are magical. I think there's one in New York. There's a lot in London. They're all over Italy. And they're called Santa Maria Novella. And they have the most intoxicating smell. It's only one scent. But when I used to run these design classes, people were like, what's that smell? And the postman would be like, what's that smell? What's that smell? And I'm like, oh, that's Santa Maria Novella. He's obsessed with it. He literally buys it for everyone for Christmas, my postman.

54:45I buy it for everyone for Christmas. It's the best gift ever because you only need the tiniest little amount. And then it's in the loo. It's in the hallway. It's in all the transitional areas. and it's this underlying, incredible, woodsy, aromatic, foresty scent. And it lasts forever. And it goes back to your harmony thing. Oh, fantastic. The harmony scent. And it goes back to my harmony thing. Yeah. Through your home. And it's not overpowering. It's just, it's so, yeah. And you don't need to always, I mean, obviously you can light a candle or incense, but it's just got this underlying layer. It's so beautiful.

55:22I love that. But I haven't heard anyone talk about using potpourri and so long that I'm like. Well, I mean, you see, the thing that really interests me about potpourri is a bit like faux flowers. Such a bad rap. When you say fake flowers or artificial flowers, people be like, oh, God, the plastic, the horrible. Or you say potpourri and people go, oh, my God, that was so 80s. But they have I mean, they haven't even reinvented it because it's been going on since 1200 and something. But they are just at the top of their game. they are it's honestly if you ever if you ever see one of their pharmacies you have to go in because they're always tiny little spaces but they are so beautiful i have never this is that's just a wonderful wonderful like thing to tell people yeah you'll love it so much you'll love it your little treat there i did have a question though what is your next so you've changed faux florals again you've made them cool and hip again i feel like you are you're helping with this potpourri wrap so what's your next uncool thing i think you're gonna make it so weird i haven't really thought about that i think for well i think for us now um you know the botanicals and having them with you guys and having them in america um is like we're so excited about it we just want to constantly innovate and push so we're now moving on to plants we're in the very early stages um and I think that's going to be our our next thing because house plants can sometimes be a bit naff like you just can't find I know it's it's actually proving quite hard because I thought plants would be quite easy and uh we're doing quite a lot of research on it and it's they're not because when I think with our stems like we want really unusual varieties and I want unusual varieties of plants but I don't always want them to feel quite so tropical if I'm going I don't want a cactus you know people do that really like plants and I don't mind if they're more draping but if I'm doing a cactus then I need to bring all my kind of I need it painted and I need it go down a lot more branches because I just think a lot of people that sell stems now, which are all fine, but they're all of a certain ilk.

57:50And I just want to go. So we're going to the Chelsea Flower Show. We're seeking out really unusual varieties and we're putting those into production and I'm learning all the time. So I just, now we're onto this kind of whole mantra of being really obsessed with it and it's doing really well, I kind of feel like I want to stay in my botanical lane. I think if I took on another thing, I don't even know what I'd take on. I don't even know what I would take on. You don't have the time for it. I don't even know. Yeah. Like there's so many things that we want to do botanically. But plants is a big thing.

58:23And I love plants. And so it's just trying, it's the, how they are painted, how they look, You know, there's so in the early days, it takes so long to get to the point where, OK, we can go from this point. There's a lot of back and forth and samples being rejected at this point and not working. So that's kind of something that we're working on. Well, your cactus looks great. I saw that online. Thank you. Thank you. He's so cute. So cute. Well, I know we are doing a big launch. We have you right now just in our flagship store, but we're rolling out across all of our stores soon. And then Future Online will have your stems as well.

59:03I know, I'm so excited. Liz, did you have the timing of all that for the rollout? Caroline, do you remember the timing for our rollout? So I can be honest to people. I thought it was five in autumn, winter, and then spring, summer, 27. It was everything, I think. I think you're right. Yeah. five or seven i think spring of i think spring summer's everything of 27 yeah so this fall will you'll be in at least 10 of our stores and then we're going to be rolling out even more in the spring of 27 amazing and we'll have we'll have more of your botanicals online so oh my gosh they are so so gorgeous um i can't wait for all of our listeners to kind of look look them up because they are just so stunning oh thank you you won't believe them thank you i just saw them at round top too i just went past them and saw somebody had purchased them from you and really and that was beautiful yeah oh that's so nice to know well we're super excited to be partnering with you because we love your brand it's just got such a i think we're very aligned with this kind of relaxed and really beautiful interiors and incredible stems.

1:00:23So I think it's a really lovely collaboration. It's true. We love lamps. We love lamps. We love painted ceilings. We really are. We love layering. Textures. Layering. Exactly. Fabulous. Can you tell everyone where they can find you, follow you, and see your work? Oh, thank you. Well, abigaillehan.com is our website. We have a flagship store in London, in Islington. And Abigail Lehan on Instagram is where you'll find me daily posting, storying, talking homeware, botanicals, everything to make a space feel layered and beautiful. I just love your videos. They're incredible. Thank you. You have such a great way of talking about, you know, decorating in a way that's real, like, easy and fun.

1:01:13Accessible. That's what it should be. Yeah, exactly. And everyone can do it. You don't have to be trained to do it. Exactly. Yeah. Well, thank you guys. Thanks for joining us. And that's our show. You can find all of the show notes on our blog, howtodecorate.com slash podcast. To send in a decorating dilemma, email your questions to podcast at BallardDesigns.net so we can help you with your space. And of course, be sure to follow us on social media at Ballard Designs. Don't forget to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts so you never miss an episode. And please leave us a review. We'd love to hear your feedback.

1:01:45Until next time. Happy decorating!

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