We’d been looking for a house for about a year and had narrowed down the search to a part of east London known as Walthamstow Village,’ recalls freelance interiors stylist Marisa Daly. She and her partner, literary agent Jonathan Conway, had been living together in his flat in St John’s Wood for a couple of years, but the time had come to move on.
‘As lovely as it was having Regent’s Park on the doorstep, space became limited once I’d moved in with all my stuff,’ she laughs. ‘I needed somewhere other than the tiny second bedroom to store the vases, plates, bedlinen, cushions, textiles, books, paintings, glasses and cutlery that I need for shoots. Furnishing an entire house from my prop store wouldn’t have been a problem, but it would have been a chaotic jumble. I love to be surrounded by colour and pattern, but less is more, and a sense of balance is important.’
The couple eventually found a three-bedroom Victorian terrace in a quiet street with the added bonus of a leafy garden and a cellar. ‘The house had been rented for years and it felt pretty unloved, but it was sound and the cellar was a fabulous extra as far as I was concerned – at last, a designated storage space for my props! I would lie awake at night mentally organising everything onto imaginary shelves.’
Using a local architect, Marisa drew up plans to update and extend the house, adapting it to their needs. ‘The intention was to nudge the interior into a more contemporary look without obliterating the Victorian character,’ she explains. Combining styles and finishes to add character and interest to an interior is very much part of Marisa’s design ethos.
The Victorian architectural details that were still in situ were retained and she even reinstated one or two, such as the fire surround in the rear reception room. However, the old fireplace in the kitchen had to go. ‘It wasn’t decorative or practical and keeping it would have reduced the work surface, so out it went.’ Marisa’s props had their place in the cellar, but Jonathan’s ever-increasing library also required house room. The solution was floor-to-ceiling shelves that bridge the space between the fireplaces in the sitting and dining rooms. ‘Each shelf is deep enough for a double row of books – there must be at least a thousand volumes up there – but a room without books is unthinkable.’
When it comes to the decorative scheme, shades of green provide a subtle link between the various rooms. ‘We look out on mature trees in the garden so they were my inspiration for the colour of the kitchen cupboards.’ The wallpapers for the bedrooms had long been in Marisa’s ‘favourites’ file and the blind fabric in her daughter’s bedroom was recycled from a shower curtain she had made 10 years ago.
Much of the furniture came from auctions, fairs and family. The pair of mirrored marquetry cabinets in the dining room came from Marisa’s maternal grandfather, who bought them on one of his regular visits to the antiques shops of Diss, Sudbury and Woodbridge. ‘Pattern and colour were in his DNA, and I guess they’re in mine too,’ she says. ‘My mother remembers as a child being taken on an outing to choose wallpaper at Cole & Son when the showroom was in Mortimer Street. In due course, rolls of the chosen design were delivered and she watched, transfixed as it was hung and the room was transformed.’
Marisa’s prop-buying excursions to antiques fairs in and around London have given her plenty of opportunity to add to her varied collections, which range from glass and china to paintings and prints. ‘Glass adds sparkle when used in a shoot, so I can always persuade myself I need another example. My grandmother had lovely Moser wine glasses that she’d inherited from her parents. I thought they were exquisite – quite unlike the glasses that were in everyday use in their house. I liked to imagine the parties where they’d have been used during the 1920s and 1930s. Contemporary Moser is just as magical, the faceted vases glowing with jewel-like colour, adding instant glamour to any room.’
Some of the paintings and prints Jonathan and Marisa have bought together, while others have been picked up on prop-buying trips. ‘I always try to visit Battersea Decorative Antiques & Textiles Fair, but it’s best without children. Ardingly is more relaxed, especially on a fine day – I can rummage through the stands while Jonathan takes the children to the RHS garden at nearby Wakehurst for lunch and a session in the ‘mud kitchen’ for Phoebe. It’s a perfect day, especially when I’ve added a decorative piece or two to my collection.’
