Bringing a bustling city and its people into your home

With interior designers in the West using more and more colour, the work of artists such as Sunil Gupta has become a mainstay. Designers have understood that the discerning public wants to have a deeper experience when in the home environment. By incorporating works by artists like Sunil, they are able to satisfy an aspect of that need.

Very collectable, Sunil’s work is internationally acclaimed – his photographic stills from the film ‘Looking for Langston’ are selling in the region of $50,000 for a set of prints.

His Delhi series too has made a huge impact – a dedicated approach that has manifested in an unusual recording a complex city teeming with life, struggling for survival, love, and culture. Nizamuddin Area 1 works tells a story – a young girl holding a bikers helmet outside an educational institute – within a moment Sunil captures an entire lifetime.

 

 

“Gupta’s images traditionally document his own feelings of living as a gay Indian man in Europe, existing between the different cultures of Eastern and Western society. The Homelands series was inspired by where the artist lived. The Homelands (2001-2003) exhibition was produced when the artist was based at the University of Southampton. Gupta kept in mind his own HIV virus and all the different places he had inhabited when he created what he describes as diptychs. According to Gupta his “initial experiments in binary oppositions – the West versus India, inside versus outside,” seemed formulaic. Thus his East/West theme has continued but with the addition of other parameters that make the work more ‘spontaneous and intuitive.” 24 hour museum

Keys to Design for Singles

In this week’s article from the Art & Design Zone – “Keys to Design for Singles” we bring you an altogether unique voice. Our guest contributor Maxine Mangat is based in Canada. Maxine is a teacher and academic by profession in addition to regularly writing for various magazines.

In this article, Maxine explores the options faced by young people when starting up in their own independent home and how to make it comfortable and pleasing to the eye; a place which signifies a sanctuary. Maxine effectively explores great ideas on how to maximise on budgetary constraints by focusing on accessories and the use of art work of various styles and genres.

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Already a member – we would love to hear your comments on this article and if it was useful to you.  Let us know your thoughts below, or if you would like to contribute ideas for another article, please do e-mail us your suggestions

Who Collects Art

This week in the Art & Design Zone we’re delighted to be able to publish the first interview from our much anticipated series “Who Collects Art”.

Who Collects Art is an insight into Private Art Collections, from the bizarre to the more traditional, and their Collectors. In this series of articles, we talk to collectors from the Forbes 100 list, celebrities to everyday people, with an aim to demystify who collects art, why and how they bring it into their everyday lives. In this, the first article of the series, Shakila Taranum Maan; screenwriter, film director and co-founder of The Art Ministry; talks about her private art collection.

Not a member of the Art & Design Zone, join today and access this free article and many more.

Already a member – we would love to hear your comments on this article and if it was useful to you.  Let us know your thoughts below, or if you would like to contribute ideas for another article, please do e-mail us your suggestions

Beginners Guide to Interior Design

This week in the Art & Design Zone we have a great new article – Beginners Guide to Interior Design. We look at key areas that will help you to define, plan and create your ultimate home.   You can read about the basic principles behind good interior design, with tips from designers and links to leading design resources. Plus you can also read about individuals who have successfully decorated their homes, talk about their triumphs and failures, and their suggestions on how to avoid mistakes.  

Not a member of the Art & Design Zone, join today and access this free article and many more.

Thank you to everyone who responded to our call outs, we’ve published some of your comments in full in the blog. If you are decorating your first home it’s definitely worth looking at some of the Top Design Tips.

Decorating 1st Home Tips #4

I’ve always wanted my home to be my sanctuary, a space which has a profound and truly healing effect on the way I feel and behave.

By combining the practical and aesthetic values of interior design with the ancient art of Feng Shui, I was able to create a living space that improved my life beyond measure.

We all sense intuitively when we feel comfortable in a room. Our home should be a soothing, calm space where we feel secure and content, and can relax completely. Bedrooms should be places for deep, peaceful and regenerative sleep. A working space needs to be a place for ideas, imagination and focus.

Feng Shui is the ancient Oriental system of arranging living and work spaces to enhance health, wealth and happiness. It is sometimes called ‘acupuncture for buildings’. When we feel more comfortable in our surroundings we sleep better, feel better and operate more effectively.

By combining the practicality of interior design with the ancient art of Feng Shui, together you can create a space that works for you on every level.

TEN TIPS FOR ENHANCING YOUR NEW HOME

• Repair anything which is broken as soon as possible. (e.g. stuck doors, dripping taps etc., as these can cause your energy to become blocked or drained, respectively)
• Clear out clutter regularly and try to avoid accumulating it, especially in corners of rooms, as it creates stagnant energy. Similarly, make sure that any gardens, patios and ponds are well-cared for.
• Ensure that the entrance to your home looks welcoming and well-lit in order to attract beneficial opportunities into your life.
• Brighten up any rooms (or corners of them) which feel gloomy.
• Avoid working or sleeping below a beam or over-hanging cupboard.
• Choose plants with rounded leaves, rather than spiky ones, which can unconsciously feel threatening or cause people around them to become ‘prickly’!
• Any mirrors used should be unbroken, should not divide or cut the top off your reflection and should reflect something inspiring and attractive.
• Have as few pieces of electrical equipment in the bedroom as possible and unplug them before you go to sleep. Apart from bedside lamps, anything electric should be at least 6 feet away from the bed.
• Avoid metal bed frames and synthetic materials for bedding and nightwear, as these concentrate the effects of electro-magnetic pollution.
• Cooking on gas in preference to electricity, if possible, and avoiding microwaves will benefit your health.

Good luck!
 
Best regards,

Amanda Keaton
Sleep for Life – helping people sleep better for life
http://www.sleepforlife.com

Decorating 1st Home Tips #3

For my first home I was very specific and I knew what I wanted and that was the way it was going to be – so it took me a long time – the blue had to be a specific blue and terracotta a particular shade.

Having been like that, when I moved into my second house I just wanted it to be functional, clean, light and airy and not worry about the cost. I remember I wanted one of the boys’ bedrooms to have a specific type of wooden bed and I searched for it in all the magazines and travelled to where they were selling it.

For the lounge at that time wrought iron was the rage and I had seen two chairs for the lounge that I wanted, found them and travelled to get, tested them but over time we all realised how uncomfortable they were. Fashion really dictated to me how certain things should be but in the lounge I had my own vision of a Desert look; cacti everywhere, pebbles, very earthy. For the kitchen I got a very expensive kitchen which turned out to be unusable for the most part – I just didn’t use half of what I had and what it cost me I never really got that back in usage.

The thing that really didn’t go to plan was the wall painting I was doing. First I used acrylics and that didn’t work, then I used car paint and then we discovered that you couldn’t take it off and the only way was to replace or skim over it, which we did in the end.

My top tips would be:

• What you think will look good and living with it are two different things – you have to remember it’s a functional space as well.
• Don’t make it overbearing
• Think it through with others, it not just your choice
• Really question what you want to use the room or a certain item for
• Don’t go for brand names
• Think about the fact that the house cannot take certain types of furnishings and fabrics – large sofa’s in a small room or too elaborate fabrics, curtains – these will dominate a small room.

Amarjeet Kaur Nandhra, Artist, West London , United Kingdom

Decorating 1st Home Tips #2

For our first home, we wanted to have warm colours, welcoming not ourselves, where we felt comfortable but also our families and friends. We spent most of the money on the lounge as Matt wanted an open house as he came from a very sociable family and family and friends are very important to him. We got our sofa which is handmade from Mexico and it was the most expensive items.

I like to have flowers and pictures for example we have an image of the Great Wall of China, its one of the places we want to visit. We have scenes of a sunset on a beach, charming pictures.

I wish there were more pictures – in the hallway and staircase going up, I’ve made a gallery of all the pictures and art we bought on our travels it fits in with where they are as you are always travelling up and down the stairs so to speak.

We though it would take two weeks to do the house, but it took 2 years! I think it’s important to communicate with each other properly and you have to fit it into your life and keep the bigger picture in your mind.

My top tips would be:

• When you are were planning, gather as much information as possible, it won’t delay the project.
• Don’t aim too high and stay in budget.
• Remember your limits, you think you can do it all but sometimes it’s cheaper to get an expert in.
• Do the lounge and bedroom first, they are areas where you relax and keep the colours bright, sunny and relaxed. 

Lyndsey Taylor, Regional Sales Manager, Elite Hotels, Bedfordshire, United Kingdom

Decorating 1st Home Tips #1

Thank you to everyone who has contacted us with their comments and tips for decorating your first home.  We’ll be posting some of the emails we received here, over the next few days:

“I wanted to maximise the light coming through my windows and getting good energy throughout the house. I wanted the house to be de-cluttered with a lot of orange colour everywhere, in the flowers, paintings that I have and poster prints. I like to see movement in the paintings that I have – one in particular has both a lot of orange and red and a lot of movement in it. I wanted to have sculptural pieces in the house so I have a South African sculpture in the hallway – this makes me feel good too.

My instinct was to de-clutter – I think you see a lot more when you have less and you can pinpoint particular things around you when your environment is like that.

Top-Tips:

• De cluttering
• Always have red wine in the cupboard
• Always have good access to your books
• Clean windows regularly to get light in
• Carpet in the bedroom for winter mornings
• Wardrobes are amazing – won’t be without one ever again
• Storage is key to enjoying living – so much better for the mind
• Clutter is less calming and more stressed orientated”
         

Navita Atreya, Barrister,  London. UK

Decorating your first home

Hello everyone
 
We’re writing a article on decorating your first home and we’d love to hear from you all.
 
What was your experience like? What did you learn, any tips for those of us coming to it the first time?
 
We’d love to hear from you, call us on 0208 581 2328 or email us or leave your comments below.
 
Many thanks

Anita & Shakila