max herd is Who Wears What in Residence UK Editor and London-based art director, tastemaker, interior stylist and creative consultant. A collaborator and consultant to leading luxury brands including Manolo Blahnik, Farfetch, Asprey, Cartier, H&M and Patrón Tequila, his spirited aesthetic – which he describes as “Oscar Wilde meets Marie-Antoinette by way of a Brazilian bordello” – enables him to curate, write and create on interiors and culture.
Starting anything is hard. Take writing, for example; Staring at a blank page can feel a bit like staring into the void. Often, infinite possibilities end before they even become possibilities. It’s truly remarkable how much I can get done in a day without the horror of facing the blank white page. Procrastination has actually become a way of tricking yourself into getting things done. Other The tasks I’ve been putting off. All I have to do is open a Word doc, and boom: In a matter of minutes, I’m away from my desk and folding last week’s laundry.
The same may be true for decoration. The idea of starting a renovation, no matter how small, can be so daunting that often, “temporary” sofas or “just for now” blinds hang around much longer than you initially planned. Before you know it, “just for now” becomes forever.
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This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t take your time when it comes to decorating. In fact, I would encourage you to do so. Making hasty decisions always leads to unnecessarily costly regrets. However, you shouldn’t let the fear of getting it wrong get in the way of creating a special space for you to live in. So, where to start?
How to Renovate Like a Pro, According to an Interior Expert
1. Sharing is caring
First of all, get excited! Whether it’s a complete dismantling of everything, including the kitchen sink, or a simple paint job, turn fear into fun. If you can, involve a few trusted advisors. This doesn’t have to be a formal working arrangement, but rather talk to friends and share ideas with people whose likes you trust. Get proactive and even start a WhatsApp group with like-minded people you know, where you can all share both realistic and highly delusional ideas for renovation.
I have a group chat called Reno and Brunch Day (I know, not just — even creative people’s creativity has limits) in which two friends and I go back and forth with increasingly outrageous decorating plans. Some, thankfully, will never see the light of day, but some ideas to passAnd there will be others very soon. The responsibility of actually presenting your ideas to people and encouraging or discouraging them is invaluable in itself.
2. Send yourself a save the date
Set yourself a work date, a date by which you must complete whatever project you are working on. Now, the trick here is that this can’t just be a random date that you pulled out of the air; There must be some reason for this. In my case, I was photographing the house for a magazine, so it needed Manolo-Blahnik-slippers-to-the-paddles to dress it up for close-ups.
Of course, this is a very specific reason, but are you hosting a big family gathering on a Sunday? Is your birthday coming? Are your friends coming for housewarming? Like a WhatsApp group to keep you on track, setting a date by which the project “must” be done means you can’t keep putting it off. The good news is that once you start, you have something to finish. So find a reason, and make a plan.
3. Invest in the best otherwise you’ll never rest
Now for the practical parts. First, prepare yourself for the financial impact. If you’re doing a full-scale renovation, it pays to get it right the first time, and to guarantee you get it right, sometimes, you need to spend. Cutting corners can get you to the end faster, but all it does is you’ll have to go back later and deal with the mess you escaped. I’ve heard this told to my friends and clients (and even to myself, lying in bed late at night, realizing the magnitude of my expenses) that for most people, your home is your biggest asset. And like all assets, they require proper care to grow.
Moving money from the bank to the bricks and mortar of your home increases the value of the property, like adding money from your savings to an investment fund. So, while the initial quote may seem frightening, you’re not just spending money, you’re investing it. It’s just that in this case, you can actually live in it and enjoy your cumulative interest. (I can imagine my accountant is pulling his hair out reading this.) Once you’ve allocated a budget – and I’d recommend you work with a number in mind in any project – add 10% to it. Then, it’s time to start the fun.
4. Map it out (and don’t be sample-shy!)
The question I probably get asked most is, “How do I decorate with color?” The answer I give every time is simple: Be adventurous with your samples. Diddy-widdy, perfectly painted squares don’t give any real sense of what the room will actually look like when it’s finished, so go big, and then live with those samples for at least a week, being sure to notice how the light affects the color throughout the day, and how the colors interact from one room to the next.
I often find that the most successful colors in my projects are the ones that I least suspected would be made of tin, but which shined when I plastered them on the wall. Color often needs space to breathe, to show you what it can do, and that can’t be in a microscopic square. For a really handy visualization tool, create a document with all the fabrics and paint colors you want to use, lining them up next to each other in the order you want them to appear in the house. This allows you to “walk” throughout the house.
Remember that each room is an individual chapter of a broader story, and the best stories are those in which each chapter contributes directly to the plot. Rooms need to work together, and the best way to ensure this is to create a physical color and texture map. The beginning is often the hardest part, but in my experience, the end is sometimes even harder. Once you catch the reno bug, it’s hard to shake it, and once you train your eye to see improvements, it’s important to enjoy what you’ve already created, without constantly looking for elements to improve.
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