A Lick Studio whole house renovation transformation

Katie and Byron are a young London couple who reached out to us towards the end of their house renovation journey. With a goal to build their dream family home in the countryside, they embarked on their very own Grand Designs renovation project, converting a humble barn-style bungalow in Somerset into a spacious family home suitable for their two children and their new rural lifestyle.

Why did they come to Lick Studio for help?

This was Katie and Byron’s first whole-house renovation project, and by the time it came to finding a colour scheme, they felt totally overwhelmed by choice. Big projects, like renovations, can be incredibly draining, and they had lost their energy due to the process of the build and all the decisions they had to make. They came to us when they had reached a point of decision fatigue;

“The pressure of getting the colours right was causing us anxiety. We had worked so hard on building this house and we really wanted to get the colour scheme right, but we just didn’t know where to start. We knew the feeling we wanted to create in our home, but we didn’t know the colours which would serve this. That’s why when we found Lick’s colour consultancy service, it felt like it was a no brainer”, explains Katie.

The pressure of getting the colours right was causing us anxiety...We knew the feeling we wanted to create in our home, but we didn’t know the colours which would serve this.

Katie

One of their main concerns was that their property would feel too new and lack personality. Being a bungalow extension, it ran the risk of feeling like a new build and losing its original country charm. We were tasked with alleviating Katie and Byron’s colour anxiety and helping the couple find a colour scheme that flowed harmoniously throughout their house, connecting the extension to the original property.

What decisions went into our colour recommendations?

Katie and Byron expressed a desire for the interior of their new home to embrace and reflect its gorgeous natural surroundings. They wanted each room to flow seamlessly into one another and for the colour scheme to feel warm and natural. We recommended light pinks and greens, which ended up being Katie and Byron’s ‘red thread colours’ that informed the colour scheme throughout the house, and were used to link all the rooms together.

The property boasts a beautiful open-plan kitchen-living room, which forms the nucleus of the home and a central family gathering area. They wanted the open-plan space to feel very warm and welcoming, and for the two areas to connect seamlessly. With this in mind, our Colour Consultants recommend the soft and warming Pink 02 to connect the kitchen to the living room.

Not only is Pink 02 an incredibly warming neutral that works wonderfully in large open spaces, but it is also the perfect complementary colour to their dark hunter-green, shaker-style kitchen (just look at that stunning tongue and groove panelling). It also creates a tonal harmony with the pink framed wallpaper panels in their living room, which they wanted to be a focal point.

Their entranceway leads into the open plan living room kitchen and features a large glass front door. It was in this space that Katie and Byron wanted to create a wow factor, whilst bringing nature in. The house is in a U-shape with big windows, and they really wanted to pull in the garden. “Our whole reason for moving to Somerset was to be closer to nature”, Katie told us.

With this knowledge, our Colour Consultants knew this was a great opportunity to create a really biophilic feel in their home through the use of a nature-inspired colour scheme and botanical wallpaper. We encouraged them to wrap the entrance hall in wallpaper (floor-to-ceiling), in order to completely immerse themselves in the design. This botanical pattern, with its soft neutral backdrop, gives the illusion of space and makes the small entranceway feel expansive, bridging the gap between the inside and the outside. As there is no breaking point on the eye, it allows the eye to travel out into the garden.

In the dining room, Katie and Byron wanted to continue the biophilic theme we had introduced in the entrance hall. We recommend a tonal green colour palette of Green 01 walls and Green 06 woodwork, which formed the perfect backdrop to their botanical prints, house plants, and the natural textures and materials in the form of a large jute rug and a wooden dining table. We also encouraged them to refrain from having any window dressings, in order to allow the natural light to flow right through and really connect the space to the outside. 

The colour palette for the bathroom also took on the pink and green colour combination. For Katie and Byron, it was about lifting the colours from the kitchen and flowing them throughout the house. We encouraged them to paint the walls of this bathroom in Pink 02, which paired gorgeously with the dark green metro tiles.

In their master bedroom, they wanted to create a soft, warm feel. We recommended a tonal colour scheme with Pink 01 on walls and Pink 02 woodwork. Tonal colour schemes are very harmonising and restful to the eye, whilst the dark wood and green accents ground the space and give depth to the room.

The Lick colour palette

Love Katie and Byron’s house colour scheme? Check out the Lick colour palette below:

How was the overall experience with Lick Studio?

We asked Katie how she found the consultation process;

“Working with Lick Studio was an absolute delight. We were like a rabbit in headlights with so many different ideas and really feeling the pressure of our choices. They totally reassured us, and helped us navigate and explain colour (and colour psychology) which was a fascinating process. They gave us the confidence to choose a colour palette of pinks and greens and we developed our whole interior design off the back of it. The peel and stick samples were also extremely helpful when we were out shopping for furniture, making sure everything was also in line with the look and feel we wanted to create in our home.”

Want to get inspired by more Lick studio transformations? Take a look at this south London living room project.