Dream House

These days, I spend a lot of time thinking about my Future Dream Home.  In fact, I think I always have – I remember as a child, going to the theatre with my parents and deciding that I was going to live in Soho when I grew up.  Make of that what you will.

Besides, living in a quite-tiny one-bedroom rented flat, with brown carpets and rules against putting anything up on the walls, it’s kind of necessary.  It’s not all bad, though – at least this flat has a shower and room for a bedside table.  The last one didn’t; I’m going up in the world.  Literally, my flat is on the top floor.

There are many variations on the Future Dream Home.  Often I set myself various imaginary budgets and search Rightmove for suitable properties in this rich and successful parallel universe, or vary where I decide I want to live today, depending on my mood.  These range from swanky flats in central London, to grand townhouses in Brighton and Bath, then country piles anywhere from Lewes to Somerset to Devon to the Mull of Kintyre.

I’m not even that ambitious – I don’t like the really huge houses and, even in my imaginary world, am daunted by a lot of land.  Ideally, one day, I would like a house with three bedrooms, space for me to have an ‘office’ and a cellar or fancy shed for Jimmy to have a studio.  A small garden might be quite nice.

Here are my favourite elements of other people’s houses that I am planning to copy (Isabella Blow’s, Pearl Lowe’s, and Amanda Harlech’s, respectively):