An eclectic bungalow in Wiltshire

By kirstylyons

Published: Sunday, 18 December 2022 at 12:00 am

Louisa Greville Williams still smiles every time she walks through the door of her Wiltshire home: ‘It’s like coming home to a warm embrace,’ she says. ‘It’s a house filled with my treasures and I love its quirkiness and colour.’

The designer is keen to extend that warm welcome to friends and family over the holidays. Her sons, George and Ned, now in their 20s, still live at home so, come Christmas, the house is filled with their friends as well as her parents who live in the village and are constantly popping in and out.

‘We like socialising and regularly invite lots of friends and families for drinks or dinner over the week or so between Christmas and New Year, and in the years I actually ‘do’ Christmas Day, we normally have another family for lunch, too. It’s the time in the year when I really have a chance to enjoy cooking and entertaining. Although next year I’m hoping to run away to somewhere hot!’

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With its six bedrooms and four bathrooms there’s no shortage of space, but it’s a far cry from the cramped 1960s/1970s bungalow Louisa bought back in 2011. ‘It was horrible in parts,’ she admits. ‘The previous owner had a joinery shop, hence the panelling and the detail on the stairs, which I love. But there were also ‘built-in’ beds and furniture everywhere, which didn’t always work, and there turned out to be annoying problems like rotten windows that slowed down renovations and ate up my decorating budget.’

Louisa had bought the bungalow with planning permission for an extension, but decided to take it back to the planning stage to create a more dramatic two-storey extension to the rear, which has improved the layout of the whole house. She cast a fresh eye on the original part of the house, changing rooms such as the bathroom and bedroom within her master suite. ‘It was quite bizarre,’ she explains. ‘The bed was built into the window where my bath is now, and most of what is now my bedroom was given over to a dressing room, including the two lovely big sash windows with the only decent view of the garden.’

Due to the necessary remedial work, the building and decorating didn’t always happen in Louisa’s preferred order. ‘In many ways I had to just throw things together, so it’s a very under-planned house, but it works,’ she says.

The furniture and accessories are a real mix of styles and eras, encompassing bric-a-brac finds, pieces Louisa has inherited from her mother and grandparents, and other gems hauled back from her travels; this is a house where traditional botanical prints sit happily alongside bright Bollywood posters, faded florals next to kilim rugs.

‘I really don’t get too precious about genres,’ she admits. ‘I choose things because I love them rather than to collect, per se. And, if it’s not auction finds, it will be something from a buying trip abroad where we’re filling a van.’

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Most of the sofas in the house are hand-me-downs that have been lovingly reupholstered. And when it comes to reupholstery, the fabric designers Louisa turns to, among many others, include Sarah Vanrenen, her business partner in Vanrenen GW Designs, as well as Penny Morrison. She is careful to mix things up, avoiding anything too matchy-matchy, and adds in cushions in vintage fabrics from the stash she has collected over the years.

It’s a design style she describes as traditional English country with a twist, although there are also many American designers whose work she admires as well: ‘They tend to be brave with where they put furniture and brave in their colour choices,’ she adds. ‘Because of the slightly chaotic way I’ve had to work here, this place is certainly more haphazard than anything I would do for a client, but the boys and I love it.’

The house had been painted white throughout when Louisa bought it, and the fabulous colour palette here evolved over time. Louisa gives a nod to her art training and the fact that her parents were great maximalists, covering every wall with paintings – a passion she has inherited – but, she can also be moved by the beauty of her surroundings.

‘Driving home one day I passed the most incredible field of yellow rape next to a green pasture, with a great expanse of blue sky above, and I knew right then I had to go home and paint the ceiling in the green sitting room yellow!’ The house is still a work in progress, she says. ‘It’s always changing, always evolving, it doesn’t stay the same for very long.’

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Year-round, Louisa fills the house with plants and fresh flowers, but she sees Christmas as an excuse to go ‘completely over the top’, gathering greenery and berries from the neighbourhood hedgerows and enlisting the help of her friend, local florist Claire Lloyd, who garlands the fireplaces and stairs.

‘I’m not that great at arranging anything bigger than a vase,’ she laughs. And as she prefers to decorate the house with real flowers and greenery, she tends to take it all down a little earlier than Twelfth Night. ‘It’s all looking rather droopy by then, which is rather how we feel at that stage!’

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The double-height galleried hallway adds grandeur to the house and allows for an impressive Christmas tree. The blind fabric is Sunda by Louisa’s business partner Sarah, available through Penny Morrison.
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Louisa with her Jack Russell, Evie.
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She has transformed the house beyond recognition, adding a double-storey extension with a gallery hallway. The walls are painted in Setting Plaster by Farrow & Ball, which is a lovely warm neutral. The light fitting is the large Skipper pendant by Tom Raffield. The botanical prints came from OKA.
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From outside it’s hard to imagine this as a 1960s bungalow. Louisa’s friend, florist Claire Lloyd, produces spectacular wreaths for Christmas and runs courses for her charity, Team Archie, which is in memory of her son Archie, who died on his gap year.
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The lampshade on a glass base on the antique ‘green man’ console table came from Vanrenen GW Designs, as did the scalloped rug.
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The snug walls are painted in Garden by Little Greene and the ceiling is a shade of yellow from Papers and Paints. The portraits are Louisa’s sons, painted by Tom Hoar, and the taxidermy was bought at auction. Louisa has kept the curtains that came with the house, and the upholstery in this room is an ongoing project that started with the wing chair she bought at auction and had covered in velvet from Lelièvre. The bespoke cushions are from Vanrenen GW Designs and the ottoman is by David Seyfried. The striped rug is Indian.
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The snug is Louisa’s sitting room, offering a quiet retreat of her own.
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he previous owner installed the panelling, fitted cupboards and recessed doorways that are such a feature of the house.
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The extension has improved the flow of the rest of the house, with rooms opening into each other on the ground floor. The generous dining table was a great auction find and the pendant lamp above has been updated with new shades from Vanrenen GW Designs. The rug is from OKA.
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Her collection of fine glassware and silver is used regularly, but comes into its own at Christmas. The wine glasses are from William Yeoward. The placemats were a present from Sarah Vanrenen.
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Louisa has a collection of Indian handblocked tablecloths that she uses in rotation, and they suit all occasions.
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The panelling is ‘what sold the house to me’, says Louisa. It’s taken quite a while to decide on the colour for the dining room but she has recently painted it a vibrant yellow by Papers and Paints. The blinds with ikat borders are Linara by Romo and the lamps are from Pooky.
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Louisa is playful with colour, creating vibrant connections between rooms.
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Louisa has kept the kitchen that came with the house, updating it by painting the cabinetry in Slipper Satin by Farrow & Ball and adding glass handles to the cupboards.
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Tableware includes majolica plates, heirloom silver and vintage baubles from Burford Garden Company. The silver dish was a birthday present.
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Louisa couldn’t find the right shade of red for the walls so mixed this colour herself – it’s a great backdrop for a collection of lively Bollywood posters. The armchair was a gift from the late Margot Dent, Louisa’s former sculpture tutor, and has been covered in a Roger Oates striped fabric. The  demi-lune table was a family piece and the lamp and shade are from Vanrenen GW Designs.
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Louisa’s bedroom is papered in Will ‘o’ The Wisp by Knowles & Christou, which provides a wonderful backdrop for her works of art and antiques. On the walls are a pencil sketch by Nick Johnson, a portrait of her friend as a child, and a copy of an old family picture. The chest of drawers was inherited from her mother’s godmother. Lampshades and lamps from Vanrenen GW Designs. The rug is from The Rug Company.
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In the bathroom, the raised platform on which the bath now sits was once part of a built-in bed. The walls are painted in Euphorbia 545 from Paint & Paper Library – the perfect foil for Louisa’s collection of pink lustreware, which she has been adding to since the 1990s when she was starting out as a designer.