{"id":16225,"date":"2022-11-01T11:13:14","date_gmt":"2022-11-01T10:13:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.homesandantiques.com\/?p=36966"},"modified":"2022-11-01T11:35:10","modified_gmt":"2022-11-01T10:35:10","slug":"a-1920s-home-in-south-london","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/homesantiques\/rss_feed\/a-1920s-home-in-south-london\/","title":{"rendered":"A 1920s home in South London"},"content":{"rendered":"

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By Katie Pike\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Tuesday, 01 November 2022 at 12:00 am<\/p>

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\u2018I\u2019m quite old-fashioned at heart,\u2019 says Gigi Eligoloff when asked to describe her decorating style. \u2018I\u2019ve always loved pieces from the Victorian and art deco<\/a> periods, and would much rather buy something old with a story than something modern.\u2019 Given that hanging on her kitchen wall is an illuminated Coca-Cola sign (\u2018probably from a chip shop in the 1980s\u2019) and on a yellow side table sits an Abigail Ahern hare lamp, her answer is somewhat unexpected.<\/p>\n

But look closer and dotted around her 1920s house in Barnes you\u2019ll find, among other gems, a 1920s glass table lamp<\/a> (inherited from her grandparents), an antique<\/a> piano stool and a Georgian window frame repurposed into wall art. In fact, there\u2019s remarkably little in the house that isn\u2019t old, something that Gigi puts down to having a family that\u2019s always worked in the antiques business. \u2018My grandfather had a junk shop and my mum has been dealing in vintage<\/a> pieces since the 1970s, when she had a market stall in Portobello,\u2019 she says. \u2018The shop, and the pieces that made their way back to our home played a big part in my childhood.\u2019<\/p>\n

So dedicated is Gigi to buying second-hand that not even her kitchen units or sofas are new. \u2018As well as finding many pieces on eBay and Gumtree I also like to shop from charity shops and boot sales. It\u2019s much less scary to experiment with quirky pieces if they aren\u2019t too expensive.\u2019 This thrifty approach often results in an interesting tale or two. The second-hand Heal\u2019s sofa in the TV room (\u00a350 from Gumtree) was delivered one evening and spent the night on the front lawn covered in bin bags. \u2018It wouldn\u2019t fit through the front door,\u2019 says Gigi. \u2018First thing the next morning I watched YouTube videos showing me how to take the arms off.\u2019<\/p>\n

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The kitchen, too, was a lucky find. Having failed to find anything she fell in love with in the shops, Gigi took to Gumtree. Within minutes she stumbled across her industrial-looking units, which came complete with a Rangemaster stove. \u2018As soon as I saw the advert, I phoned a friend who\u2019s a handyman and carpenter and asked if he\u2019d be able to repurpose it to fit our kitchen. He said yes, so I bundled the children into the car and sped down the A3 to Surrey to collect it.\u2019<\/p>\n

The units add warmth to the bright white walls of the kitchen and the wall cabinets have been cleverly adapted into a kitchen island \u2013 topped with a piece of pine, picked up from a salvage yard and crafted into a countertop.<\/p>\n

Fortune was also smiling on Gigi two years ago when she was hunting for her current home. Although the house dates from one of her favourite eras and is located in leafy Barnes, two factors combined to keep it within budget: it\u2019s an ex-council house and hadn\u2019t been touched for 20 years. \u2018As soon as I walked into it I thought, \u201cThis is the one.\u201d The sun was streaming in and it had a really lovely feel,\u2019 she says.<\/p>\n

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