Let our editor introduce you to the April issue

Our April issue is out. Let Acting Editor Gabby Deeming talk you through the highlights....

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Personal collections add so much to the look of an interior. Whether precious works of art or carefully chosen pebbles, they often reveal much more about the homeowner than their choice of sofa or paint colour. In the past few years, we seem to have become more comfortable with how we choose to display our treasures. Rather than consigning them to glass cabinets, we are happily creating little scenes on the mantelpiece and hanging all sorts of things on the walls. The once-dreaded découpage, china figurines and decorative plates have risen from the ashes of Britain’s worst B&Bs and are setting hearts a flutter in houses up and down the down the country. Reinvented and imagined by clever artists and designers, many are now serious objects of desire.

The American designer John Derian has played no small part in this revival; many of you will be familiar with his trays, plates and ceramics featuring whimsical images from centuries past. His latest venture is an exciting wallpaper and fabric collaboration with Designers Guild, the results of which are great fun and stylish. We photographed John and Tricia Guild together with the designs in his New York studio (page 51).

‘The bottom line is that I love stuff,’ says Guy Tobin, discussing his family house in Battersea with his sister – our arts editor, Emily Tobin. Emily’s account of her brother’s relationship with the beautiful things that fill his home is as wonderful as the interior it describes (from page 134); it is a brilliant example of how both humble and grand objects contribute so much to the final picture. We also revisit the London house of rug and textile designer Christine Van Der Hurd (from page 126). It was previously featured in 2006, so it is great to see its new incarnation. Architecturally pared back, it provides a gallery-like backdrop that allows Christine’s colourful designs, as well as her much-loved collected pieces, to shine.