When someone asks if you want to see their cellar, the answer for anyone with even a rudimentary cinematic knowledge has to be, ‘No, thanks’. But in the case of Paul Lyon Maris and Robin Muir’s house on the edge of the Cotswolds, it is a key room. For this is a property with a singular purpose – a ‘hunting box’, bought specifically to facilitate their love of riding to hounds. Home to a selection of handsome boots and jackets, and functioning as a utility room, the cellar is a bit like the engine room that allows the rest of the house to be beautiful.
And very beautiful it is. Part of a 16th-century coaching inn, the flat-fronted stone village house with cross-mullion windows was a perfect fit, having only one door to lock behind them and no outside space. It was already ‘perfectly liveable’, says Paul. But, as anyone can attest who has seen their houses in Sussex and London (featured in House & Garden in October 2014 and April 2016 respectively), liveable was never going to be enough for this couple. Paul is a theatrical agent and Robin a contributing editor at Vogue and photographic curator. So they asked interior designer Caroline Holdaway to ‘tweak’ the interior – a verb that stretches a long way in the hands of a decorator.
A kind of alchemy happens when these three get together, as they know each other’s tastes inside out and love the whole process. Paul explains how they have grown into their roles: ‘It’s odd – you employ a decorator because they know what they’re doing. But, at the same time, you feel you should have strong opinions, otherwise you’re being railroaded. On this third project, I totally trusted her and threw ideas at her and vice versa. On the other hand, I know if Caroline agrees immediately and says, “That’s such a good idea,” she actually thinks it’s not a good idea at all. Then I think about it for a while and realise that, in fact, it’s a terrible idea.’
As soon as she walked through the front door, Caroline says she had an instant sense of what the house should look like. ‘The nuts and bolts, the feel of it – I knew immediately.’ The nuts and bolts involved taking down a wall between the wide hallway and narrow sitting room, and moving the kitchen doorway to frame the dining area rather than the sink, like a large still life. Because your eyes are drawn to the pink staircase, there is still a sense of a thoroughfare, as if the hall lives on in spirit, rather than the uncomfortable feeling of walking into a sitting room.
Next, came the floors. For Caroline, when they are right, ‘everything else falls into place’. Here, the scene is set by scrubbed and waxed, reclaimed Baltic pine boards. These give way to a striking Austrian handmade raku-tiled floor by Karak in the kitchen. When Caroline showed samples to Paul, he baulked: the tiles reminded him of the Seventies Hornsea brown and caramel pottery storage jars with wooden lids. ‘But then I kept looking at them and realised I was being stupid – they’re beautiful,’ he says. Using reclaimed timber joinery, Caroline kept the kitchen ‘as rustic as we dared’ without it being – and here she lowers her voice to a whisper, alerting you to something unpleasant – ‘a pastiche’.
Caroline used to be an actress, which is evident in the cadence of her voice: listening to her recite paint colours is a delight. And colour is a language in which she is particularly fluent. She uses a palette that is sombre yet rich and paints that are historic but do not scream National Trust, mixing them with textures and fabrics, like the Lewis & Wood matelassé cotton on the sofas, in an alchemic formula of homely comfort combined with subdued luxury.
While the ground floor is generous, the staircase narrows to a more intimate space: a furnished landing, a bathroom and two bedrooms. Wallpaper and curtains are not what you expect in a bathroom, but they form a gentlemanly alliance with tongue-and-groove dado-height panelling and a stone windowseat. Next door, the size of the main bedroom comes as a surprise. It is papered in a Robert Kime print that looks as if it has been there for ever and provides the perfect background for Robin and Paul’s collection of paintings from the Forties and Fifties. Caroline loves their taste, but felt there was so much colour and life going on in the paintings that they overpowered the bed. So she added needlepoint cushions from Fine Cell Work to restore the balance, while they chose the colourful bedside lamps so that it looks, as Caroline says, ‘eclectic and joyful, rather than as if three people had had a go at it’.
In fact, there is only one room on which they disagree and it is Paul’s favourite. ‘Caroline never went down there once – she thinks it is an appalling place,’ he says. ‘She wouldn’t even choose the colour.’ It is, of course, the cellar.
Caroline Holdaway Design: 020 8341 6525; carolineholdaway.com | Robin Muir has curated ‘Cecil Beaton’s Bright Young Things’ at the National Portrait Gallery, WC2, March 12-June 7; npg.org.uk
Paul Massey1/8The walls are painted in ‘Truffle’ by Paint & Paper Library, which tones with a grey striped curtain in a Claremont fabric. The central ottoman is upholstered in Vanderhurd’s ‘Flower Cut Out’ linen. To the right of the chimneypiece is an oil painting by the mid-century British artist Daphne Fedarb.
Paul Massey2/8Reclaimed Baltic pine floorboards are partly covered by a ‘Hagga’ diamond-pattern flatweave wool rug from Sinclair Till. A pair of Scandinavian tole sconces flanks the doorway to the kitchen.
Paul Massey3/8A Victorian pendant light from The School for Scandal hangs near the tongue-and-groove panelled staircase, which is painted in ‘Kasbah’ by Paint & Paper Library. French provincial portraits – chosen for the quality of their frames – have been grouped together for decorative effect.
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Paul Massey5/8The 1720s Irish dresser and 19th-century Welsh dining chairs are from John Cornall Antiques in Warwick. Most of the slipware on the dresser came from Trésors Trouvés in Amsterdam.
Paul Massey6/8Paintings by artists including John Banting and Eileen Agar are displayed on walls papered in Robert Kime’s ‘Cabbages’. A Fine Cell Work needlepoint cushion brightens a bedcover in Holland & Sherry’s ‘Georgia’ linen in straw. The antique table from The Decorator Source in Tetbury holds a Marianna Kennedy resin lamp with a shade in ‘Laurel’ linen by Raoul Textiles. The bergère chair is from Alex MacArthur.
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Paul Massey8/8A bedcover and curtains in Christopher Maya’s ‘Ostrich’ linen in charleston from Holland & Sherry pick up on walls in ‘Moss’ by Paint & Paper Library. The antique ceramic finial on the window ledge is from Brownrigg.
