The Heaver Estate is a leafy conservation area of south west London where the streets are lined with handsome late-Victorian houses that follow a disciplined street grid. It was here that interior designer Susan Chesney was presented with a substantial double-fronted family home whose owners needed her help. ‘When I first saw the house, I was immediately taken with its stately proportions,’ she recalls. ‘Although the property was beautiful, the spaces were underutilised, furnished with smaller-scale pieces that felt adrift and almost camouflaged within the rooms.’
Although south-facing windows lined this front-facing suite, the rooms felt dark, as if it were always evening. The space was asking for a cohesive narrative. The homeowners are busy professionals who were thinking about the house in the context of a growing family with children of a broad age range, so it needed to feel beautiful but also easy to live in. ‘They’re very well travelled, and I think that really shaped their expectations,’ explains Susan. ‘They’d stayed in some incredible hotels around the world, and they wanted that same feeling of relaxed luxury at home, something with the ease and atmosphere of a boutique hotel, but still personal and grounded.’
She noticed her client favoured curved furniture, which made sense for the project. The house already had a strong framework, with Crittall doors, black spindle staircases and moodier tones, so softer, more sculptural shapes brought a sense of balance. ‘We ended up thinking a lot about that tension between stronger, architectural lines and something gentler and more fluid. Smart and sophisticated, yet informal,’ she says. They were also very clear about what they didn’t want: no pastels and nothing ultra-modern. That meant ensuring any pieces with a more contemporary shape were grounded in materials that felt timeless.
With any period property, Susan’s instinct is always to look at what’s already there and ask what can be retained, repurposed or reimagined, rather than stripping everything back unnecessarily. In this case, existing elements included a light fitting, a large freestanding bath, the fireplace with its original stone mantelpiece and the period surround tiles. Since the bedroom was already painted green, they incorporated that colour into the scheme.
A softly saturated Liberty cotton velvet in ‘Amaranth’ red became an important cornerstone for the scheme. ‘It had such richness and depth, and once that fabric was on the table, it gave us a clear sense of mood,’ says Susan. From there, everything began to fall into place.
Spatial flow was key, both in terms of functional layout and the shifting of colour palettes from one zone to the next to help create gently transitioning moods. ‘We wanted the anteroom to be a dramatic threshold welcoming our clients into their primary chambers, the bathroom to feel like a sanctuary from busy London and the bedroom to be a warm embrace – all of it lush, saturated and balanced.’
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Susan liked the idea of building in an elegant moment for getting ready, so she designed a bespoke demi-lune bench where one person could sit while the other was dressing. It’s upholstered in a jewel-toned, geometrically patterned jacquard velvet, which gives the room a touch of rhythm and personality. ‘We repeated that shape in the leather-covered table, which helps everything feel connected,’ she explains. ‘The suede antechamber walls and the bronze and alabaster wall lights bring warmth and texture in a restrained way, so the room still feels quite clean.’
Modest structural changes to the bathroom significantly impact how the space works. The wall over the existing chimney breast was extended and reinforced to accommodate a bespoke double vanity, and a stud wall forms a partial shower partition, allowing Susan to conceal storage, create a greater sense of privacy and add more depth to the room.
Cold grey-toned tiles were swapped out for a crisp marble pattern in rich colours. ‘We also wanted to retain original cornicing throughout the shower vestibule, so we only interrupted the cornice where the shower screen needed to meet the wall, allowing it to continue inside the shower.’
Despite experiencing some ‘wobbly moments’ where the ‘Amaranth’ colour felt a bit strong for larger pieces such as the bedframe and full-length curtains, Susan explains how once the final touches came together, her clients were very pleased with the rich, yet soft drama the fabric brings to the scheme. ‘It was very much an act of balancing energy in each room.’
For her, the most satisfying part of the process was hearing her clients say the house felt as special as their favourite boutique hotels – or even better, to the extent that ‘it has become difficult for them to enjoy their stays while travelling now, as nothing compares to what they have achieved at home.’
‘There’s always something magical about the point where everything leaves the screen and becomes real,’ she adds. ‘Seeing the clients experience the finished spaces for the first time and their joy in that moment is hard to beat. It never gets old.’ susanchesney.co.uk
