What’s the secret to creating a soothing bedroom? A green colour palette is often the answer. From pea to sage, emerald to eucalyptus, explore these projects from the ELLE Decoration archives and see how the experts use leafy colour palettes to create cosy, colourful and calming bedrooms to provide an excellent nights’ sleep.
Leafy green and natural wood for a Cotswolds bedroom
By colour drenching this room in a soft sage, design firm Maddux Creative enveloped this bedroom with a calming energy. The John Alfredo Harris bed, with a bespoke live-edge timber headboard, is a beautiful focal point, while two vintage pieces, an armchair by Paolo Buffa covered in bouclé by Yarn Collective and a Habitat floor lamp topped with a shade from Ode Interiors, make a sweet reading spot. A deep-pile rug from Nouvel Atlas is soft underfoot, while the bedding is from Caravane.
A richly layered colour palette in Somerset
‘I’m a big believer in colour as the first step in creating a layered scheme without having to overfill it,’ says designer Christian Bense. In this Somerset home, burgundy, apricot and pea green abound. This verdant bedroom is anchored by a pair of antique Queen Anne-style single headboards, which he placed side-by-side to create a dramatic focal point above the bed, which is dressed in The White Company linen with cushions covered in GP&J Baker’s ‘Morley’. The ‘Adeline’ rattan side tables are from Sharland and they hold table lamps by Duzy from Etsy. The ceiling is painted a deep plum-brandy colour that creates an air of cosiness.
Green bedroom in a rainbow-hued Berlin home
This Berlin home is defined by ecstatic colour. As requested by the client, designer Fabian Freytag gave each room a different shade – sunshine yellow, teal, tangerine. The bedroom features stripes of Farrow & Ball’s ‘Sutcliffe Green’ and ‘Dyrehaven’ in varying widths, creating a dynamic effect across walls and ceiling, while striped cushions from Ferm Living echo the motif. The ‘Husk’ bed is by Patricia Urquiola for B&B Italia, the antique bedside tables and ‘Rain’ table lamps are from Robin Lamps, and the ‘BTH’ bench in stained wood and rattan is from Detjer.
A stylish kid’s bedroom in London
In a somewhat unusual situation, designer Emma Shone-Sanders was presented with this Hyde Park home that was more or less ‘done’. Rather than a complete overhaul, it needed to be injected with her client’s personality and colour was one of her secret weapons for adding warmth. Apple green was the perfect uplifting shade for one of the kids’ bedrooms. The wall colour, by Queenie Paints, is paired with checked fabric from Nordic home-textiles brand Projektityyny, while the headboard fabric is Colours of Arley’s ‘Midi Stripe’.
This London home is an homage to an Italian icon
Designed by Maria Speake, co-founder of interior design and reclamation firm Retrouvius, this London home is an ode to style icon Gabriella Crespi. Painted a bespoke colour from Francesca’s Paints, the bedroom has one entire wall dedicated to wardrobe space for its fashion-loving owner. The chair in the corner is a vintage design sourced by Retrouvius, and the wall light by Tommaso Cimini is also vintage, while the globe pendant light is a salvaged Czech design and the bedspread is from Libeco.
What's everyone reading?
The Paris bedroom in a soothing sage
Farrow and Ball’s ‘Card Room Green’ is named after the small study-like nooks that were common in the Victorian period. Designer Fleur Delesalle, who is renowned for her skills at devising mood-lifting colour palettes, used it in this Parisian bedroom to create a more subdued atmosphere compared to the rest of the brightly coloured home. She custom designed the walnut bedside table, while the brass wall lights are a vintage 1960s design by Jules Wabbes. The artwork is Soleil by Bruno Nuytten.
The updated period home in Melbourne
Soft and smoky colours, from a rich tobacco to the deep sage of this bedroom, define this Melbourne home by interior decorator Simone Haag. She took the homeowner’s existing bed and updated it by upholstering the headboard in ‘Scapigliata’ fabric by Filippo Uecher which adds textural interest. The bedside table is the ‘Orbit’ by Fanuli and the lamp is vintage – as are the ceramic pieces. Linen bedding from Cultiver, in the moody ‘Slate’ colourway, completes the scheme.
The home defined by the changing of the leaves
Interior designer George Townsin of Studio George urged her clients to look to the changing landscape of the surrounding countryside when devising the palette of their Suffolk home. This cheerful bedroom is drenched in Paint & Paper Library’s ‘Chelsea Green’ while the bed is dressed with a headboard in ‘Woven Ribbon’ by Christopher Farr Cloth – the brand’s textiles are seen throughout the home. Donna Wilson’s ‘Field Day’ cushions, a vintage blanket from Latvia and Pooky bedside lamps complete the verdant scheme.
A revamped Arts & Crafts home in London
Designer Tiffany Duggan was tasked with bringing personality back to this Arts & Crafts-era home, adding personality, texture and a more modern layout that works not just for the owners, but their two young children, too. In this minty kid’s bedroom, a forest green ‘Novak’ desk chair and ‘Bonnet’ lamp, both from Graham & Green, are paired with West Elm’s ‘Mid-Century Wall Desk’ to create a stylish homework nook.
The elegant bedroom with touches of green
This pared back bedroom by Tom Bartlett of Waldo Works is elevated by pops of green via an emerald throw and intricate metal wall sculpture covered in enamel paint. Bartlett has design in his genes – his father was a property developer and his mother worked at Biba. ‘I grew up around punchy interiors and buildings,’ he says. ‘I have always been fascinated by the ways people choose to express themselves in their homes, and the way they react to designed spaces.’
