Interior Styling Workshop – THTMM & Laurie Davidson

It was a cold and snowy, Saturday morning, immediately following our day out at Cheltenham Gold Cup, that I dragged my ever-so-slightly hungover daughter to THTMM – (The Home That Made Me) – for a workshop with Laurie Davidson on Interior Styling.

For those of you that don’t know THTMM is a hugely successful Instagram feed and blog from the bubbly Charlotte Amor Valentine. She was hosting a lovely workshop for fifteen like-minded instagrammers, with Laurie giving hints and tips on how the magazines style for interior and home editorial.

Laurie, a professional Interiors Stylist and writer on the subject, having previously been Houses Editor at Style at Home magazine, was well qualified and experienced to teach us all something new and exciting.

We arrived to a Prosecco reception, (although I’m still being good, and Hannah was too green to face it), followed by a chatty ice-breaker exercise. We then cracked on with the business of learning a little bit more about Interior Styling.

Our first task was to capture some new and interesting shots of Charlotte’s lovely home – not an easy job considering how photographed it is already! Charlotte was very chilled considering  15 strange women were accessing all areas!

By now it was lunch-time and a tasty buffet of sandwiches and nibbles was laid on. Lots of interiors related chat ensued amongst all the attendees and the hosts!

The afternoon session started with Laurie running through a few handy tips for putting together small staged sets known as ‘vignettes’, as well as for dressing full room shots. Much sharing of who uses what filter and photo editing application followed!

We then moved on to what was to prove the main exercise of the day.

We were split up into groups of three and each team picked a room out of a hat. Next enormous piles of props arrived and we were given the task of re-styling the room we’d picked.

Our trio had picked ‘Children’s Room’. As my kids are all grown up, and the other two hadn’t yet had any children, (one was expecting though), I suggested we styled a teenagers dressing table, (an on the hoof suggestion triggered by a string of light-bulbs reminiscent of theatre dressing rooms, that were peeking out of the prop bag). We quickly nabbed them before anyone else did!

A great deal of re-shuffling went on during the hour or so re-style, as every group purloined pieces from all over Charlotte’s house and temporarily re-homed them! We were cheeky enough to move a lovely bow fronted chest of drawers from one bedroom to another – we had no shame!!

In the meantime, Hannah’s team had worked in the lounge, styling the neutral sofa with lovely blue accessories they’d pinched from all around the house, ( and they moved all the furniture around, so we didn’t feel too bad in the end).

After all the restyles and requisite photo snapping, came a debrief of each teams work by Laurie, where extra styling tips were gleaned.

By now it was gone 4 o’clock, the suggested finishing time for the workshop, and as there was snow on the ground, many of us left, (& Hannah really needed a nap!). However, for those able to stay, mood board creation was next on the agenda.

Overall it was a fun filled day of meeting new people, getting creative and finding interior inspiration, all washed down with a glass of bubbles.

Charlotte runs various workshops regularly, details can be found on her website.