A Forest House in East Sussex
I was happy to see this beautiful home we shot for Decorate Workshop, which belongs to a friend of a friend of mine (how I found out about it in the first place), pop up as a location for hire today over at Light Locations. I loved working in this home. In fact, you can take your copy of Decorate Workshop and compare the photos we took with those on this page and then you can clearly see what a little before and after styling fun - you can see what I did to bring in a little Holly style to the mix.
Some homes require little styling, some way more, but this one kept me busy as it was very spare so I needed to really collect from other rooms and rearrange things, including furniture, in order to make it feel more lived in since it was only a summer house. Working in this home for a day was a dream come true, I wanted to move right in, I never connected to a home as much as I did this one. It was in the middle of nowhere - in a forest about an hour or two outside of London and we got SO lost getting there but once we arrived, I didn't want to leave. In fact, I barely missed my flight home that night. I remember the two buckets of flowers we loaded into the car that I bought earlier that morning in Chiswick before we ventured out and how excited I was when I arrived on location - I hadn't seen the home previously - only a few rooms and vignettes, so I wasn't sure what was in store for me but wow, it was a pristine gem of a place. It made me so happy "playing house" for the day - and the best part was that the home owner wasn't around so the photographer, Debi Treloar, and I could really relax and go at our own pace.
I love when homeowner's are around to, don't get me wrong, but I find it less tense when they're not - I always worry about moving things and rearranging stuff in front of the person who lives there and they can easily get offended or worried you will drop something or they can also spend a lot of time explaining where this or that object came from and while those bits of history are wonderful, it takes so long to shoot a home like this one. This house was massive on two levels so it took some time to work through. Also, when the homeowner is there, you usually are asked to stop and break for lunch and Debi and I like to work straight through so we can get everything done and leave before the light is gone. We were shooting late winter, so we had to wrap up by 3:00 - and it takes about an hour to clean the house after, put everything back into place, back up the photos and pack the car, so you get a lot more shots when no one is home. This was such an enjoyable shoot... I remember the fresh country air, the singing birds and that feeling like this home would look extra gorgeous in my book and well, it did. Here is one shot from my book below - to see more, I guess you have to get the book (wink). :)
To the lovely lady, Emma, who owns this home, thank you. I loved working there for the day and pretending it was my own!
(images: light locations)