House Tours

At home with… Giovanna Fletcher

Giovanna Fletcher is a writer of charming, romantic women’s fiction, she became a No.1 Sunday Times Best Seller with her non-fiction tales of motherhood, a presenter, vlogger and blogger.  Somewhere in between her glowing career, she’s also a mum of two boys, Buzz and Buddy, and wife to Tom (of McFly fame, our inner teenagers are jumping for joy right now!). Over the past 6 months, Giovanna and Tom have been renovating their beautiful home, to include a side extension – knocking down walls to create more open space for their family to live in.  Not only are they creating a wonderful area for their family to grow in, they’ve also included inspiring, creative rooms to work and brainstorm in, one of which is now home to one of our luxurious sofas, Patrick. Now the renovation is almost complete,  we caught up with Giovanna to discuss inspiration, renovating around children and colourful designs.

The sunshine sofa that everyone’s talking about… Image via @mrsgifletcher

 Giovanna, how would you describe your style at home? Well, when we first moved into our home eleven years ago it was the show house for the rest of the street. It was beautiful with lots of cream and golds – we literally put our clothes in the wardrobe and left everything as it was. Now we’re older, we decided to put our own stamp on the place. We’ve got exposed brickwork, patterned wallpaper (flamingos, floral and bees), and big neon signs. It’s homely and comfortable. We’ve recently spotted on your Instagram account an array of green and blue Farrow & Ball paint colours being sampled on your wall, how are you going about choosing colour schemes and looks for your home? Gosh, it’s so difficult to choose as anything is possible, but we’ve both been on the same page, luckily. We’ve gone for a Lulworth Blue in our bedroom and it looks incredible. The hallway is all grey, which looks fab with the exposed brick, but then we’ve been quite bold with the green in our kitchen… it’s very colourful. Maybe the years of cream have caused us to dramatically go the other way!

 Decisions, decisions… Farrow & Ball paint inspiration. Image via @mrsgifletcher

We can see that your beautiful family is at the heart of everything you do – what kind of environment do you hope to create for them throughout your home renovations? I want the boys to feel like they have enough room to run around and play. We also love the outdoors, so we’ve put in 8-meter frame-less glass windows and a big skylight so that we really feel like the outside and inside are connected. A home should be somewhere to relax and unwind, so I don’t like buying things that I’ll stress over the boys ruining them. I don’t want to be squawking at them constantly to ‘stay away from that crystal vase that cost an arm and a leg’…

Story-time on Patrick! Image via @mrsgifletcher

Where are you drawing inspiration from? Pinterest is my best friend. I also love going to other people’s houses and having a nose around to see what I like. I think because we’ve been planning this for quite some time we’d collected a lot of ideas, so we had a clearer idea from the start. What is your most treasured item in your home? Hmmm… that’s a tough one. We’ve just got a new neon sign from Bag and Bones that reads ‘Let’s stay home’. I love it. I think it sums us up perfectly.

 Home is where the heart is… Image via Bag & Bones

We have long been fans of your wonderful books! Do you have a special room in your home where you hide away to write? What kind of ambience do you like to create to get your creative juices flowing? Yes, I have my office. I’ve recently moved into a new room within the house which is bigger and airier. I’ve just put up some gorgeous floral wallpaper, some wall lights from Fritz Fryer and painted my door pink. I’m also having a desk/unit made… it’s very feminine, floral and pretty. I’ve never had a room like it and I’m so excited for it all to be finished.

Work could never be a chore in this office… Image via @mrsgifletcher

You’ve recently chosen our stunning Patrick sofa for your new creative/library room. What was important for you when looking for a new sofa, and what drew you to this particular design? We’d love to hear about the room it is in, how have you chosen to style our Patrick sofa? This room is between both my and Tom’s ‘offices’ and is where all the books are kept. When redoing the house we were set on the idea of the front of the house being work focused, and the back end being totally family driven. This room is at the front and where our creative minds collide. It’s actually my old office but it doesn’t look a thing like it did. On the walls is Farrow and Ball’s Bumble Bee wallpaper in green, and then we have a black walnut book unit – which I paid for with my advance when I signed my first book deal, so it’s a stunning sentimental piece. We wanted a comfortable, fun sofa to go into this room and the Patrick is perfect for lounging around reading, brainstorming and having meetings about joint projects. The sunshine velvet is such a luxurious fabric, I couldn’t resist it, and it looks fab in the room, which is vibrant yet earthy all at once. I love it.

 Patrick in Sunshine pure cotton matt velvet – in all its glory!

  Thanks, Giovanna!

For more design inspirations, visit us on Instagram @sofadotcom and keep up to date with Giovanna @mrsgiflectcher.