Our TeamEleanor Büsing

Eleanor Büsing

    About Me

    Interior designer, freelance writer, passionate foodie. Canadian by birth, Londoner by choice and Parisienne at heart.

    Latest Stories

    Be Your Own Designer: 10 Flawless Ways to Lay Out a Living Room
    Warning: You'll want to move your couch after reading this.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Jul 18, 2025
    These Are the Game-Changing 2-Twin-Bed Layouts Everyone Should Know About
    Design Ideas
    See them in real people’s homes, too!
    Eleanor Büsing
    Mar 22, 2025
    8 Tips to Ensure You Can Actually Enjoy Your Own Holiday Party
    Throw a holiday bash to remember without all the stress by using these tips from a top party planner in Beverly Hills.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Dec 1, 2023
    Design Lessons: How To Spot (& Fix!) an Off Balance Room
    Balance is a tricky beast when it comes to interior design. Some people love perfectly symmetrical spaces, and others are utterly bored by them. Wherever you fall, you’ve got to admit that a balanced space — in terms of color, visual weight, pattern and layout — is perfectly pleasing to the eye. But knowing how to get there takes trial and error. For some examples, I’ve rounded up a few spaces that with a tweak or two, could be perfectly in balance.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Oct 3, 2023
    The Dos & Don’ts of Hanging Art: An Illustrated Guide
    As a designer, poorly hung art is probably my number one design bugbear. Our pictorial guide to hanging art like a pro will help you avoid many all-too-common design pitfalls.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Mar 31, 2023
    How To: Create a Gallery Wall
    Ah, the gallery wall. So ubiquitous in shelter mags and on blogs, they’ve become a staple of modern home decor. I know several people who think the curated wall is on its way “out”, and feel that individual pieces of art never get to shine anymore. But for someone like me, who accumulates art like some people accumulate paperbacks, gallery walls aren’t just a necessity- they’re a way of life.This liking for art-stuffed walls seems to be a family trait.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Mar 30, 2023
    15 Ingenious IKEA BESTA Hacks To Try
    IKEA's BESTA range is so minimal and versatile, it's almost impossible not to put your own stylish spin on it. Check out how these homes did just that.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Feb 25, 2023
    Real Life in London: 7 Things You’ll Need to Be OK With To Love Living Here
    I canvassed my friends, from born-and-bred Londoners to long-term expats and recent arrivals, for thoughts on living here.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Nov 16, 2022
    The 10 Commandments of Furniture Placement
    Sometimes moving a chair, shifting a sofa, or re-orienting a bed is enough to give your home a whole new lease on life.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Oct 14, 2022
    5 Ways to Arrange Furniture in a Small Bedroom (& 4 Bonus Tips for Making the Most of It!)
    Plus four bonus tips for making the most of what you've got.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Oct 6, 2022
    10 of the Best Things You Should Make Instead of Buy
    Over the years, we’ve shared a lot of money-saving projects, large and small. If you can make something at home easily and cheaply, why wouldn’t you? Save some cash and flex those DIY muscles with these ten ideas for things to make rather than buy, from the Apartment Therapy and Kitchn archives. Your wallet and your home will thank you. Household cleaners. Ban chemicals from your home once and for all, and save pennies too with these recipes for eco-friendly cleaning products.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Jul 17, 2020
    My Life Without a Dishwasher
    My current flat has a dishwasher, which, after 5+ years of living in London without one, felt like a huge luxury when I moved in a year ago. In my naivety, I thought I’d become so used to and efficient at washing my own dishes that I’d barely use the thing. Yeah, you can guess how long that attitude lasted. The following statement pretty much sums up how my flatmate and I view doing the dishes: if something fits into the dishwasher, it’s going into the dishwasher.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Mar 12, 2020
    How To Properly Light a Kitchen
    The kitchen: it’s the laboratory of the home, where we “work” to create meals for ourselves and those we live with. Conversely, it’s also often the social hub of the home, where friends gather at parties or even where you might like to hang out solo, just reading a book or listening to the radio. With these dual purposes in mind, it’s often tricky to strike the right lighting balance.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Mar 11, 2020
    Brilliant Bike Storage
    You know how, when you have a new interest, it’s suddenly all you can see? Just as a newly-expecting couple might see babies everywhere they look, so it is with me and bikes. I’ve recently decided to buy one, and find myself checking out others’ wheels 24/7 these days.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Mar 11, 2020
    8 Bold Paint Colors You Have to Try in Your Small Bedroom
    It’s no secret that we at Apartment Therapy love color, even (er, make that especially) in small spaces. While the rest of the internet might still be spewing the “paint it white to make it seem larger” line, we know that a bold shade can bring energy and a sense of expansion to a modest room. Have a small bedroom and want some paint ideas beyond white and gray? We’ve got you—and your walls—covered.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Mar 11, 2020
    Living in a Small Space: Three Things that Make a Big Difference
    Do you live in a small space? Do people sometimes confuse your bedroom for a closet? Can you reach your kitchen sink from your couch? If you’re looking for ways to make your space more livable without spending a ton, you’ve come to the right place. Here are three classic ways to make living little work for you: 1. Lighting Small is one thing, but small and dark is quite another. Almost nothing has the power to transform the a room like good lighting.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Mar 11, 2020
    Sarah’s Contemporary Color in London
    Name: Sarah RedshawLocation: Wimbledon, London, United KingdomSize: 905 square feetYears lived in: 13 years; owned For most of its life, Sarah’s South London terraced home had a traditional two-up, two-down layout. But after 12 years of ownership, Sarah decided that the arrangement wasn’t working for her anymore. She craved more space, more light, and a more contemporary feel.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Dec 19, 2019
    Before, During, After: The Best Part of Any Project – Learning New Skills
    This isn’t your average DIY; I can’t give you simple step-by-step instructions or promise that you can get this done on a Saturday afternoon. After all, these chairs took me months to complete.A few years ago, I enrolled in a just-for-fun, one-morning-a-week course in Traditional Furniture Upholstery. The idea had been at the back of my mind for a while, as something which would combine my background in fashion textiles with my burgeoning interest in interiors.
    Eleanor Büsing
    May 6, 2019
    How To Paint a Wooden Dresser
    I know some of us at Apartment Therapy have strong views on painting wooden furniture, particularly (gasp!) painting it white, but sometimes it’s gotta be done. This bedside table belongs to my flatmate/landlord, left behind by some long-ago tenant. We both agreed that the knotty pine was an eyesore, and that for the benefit of future tenants, giving it a makeover with a lick of white paint was the best thing we could do.
    Eleanor Büsing
    May 5, 2019
    Wedding Reception Games: Ice Breakers, Kiss-Makers and More
    Many people are divided on the idea of “games” at weddings. There are those who find them fun and harmless, and those who think that surely weddings are enjoyable enough as-is, and question the need to add opportunities for embarrassment to the day’s schedule. While I have sympathies with the latter group, my older sister, who married last summer, is firmly in the former camp.
    Eleanor Büsing
    May 5, 2019
    How To Definitely Get Your Deposit Back: 10 Things To Do Before You Move Out
    Moving is the worst, I get it. But not getting your rental deposit back? That is the worst of the worst. Make sure it doesn’t happen to you with our ten-tip guide. Clean the kitchen appliances. This is often one of the places people will look at first to gauge a home’s cleanliness, so scrub out the oven, wipe down the inside of the fridge, and clear the dishwasher drain. Clean the windows.
    Eleanor Büsing
    May 4, 2019
    How To Properly Light a Bedroom
    At first glance, the bedroom seems the least important room in the home, in terms of lighting. After all, we’re not really working in there much (unless it doubles as an office), and the primary goal of the space is to support sleep— which requires an intentional lack of light.
    Eleanor Büsing
    May 4, 2019
    How to Properly Light a Bathroom
    As with the kitchen, the bathroom is a “work room,” and therefore one of the most important spaces in the home to get lighting right. They also tend to be smaller than all the other rooms in our home, and don’t have as many (or as large) windows. Careful consideration of the General, Task and Accent lighting we add to this room will pay dividends in how the area functions and feels.
    Eleanor Büsing
    May 4, 2019
    How To Downsize a Kitchen: 8 Tips for Owning Less in the Most Space-Sucking Room in the House
    Lately it seems that I’m hearing the word “downsize” everywhere. From friends buying their first bijoux apartments after years in shared and spacious rented accommodation, to my parents’ generation selling multi-bedroom suburban houses and moving into city condos, to articles about living more minimally, owning less is trending. Obviously, downsizing is going to be different for everyone.
    Eleanor Büsing
    May 4, 2019
    Before & After: Organizing the Kitchen “Sad Drawer”
    Almost every kitchen’s got one. They go by different names: my old flatmate and I called ours the Drawer of Doom, and with my current one, The Sad Drawer. It’s that one place in a kitchen, be it drawer, pantry shelf, or simply an unfortunate corner, that attracts random debris like nobody’s business. From the actually useful (tupperware, kitchen foil) to the barely-used (madeleine pan, anyone?), the Sad Drawer is where things that don’t go anywhere else find themselves.
    Eleanor Büsing
    May 4, 2019
    DIY Fall Decor: All Gold Everything
    Fall is officially here, and everything is coming up gold. From garlands and wreaths to pumpkins and pears, read on for simple ways to DIY this metallic into your home for the season. TOP ROW: 1. Falling leaves garland from 6th Street Design School. 2. Gilded acorns available to buy from Light of Day Creations on Etsy, but an easy thing to DIY! 3. Gold-painted branches from Popsugar. 4. DIY no-sew burlap table runner from Inspired by Charm. 5. Gold-dipped log candleholder DIY on the Etsy blog.
    Eleanor Büsing
    May 4, 2019
    How To Establish a Home Filing System (& Stick To It!)
    It’s a new year, and around the globe people are making that age-old promise to themselves: this is the year I finally get organized. No more drowning in paperwork, no more dining table cluttered with bills and receipts—this year it all stops. Want to know something? It can be done. A simple, user-friendly filing system is something every home should have, and is easy to set up and maintain.
    Eleanor Büsing
    May 4, 2019
    The New Look for Painted Trim? Anything But White
    For a long time now, white-painted woodwork has been de rigeur in the domestic interior, so much so that it’s almost a foregone conclusion. But this is slowly changing: we’ve seen black woodwork popping up lately, and now grays and bold hues are making their voices heard as well. If you fancy this change but aren’t sure what to go for, let this trim-spiration sourced from around the web be your guide.
    Eleanor Büsing
    May 4, 2019
    A Minimalist Manifesto: How To Simplify Your Style at Home
    Sometimes, our homes can overwhelm us. What should be a place of retreat and comfort becomes bloated with items not needed, styles experimented with and abandoned, and projects started but never completed. While a good Spring Clean (whenever it happens) is always welcome, sometimes you want to go even further than that and streamline your style, too. Read on for our Minimalist Manifesto, and for ideas on how to simplify your home.
    Eleanor Büsing
    May 4, 2019
    My Capsule Wardrobe Experiment: Part One – Why I Decided To Pare Down
    Not my wardrobe. Sigh. (It belongs to Amanda of Chocolate Heels.) In the middle of 2015, I wrote a post on ways to reduce clutter in the closet and money spent on clothing. Among the ideas presented was the Capsule Wardrobe, an idea which has long been hanging around the internet, but which really took off that year.
    Eleanor Büsing
    May 4, 2019
    My Capsule Wardrobe Experiment: Part Three – Lessons Learned, Tips & Takeaways
    This is the final post in my mini-series on capsule wardrobes. If you’ve been following along, you’ve seen why I decided to give this a go and how I created my first capsule, and now it’s time for the results. Read on for my thoughts (warning: I’ve got a lot of ’em) on living with a 37-piece wardrobe for three months. First up: I really loved opening my closet every morning to see a small, edited collection of clothing that I really wanted to wear.
    Eleanor Büsing
    May 4, 2019
    My Capsule Wardrobe Experiment: Part Two – How I Created My Capsule
    Previously, I introduced you to my recent wardrobe obsession: capsule wardrobes. This on-trend idea (hi, KonMari!) was everywhere last year, and for me, a lifetime of loving fashion, a penchant for organization, and a tight budget came together and created the perfect environment in which it could take root. This week, I’m showing how I made my first capsule back in September 2015 and sharing tips for the structure and creation of capsules in general.
    Eleanor Büsing
    May 4, 2019
    Retro Bathroom Refresh: Why Older Bathroom Suites are Still Sweet
    Common wisdom says that when it comes to bathroom suites, newer, more streamlined, and whiter is better. The bathroom is often the first room homeowners want to gut, but this isn’t the only option. If you’re lucky enough to have a suite of retro bathware in good nick, whether it be pink, mint green, or even avocado, maybe think twice about ripping it out. Read on for some swoon-worthy retro bathrooms.
    Eleanor Büsing
    May 3, 2019
    Capsule Wardrobe Update: Eleanor’s Spring Capsule
    Earlier this year, I wrote a 3-part series about my recent experiment with capsule wardrobes: why I did it, how I did it, and what I learned. While many of you seemed to like the idea of capsules and the posts themselves, a common comment was that you’d prefer to see real-life examples of what a capsule wardrobe looks like— i.e., my own wardrobe. Gulp. There were a few reasons I didn’t do this the first time around.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Apr 30, 2019
    Eleanor’s Cure: A Crash Landing, Averted
    I count myself pretty lucky that my flat has a built-in Landing Strip, in the form of a covered radiator with mirror in the entry, and hooks for coats further along the hall. I know not everyone is this fortunate (I lived for years in a flat where the keys-mail-coat situation happened right in the kitchen, using up valuable counter space), so I’m definitely grateful for my current situation. The only problem with having a ready and waiting landing strip is that you do tend to abuse it.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Feb 24, 2019
    Tyler & Lolly’s Modern Mews in London
    Name: Tyler and Lolly Lux Location: Kensington, London, United Kingdom Size: 560 square feet Years lived in: 2 years, rented The morning of my photo shoot at Tyler and Lolly’s west London mews home, the couple were visited by an unexpected guest, in the form of a pigeon who somehow managed to fall down their chimney into the living room. “We woke up and could hear this strange flapping noise” Lolly told me when I arrived several hours later.
    Eleanor Büsing
    Feb 20, 2019