Every Room in a Barn-Turned-Home Is Dark, Bold, and Spectacularly Sassy

Name: Sally Worts, husband, four sons, two dogs
Location: Skipton — North Yorkshire, United Kingdom
Years lived in: 7 years, owned

My home is a barn conversion in a tiny North Yorkshire village. We don’t have a village shop or a pub but what we do have are wide open views of the countryside straight outside the back barn doors and that is priceless.

I live here with my husband, two sons, and two dogs. We have two older sons as well but they have left home now.

When we moved in there was so much orange pine everywhere it was like living in a 1970s sauna (without the heat) so we tackled that first. We actually painted the whole house in country cottage colors but it felt really bland so we decided to go to the dark side and have never looked back.

Wrap-around dark interiors feel very cocooning and I can’t ever imagine we will want to change the color scheme.

Describe your home’s style in 5 words or less: Dark, bold, sassy, rock ‘n’ roll

What is your favorite room and why? Oh this is such a difficult question!

I was really mindful that I wanted to create a flow between the rooms and for the eye to be able to travel undisturbed from room to room. As such I think I would say my favorite “view” is when I’m standing in the kitchen, looking through the hall into the lounge and into the home bar at the other end of the house.

But… I also love, love, love our dark floral bedroom. We are very lucky as it’s a huge room at the end of a corridor away from the rest of the house so it feels like our own luxurious apartment.

What’s the last thing you bought (or found!) for your home? I had been trying to find a vintage dressing screen for absolutely ages, and despite my best efforts, failed.

So I bought a really cheap, nasty screen from Amazon and commissioned Sarah of @relovedmcr to transform it for me using Pearl Lowe Wisteria wallpaper from @woodchipandmagnolia. It’s absolutely perfect and totally fits the romantic boudoir feel of the room.

Any advice for creating a home you love? Just go with your gut feeling and fill your home with things you love.

My top tip is layering. Don’t just go for one rug, use a few of different sizes in a room.

Don’t be afraid of using pattern—I love to use lots of patterns and mix them up one on top of the other.

Art: fill your walls with art in different eclectic frames.

If I find something I love, I do tend to repeat it throughout the house to create a flow to the space.

At the end of the day it’s your home so make it somewhere you can’t wait to come back to each day.

Thanks, Sally!

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