When Susie Watson and her husband Hamish found their Grade 2 * listed farmhouse near Marlborough, they fell in love with the garden and the charming timber-framed house on sight.
‘The farmhouse dates from the 1600s but had a later Queen Anne extension,’ says Susie.
This was in 2002, and the couple were looking to leave London after 10 years in order to downsize. All their four children had left home, and now they share their space with Jack Russells – Wally and Daisy – and a German wirehaired pointer called Nelly.
The hall is painted in Warm Seas and the curtains are in an Akansha blockprinted in Indian Red. The kilims are in Rose Ragini, Biarritz and Pushkar Ros all Susie Watson Designs. (Photo: Simon Maxwell) The house had been a working farm for generations. Then it was sold in 1950 to a family who lived there for the next 50 years. ‘They had planted extensively and left a wonderful selection of trees and flowerbeds,’ says Susie. The garden had almost vanished by the time the Watsons arrived but after much work they now open it some years for the National Garden Scheme.
‘So, no-one had done very much to the house which is what we liked,’ she says. ‘All the original features were there which was important as we love old houses and have been restoring them for several years.
‘It was essential to keep the charm of the old building,’ she continues. ‘So, wherever possible we sourced from local reclamation yards. The tiled floor in the new conservatory and the herringbone brick floor in the extended kitchen look as if they have always been there. A carpenter, who had worked with us in London, made the wooden kitchen units, and we installed a large Aga into the inglenook with its huge old bread oven.’ This was discovered behind the original kitchen units when they were dismantled.
Currently, Susie and two of her children, Anna and Toby, run Susie Watson Designs. They now have 10 stores in attractive market towns around the country, ranging from Sherborne in Dorset to their recently opened flagship showroom in Broadway where they also have a high street store. Their original store opened in Susie’s hometown of Marlborough in 2008. Last year the store moved into a large, beautiful double-fronted townhouse on three floors in Marlborough High Street.
With reference to the Sherborne store on Cheap Street, Susie says, ‘Dorset is a very beautiful county and home to quite a lot of our customers. In fact, it’s the furthest west we extend (apart from our small shop in Salcombe in Devon.) We were offered an excellent space by our landlord and Sherborne is a beautiful market town to base ourselves in.’
Back to their own home in Wiltshire. The Watsons’ house had four bedrooms originally and just one bathroom on the first floor; but the previous owners had converted the attic to create a huge dormitory bedroom.
So, Watsons split one of the first-floor bedrooms to create two extra bathrooms but retained the lovely original oak floorboards in both. Cast iron baths, basins and traditional sanitary ware, often reclaimed, suited the house and made the new bathrooms look in keeping. They also refurbished the original bathroom, adding wooden paneling to the walls to match that in the bedroom.
Then they replaced a small lean-to greenhouse with a pretty west-facing conservatory. This acts as a dining room off from the kitchen, and it is surrounded by trees and the garden. They also decided the summer house in the garden would make a perfect studio for Susie and her team to work in, and it is often used for photoshoots.
But how did Susie begin her career as a designer?
‘I designed clothes when I was in my twenties for several years, but four children took up more and more time. We moved quite a few times, which meant I was constantly rebuilding our home and thinking about the things that worked and things which were disappointing. I became more and more interested in interiors, often mixing colours and painting walls myself.’
When they returned to London, Susie and Hamish started a business restoring houses to resell. They built up a small team of artisan builders who were very much part of their team. ‘Planning, renovating, redecorating and then selling and moving onto the next project. Whilst planning a house, I would always imagine it was for us to live in which worked well, as it meant they were really practical and homely.’
As a result, their designs now include a large range of natural fabrics and hardwood furniture, paint and wallpaper, handmade kilims, wool throws, bedding, lighting and a huge range of handmade cushions.
‘Everything we sell is handmade and designed by us,’ says Susie. ‘Our ethos remains the same, we specialise in making houses into homes and believe that good design should never date.’
Bath Reclamation (formerly Walcot Reclamation) 07983556757, bathreclamation.co.uk
Beechfield Reclamation; 01380 730999, beechfieldreclamation.co.uk
Vale Garden Houses (conservatory) 01476 564433
Sherborne Shop, Cheap Street 01935 817641
Broadway Flagship Showroom 01386 574720
General enquiries 0344 980 8185
susiewatsondesigns.co.uk
:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc():focal(471x244:473x246)/CNN-New-Years-Eve-with-Anderson-Cooper-123124-9952e5f00fc1425f87113ba2bfb97b29.jpg "Anderson Cooper Says He Once ‘Hated’ New Year’s Eve While Co-Hosting CNN Broadcast")
