How an old-fashioned Cotswolds family home was brought back to life

Nicola Harding is in the open-plan ground floor of her detached Cotswolds home, struggling to accept a compliment about a red stripy rug. “That’s just a flea market find,” she says with a laugh. “God knows what colour it would actually be if it wasn’t covered in all sorts.”
That pretty much sums up the lack of pretension that has made Harding, who has worked on a slew of well-heeled homes and hotels, such as the Beaverbrook Town House in Chelsea, one of the country’s most sought-after interior designers. She is a master of the elegant yet “undone” look — the interiors equivalent of no-make-up make-up — with layered rooms that appear so natural they barely betray the expertise behind them.
Not for Harding are formal compositions, overly curated bookshelves or questionable karate-chop cushions; instead there is pleasure in the unpolished and an appreciation of comfort over style. “The greatest compliment is if someone walks in and has no idea there has been a design, but it pulls on the heartstrings and you feel at home and want to hunker down,” she says.
Her six-bedroom abode, originally a small 17th-century farmhouse that has been added to over the years, does exactly that. Once in the entry hall with its block-print botanical wallpaper, there is a relaxed conviviality. It feels reassuringly lived-in; the kitchen is stashed with family mementoes — she and her husband, Andy, co-founder of NiX, her successful homeware brand, have three children aged 15, 13 and 9, as well as three dogs and two cats — and nothing looks discernibly new. Indeed, much of the furniture is antique or vintage, and is reupholstered in fabric from Harding’s collection or it has informed the NiX pieces that are dotted around.
The double-fronted house had been untouched for 40 years with a warren of gloomy-looking rooms, and Harding admits it was initially difficult to envisage how they would make the space work. “A lovely lady had been living there and she had never had kids, so it wasn’t set up for family life at all. But there was something overwhelmingly compelling about the house. We just knew that even though it sort of didn’t make sense, it was an opportunity we couldn’t pass up.”
The biggest job was reconfiguring one side of the ground floor to create a spacious, open-plan kitchen, living and dining space with a Lutyens-inspired extension. “I wanted it to be a lovely place to gather,” she says. “I have had 33 people here before.” Harding eschewed a traditional fitted kitchen for a relaxed look by Plain English. “It feels more like a room. Kitchens can feel surgical but by adding the artwork and the table lamps, it makes it warmer and more inviting.”
Harding’s renowned use of colour and pattern is deployed throughout and her clever combinations and unexpected hues remove any feeling of stuffiness and give a fresh spin on the English country aesthetic. The open-plan space is layered in shades of green, from the fresco finish on the walls to the deeper shade of the kitchen cabinets. For the library and TV room, she embraced the lack of natural light and painted it a deep aubergine for a cocooning feel, while her drawing room-cum-study is in her favourite pink, Old Rose by Pure & Original, which makes the artwork and pistachio green corduroy sofas sing. “I love corduroy because it is tactile but without being too smart or precious, as there are always dogs or children jumping on them.”
Woodwork is often in a deeper tone than the walls, as is the case in her bedroom, painted Summerset Mauve (again by Pure & Original), a trick she picked up from her friend Joa Studholme, colour curator for Farrow & Ball. “She taught me that if you paint the windows a darker shade, it pulls your eye through,” Harding says.
During the restoration, Harding ensured she reused as many existing elements as possible. The parquet flooring in the drawing room was reinstated from the hall. In the family bathroom , the existing bath and loo were retained (reclaimed taps replaced the modern ones) and the pink tiles were previously in the downstairs loo.
Even threadbare curtains left by the previous owner were revived with new trims. Harding also made use of leftovers from work projects, such as the zellige tiles on the bathroom floors.
In the main bedroom, a double-height space has been carved up to create a sleeping area and mezzanine with a bathroom —complete with windows reclaimed from the former kitchen — above a walk-in dressing room. “The bedroom is raised, so from the bed you can see out of the windows,” Harding says. “It was also about trying to create a lovely spot to have a bath and thinking about what magic you can bring to it.” Pieces here include a cherished floor lamp inherited from her grandfather, which inspired one of her own NiX designs.
It may look like a forever home but Harding doesn’t rule out a future move. Even so, she is in no doubt about the house’s magic. “We are incredibly fortunate to live here,” she says. “My aim is always to create homes with soul and ones people feel held by, and this house has done exactly that for us.”
nicolaharding.com