editor's note
MAKING HOME YOUR HAVEN Caitlan Mitchell, Editor, caitlan@reviewmags.com
T
he Kiwi dream is and will always be to have your own home. To have the freedom to do whatever you want, paint the kitchen fluro orange, have a gold tap – the sky's the limit. A few weeks ago, my husband and I bought our first home. We are bouncing off the walls to put our mark on our beautiful home. While most people dream of flawless white walls, my hubby and I are kind of maximalists… After the auction, I said in passing to him: “I wonder what colour we should paint the front door?” to which he replied: “Obviously bright pink.” I knew right then and there that not only was our house going to be wild, but that I had married the perfect man. Planning is extremely important, along with thorough research. If you don’t have a Pinterest account, go get one. The best way to ensure you are on the right track is to find 20 different images of the same style or concept for a room, and if you are still happy - go hard. However, if you only like one hero image in a certain house, you are probably not going to achieve it. It is very
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much like going to a hair salon with black hair and wanting to be platinum blonde by lunch. Be realistic with what your space looks like in comparison to your reference images. Also get a builders report if you have crazy dreams of knocking walls down. Always get a professional opinion, help or support before you start swinging your DIY hammer. It can be a really exciting and liberating time to find your own style. For the last five years I thought I was a MidCentury-Modernist, but now I realise – I’m a Maximalist, baby. Loud. Colourful. Unapologetically shocking. While for most, it is quite acceptable to have plain white walls, I feel like at times we are constantly trying to fit a cookie cutter mold where we must follow and seek out trends. For me, everything in my home has to make me smile or laugh or feel something. For my birthday this year, I was given a very large sculpture of a corn cob that was intended to be a footstool but I have it proudly sitting on a table. Hands down, the best gift I have ever received.
I am a huge fan of shock value, but I do understand limitations around this if you are on a budget like me. Hardware around the house like door handles, tapware, and so on – versatility always wins. When dressing a room, I put all the personality into things I can change easily. Paint and wallpaper. I may have a grey couch, but I have colourful loud throw pillows and blankets to decorate it. Decor is very easily changed whereas a pink fridge is a pink fridge (no regrets). I buy a lot of second hand furniture online and refurbish them myself to save some moolah. Pink bathroom? Why not! I was talking to my husband about a really intense and aggressive flamingo wallpaper for a small bathroom, and he couldn’t stop laughing after I showed it to him. You don’t always need to worry about the resale value of your house because for right now in this moment, it is your home. And it should only serve you. So go on, jump in, the water is fine.
Peter Mitchell Tania Walters Kieran Mitchell Sarah Mitchell
Retail 6, Heards Building, 2 Ruskin Street, Parnell, Auckland 1052, New Zealand. PO Box 37 140, Parnell, Auckland, New Zealand +64 9 304 0142 edit@reviewmags.com
Caitlan Mitchell Janet Guan, Sophie Procter, Shania Taylor Caroline Boe, Felicity Flack Raymund Sarmiento, Debby Wei
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