I have always had a connection to, and love of, older things,’ says former environmental manager Lucy Warry. Her earliest experiences of antiques shops and auction houses came via her mother and both her grandmothers. ‘My mother was always upcycling the furniture she’d bought in a junk shop with a quick lick of paint,’ she says.
But her real passion for auctions and collecting came about when she met her mother-in-law,
an ex-television props buyer, art director and vintage shop owner. ‘Her house was the first home I saw where colour, textiles and antiques were really exciting and full of life,’ she recalls.
When Lucy and her husband Jasper, founder and creative director of Hello Deer Productions, first set up home in Tooting, south London, they spent a lot of their time visiting antiques markets in search of furniture. ‘Very little that we bought for the house was new,’ she recalls, ‘so its contents had a story to tell, which I really like.’ Much of what they amassed at that time moved with them to Wales, when they decamped following the arrival of their two eldest children, Bean, aged 16, and Roly, aged 15.
‘London became harder to navigate,’ says Lucy, adding that the couple would frequently escape to spend weekends with Jasper’s mother in Powys. ‘We really fell in love with the area,’ she explains,
so when Jasper’s mother suggested they might like to move into the newly renovated barn next
door to her 17th-century farmhouse, they leapt at the chance.
Converted for domestic use, the building was a spacious blank canvas on which they could make their mark, using colour and the furniture they had collected in London, to frame the open-plan spaces. A number of mid-century pieces, including an Ercol sideboard – now in the living room – and a 1960s Danish dressing table in the couple’s bedroom, looked particularly at home against the whitewashed walls and weathered beams.
‘It seemed to fit in perfectly within this rustic building,’ says Lucy. ‘The warm wood and fine streamlined look are very adaptable, and it’s made it easier to add and take things away over the last 13 years.’
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The last couple of years, with their repeated lockdowns, prompted a radical career change for Lucy, and she is currently studying for a degree in ceramics and jewellery at Carmarthen School of Art. The course has resulted in a new-found confidence in colour as well as a change in taste, she says, and the lockdowns themselves offered her an opportunity to redecorate the house.
‘I’ve always loved colour, but I’ve become braver with age. The new blue on the walls of the sitting room, for example, was inspired by Matisse’s Blue Nudes lithographs,’ says Lucy. It took her a long time to find the exact shade, she explains, but eventually a local building materials supplier came up trumps. ‘The kind people at Huws Gray in Hay-on-Wye scanned a blue plastic eye bath, which gave me the perfect shade,’ she says.
Little vignettes provide interesting focal points throughout the house, and enhance the relaxed and eclectic look – nothing looks forced or contrived. Over the past few years, Lucy has introduced decorative fabrics from different eras – a vintage kantha quilt as a hanging panel, and geometric prints and florals on cushion covers. The walls are hung with contemporary works by friends and family, and pieces bought at auction.
‘We are very lucky to have a good selection of antiques and bric-à-brac shops in the surrounding towns of Brecon, Hay-on-Wye and Builth Wells, as well as auction houses and fairs, which are always full of unexpected goodies that can be upcycled or displayed in the house straightaway.’
The influence of Jasper’s favourite film director, Wes Anderson, can be felt in some of the colour combinations, such as the pale pinks juxtaposed with brighter colours, and the kitsch, slightly Deco touches that hint of old Hollywood – notably palm tree table lamps, a quirky flamingo tapestry in the bedroom and the oversized ceramic dogs and leopards that appear at every turn.
These large ceramic animals – big cats in particular – are something Lucy started collecting following the move to Wales, and would be the things she’d rescue in a fire, she says. ‘Family and our border terrier, Phoebe, first, but they would be a close second,’ she laughs. ‘Being a child of the 80s may have been something to do with why I love them!’
Lucy has kept hold of everything that she and Jasper have collected since the beginning of their relationship. The backdrops might have changed, but somehow it all still works, she says. ‘The thread of our taste and our relationship still runs throughout the house, just like it did in our previous homes.’
The presence of these familiar possessions, which have been constant throughout their lives, is important to her. ‘I would never start over,’ she says. ‘Our belongings are part of us, and part of the family home – the children have grown up with them. I really like the idea that we’re surrounded by memories; they make our home what it is.’
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