One *book at the HoBB is full of designs from the Victorian era. I like some of their rustic garden structures and have started to grown a roof of ivy as a natural thatch for sun hiding. This roof of ever greenery includes 54 varieties of Ivy and grows around a small circular seating area under two apple trees.

Unusually, we are constructing the sides of this ‘sitmedownuponder’ to support the roof as the ivies grow, and not beforehand. By doing this, we can follow the way the ivies grow naturally and give them the support they are seeking. All plants have a ‘leaning’ and by working alongside the way they determine their growth, the effect looks more natural.

Once the Ivy plants have formed a living roof they will naturally de-foliate on the underside away from the sun and reveal a complex natural lierne vaulted effect or the melon skin shown in the picture above.

At night, up lighters will highlight this complex web of overlapping ceiling stems and from the outside it will look like a large green glowing ball.

The tale of this sitting area will only be told in the growing but with the intention, the ending will forever be alive and useful.

Waves from ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ <+))))))))>< ~~~ Grant

(*Victorian Do-it-Yourself. E.J.Wiseman ISBN 0 7153 7307 2)

After a lot of tile showroom crawling, and only a little pub crawling to refresh the ongoing search, we found these vibrant tiles from Thailand.

Great fun, bright and they tie in the surrounding colours of the main HoBBian bathroom so well. There’s still a bit of carving to do above the bath as the first trial went wrong – the plaster fell off the wooden background when I tried to carve it.

Is the HoBB becoming an Interior Designers’ playground? It can look like it at times as we use the place to run-up our ideas and test methods.

Everything is drawn on paper initially so that we can make any alterations in the ‘look’ before we start. This saves time, money, effort and surprises. We like developing designs that work in a practical, visual and sometimes fanciful manner. If you are interested in our design thoughts and have some of your own that you’d like to explore, let me know as I am always interested in chatting about new lifestyle concepts and pushing forward the boundaries of material use.

~~~~~~~~~~ <+))))))))>< ~~~ waves from Grant