Lauren-Grace @gracieellehome is a Graphic Designer for a busy marketing agency, living in Yorkshire with her partner Tom, 2-year-old son Hugo and house rabbit, Casper. With a creative background, passion for interior design and photography, she spends her downtime styling and mood boarding future projects in her first family home. She documents her honest renovation journey of her 1930’s home through aesthetic content on her Instagram @gracieellehome, as she brings earthy tones and character back into the property.
As I sit typing this, candles lit with our beautiful wool carpet underfoot, I remember the first time we viewed our current home back in 2016. As first-time buyers we were inexperienced, but we could see its potential. Looking beyond the harsh floral textured wallpapers and deep grey pile carpets we fell for the large windows, original chimney breasts and the old, protected pear trees draping the gardens. We made quick changes when we first moved in, including replacing the carpets. Living in the space, despite the huge windows, the position of the house left the living room and the hallway feeling dark beyond 1pm and we quickly realised our poor carpet choice hadn’t helped. A few years in, once bigger renovation projects were complete we started revisiting the rooms with a more refined interior direction. As with many 1930’s semi-detached houses, the rooms are snug. Our living room had become the heart of the home, serving as a play space by day and adult retreat by evening, and it just wasn’t working for the latter in its current state.
With a vision of a beautifully calming space, we made many changes to the living room, but by far the one that made the most impact was replacing our old carpet with a luxurious Brockway carpet. We transformed the room adding subtle, traditional panelling to the walls, which added texture and interest without over accessorising and gave the illusion of higher ceilings. Painting the walls a deeper tone, a beautiful earthy sage green and softening darker corners by lightening wood elements around the room. When it came to carpet, we opted for the Elements range in shade ‘Pebble’, a beautiful warm mid grey with differing flecks and depths. The day it was installed I knew I’d want these carpets throughout. The beautiful loop weave gave us interest and texture, but felt durable, classic and instantly made the room feel smarter and more luxurious. It feels like a hug underfoot and maintains its form and shape incredibly well, which was so important to us in a heavily used family room. Choosing the carpet was hard, as there are so many beautiful options, but the free sample boxes are incredibly useful when helping you decide on a shade and range in your own space, especially in rooms like ours where the light so drastically changes throughout the day.
We opted for the Landscapes range in shade Tundra for the staircase, landing, and home office space. A much lighter neutral shade, still with a beautifully earthy undertone. Originally dark, deep pile grey carpets, the staircase always felt dark and closed in, yet instantly opened up with the installation of the beautiful Tundra. It’s a tighter, smaller weave, but still gives beautiful texture and smartness and sits so tightly to the stairs it felt like an entirely new space. The change it made to the home office (3rd bedroom) was drastic. It was a cold, draughty room with old wooden floors previously, now transformed into an inviting, warm, soft space which is a joy to work in each day. We have comments on how beautiful this carpet is underfoot from most visitors.
I could not recommend Brockway highly enough, a British family-run business with sustainability and high-quality craftsmanship at its core, I know these carpets will last the test of time in our family home and I’m already planning the next room it will be installed in. With comments from our fitters about its quality, beauty, and the brands reputation I knew we’d made the perfect choice. If you’re looking for a sign to order some samples, consider this it.
