Best Things: Holidays at home

We spent our holiday very much at home, which was a really good thing to do after a rather disrupted home in 2015. Shortly after having bought the apartment next door early in the year, we found our neighbours were going to have a baby in November, so we rather hastily started our long dreamed-of plan to combine the two units. Not long after returning from our trip to LA, the builders started bashing things with the intent to turn what had been our living room and bedroom into a giant open space, and the new apartment next door into a bedroom.

Three months later, and the renovations worn on (as they always do). I had to leave for India with Ritchie Ace Camps in early October, and as I walked out the door with my wheelie bag, this was my last glimpse of our beloved apartment. Yikes! Poor Paul, who had just three weeks to go before his solo exhibition at WhatiftheWorld, was left in charge.

Eventually, the builders left and the last of the dust was hoovered up. November and December flashed by, of course, so after such a busy, disrupted year, spending a couple of weeks at home, getting to know our newly supersized space is exactly what we needed.

This week, the painters will finally make an appearance, so we can finish up more thoroughly, but some bits are looking good enough to Instagram, so I posted these over the holidays.

On the Holiday To Do List was the item “Find Living Room Rug”. It’s a bigger task than it sounds, but after having taken home a fair few almost-wins, we found exactly what we wanted at Tirmah Interiors on Buitengracht Street: an interesting, not-too-expensive contemporary rug of just the right size that met with the cats’ approval…

The owners at Tirmah Interiors were kind enough to offer a 10% discount to any Skinny laMinx reader who buys a rug from them, using the exclusive code TIRSKIN. They ship nationally, and abroad too, so the offer is valid, wherever you may be in the world. Browse their rug selection here.

The apartment we added to ours has a tiny enclosed balcony, which the previous owner had used for a washing machine, so it needed some love and attention, which is what we did (in the form of scraping and painting) when we took a break from naps and swims. With the addition of my macrame hangers, and pots of tomato and basil on the tiny sill, we transformed it into the most serene little reading/loafing room, now dubbed “The Caprese Lounge”.

We LOVE our new place and once the painting is all done, I’m sure I’ll have lots more pics to share. Nearly there!