The Robinson garden at Hyde Hall

Now you're not going to believe this. I almost didn't. And before I tell you, we'd already decided on our gabion journey when I saw this garden, but seeing it made me smile and confirm it had to be done.

If you've no idea what I'm talking about then while I might claim this garden as my own, I'm not the Robinson it's named after. The Robinsons were the first owners of Hyde Hall and this, and the Woodland garden were the first gardens here. In 2006 the Robinson garden was redeveloped to "create a contemporary garden with three distinct boggy areas."

So now I've set the scene, would you believe it looked like this:

NEATLY STACKED GABION BASKETS IN THE ROBINSONS GARDEN

I know, I'm seeing gabion baskets everywhere now!  

AN ENTICING SPACE

Although this is clearly on a much larger scale than ours!

It was useful though to prove to MOH it can be done, and can look fantastic. Being the thorough sort though we spent probably far too long looking at how these were put together. I must admit to loving the order of the neatly stacked inners, but I'm still pleased we opted for the more purse-friendly reclaimed look.

IT'S EVEN GOT A CURVE

It was here though that I really appreciated the helicoils and was glad I'd over ordered and we could add them to the joins and corners on ours.

HELICOILS SOFTENING THE SHARP EDGES

AND CURVES, MEAN TRIANGLE SHAPED SPACES. AND THESE ARE PARTICULARLY GOOD!

The plants weren't bad either...

But this garden wasn't just about the gabions, stones and helicoils. The plants had my name all over them too. 

ALLIUM SEED HEADS

I need more alliums in my garden - must remember that when the bulb catalogues start arriving! But I have plenty of these hart's tongues ferns though - they grow in the old stair well alongside our conservatory.  Every year or so I scrape a load off the wall and plant into a pot and let them grow on. That's how I had enough plants to fill our gabion baskets that we used as planters.  It drives MOH crazy I'm sure, but this summer for the first time ever he saw why it was useful to have some plants that grow in our garden mature enough to be useful.

HART'S TONGUE FERN

The astrantia below should also be on my plant list. I've lusted after it for a while, in fact since I first saw them at Bosvigo in Cornwall in 2014.

GORGEOUSLY DELICATE ASTRANTIAS

The plants were totally at home with the gabion retaining wall, and happily clambering up them.

PLANTS WERE HAPPILY CLAMBERING OVER THE GABION WALL

It's an impressive space, and one that helped us have the confidence to really push forward with ours.

And you never know, maybe the future is gabion basket shaped!

I'm still not sure if I'm spotting more gabion baskets because I'm tuned into them, or if there's more around...

The bedroom and bathroom room sets at this year's Ideal Home Show

Unbelievably I visited the Ideal Home Show almost five months ago - I'm not sure where the time has gone. Equally as unbelievable is I've shared very little from there, and from the Grand Designs show a month later, here until now.  Over the next few weeks I'll share the room sets, the houses and the garden sets from both shows, because, well because it's a great way to see the interior trends, and there's nothing better than having a look at how someone else decorates is there?

This week I'm starting with the bedroom and bathroom room sets and the rest of the rooms will follow.  I talk a lot about texture here on the blog so you can imagine my delight when I saw this bedroom stuffed full of textures, and with a yellow back wall to boot. The faux wall was an interesting idea that could work well in the right sized room.  It provides a great focal feature which you can frame, as they've done here, with a bold colour.  I'll not tell you what's behind there until later.

Yes, this bedroom was all about snuggly texture. The throw on the bed is just insane isn't it?

I also liked the simplicity of the seedhead wallpaper and how the muted colours and patterns all worked together, but I think that string of pom poms on the headboard would be a real dust collector.  The bedside tables are also a design hit with me, the A frame works well doesn't it?

Every bedroom needs a mirror and somewhere to put stuff and this bedroom managed that stylishly too. Although not copper, the mirror perfectly complements the copper hairbrush and eyelash curlers. I never knew copper had become some entrenched, and it looks like it'll be around a while longer doesn't it, but... copper eyelash curlers?  I don't possess any (curlers not eyelashes) but I've a feeling I might need these...

And behind the wall?

The cutest office space. With room for a desk and chair, and a brightly coloured rug it looks a completely different space doesn't it? And a very clever way of keeping a workspace out of sight. Although this one is pretty enough to actually be on display...

The rug fits well with the seed head wallpaper too and I think brings the space together.  I'd happily find room for this in my house too. Along with that tower of white drawers, although I'd resist adding labels and then never remember which drawer I put anything in.

Even now looking back over these pictures I love that bedroom. MOH didn't like the big chunky throw, but he wouldn't need to have any of it would he?  So moving on...

To the bathroom

A completely different look here, and a dramatic one too. I've seen lots of black and white in bathrooms, and there's a good reason for that, and that's because it works. This one has touches of grey, wood and metallics as well as plants. Of course it's completely unrealistic size-wise but there's some great ideas here too.

I like the inbuilt tiled shelf for pots and jars - but only stylish ones obviously, and the black ladder towel rail against the black wall. You'd think it wouldn't stand out, but it does.

With the bath in the centre of the room there's another faux panel to frame it and add decorative touches. We'd never be able to have such prettiness in our bathroom as I'm sure it wouldn't last too long before being knocked to the floor. I'm not usually a fan of standalone baths, but I like this one with its own wall close by.

So there's the first two room sets, both inspiring, but both very different. What did you think? Would you - or do you - go for either of these styles?

Love this #76: The Kalevala CAL

You might have seen on social media last weekend that I decided to teach myself to crochet. It's been a long time coming, and you might be wondering why now?  That's a fair question as I originally said I wanted to start crocheting back in 2014, and I've not really got close to it before. It was one of those aspirations, that well remained just that. 

At least though I'd bought some wool, some crochet hooks and a granny square book, and mum sent me the Learn to Crochet booklet. It doesn't have a date, and I hesitate to call it vintage, but let's just say the price on the front is 2/-

And I made good progress; four traditional granny squares and a foray into something more adventurous too - the Blooming Granny, complete with popcorn stitch flower (get me!)  - and mum's asked me to show her this stitch.

I'd always looked at crochet diagrams in bemusement, but I quickly realised with a bit of decoding, the learn to crochet guide and a peek at YouTube it wasn't anywhere near as hard as I thought. And much to my surprise the crochet diagrams are easier to understand than the written instructions.

I've always been a knitter (some might say knit) and so working with a single hook seemed alien. Over the weekend I learnt that the hook does all of the work and it's quite fascinating to watch and see my granny squares develop.  On the plus side, it seems progress is quicker than knitting too, which for a beginner is just awesome...

BLOOMING GRANNY

So I've seven completed squares, and the crochet has been in my bag every day at work this week. It hasn't quite made it out yet, but lunchtimes this week have been a bit rushed, but it's staying there because I'm an eternal optimist.  I was starting to tire of using the same wool, but the pistachio green and candy pink wasn't quite the look I was going for, so off I headed to Hobbycraft after work on Monday.

It's great, I walked there and then home again so I could feel totally virtuous with the 13,500+ steps I clocked up that day, and thankfully walking meant I had to carry my purchases.  I wasn't sure what I wanted, other than a change of wool, but I left with more yellows, mint greens and creams. 

MOH hasn't seen them yet, and he doesn't really need to just yet - he's already asking what I'll do with the growing pile of squares I'm manufacturing. The answer is clear, I'll make a blanket. Obviously. He looked less than convinced, but it'll look great in our spare bedroom.

But I haven't told you why last weekend yet, have I.  And my granny squares are just that, they're nowhere near as beautiful as the Kalevala CAL in the title of this post.

The Kalevala CAL

Early Saturday morning saw some Facebook browsing and I came across a post about the Kalevala CAL, which I had no idea what it was. But the lady that posted seemed excited by it, so I took a look. And maybe, the image below might have caught my eye.

I mean, isn't that blanket fantastic?!

My ambition for learning to crochet was always to make an afghan (or blanket) with various patterned squares, but like learning to crochet I'd done nothing more about it. And here, fortuitously it had been presented to me and so with my simplistic way of thinking, it was clearly meant to be. 

My Facebook browsing was abandoned and I went into research mode.  I learnt the Kalevala CAL is a project to celebrate Finland's 100 years of independence. The blanket is made up of twenty four squares, plus the join and the border and each square relates to the Kalevala poetry by Elias Lönnrot.  

But could I do it?  

Well laying in bed there Saturday morning the answer was clearly no, but I thought if I could learn to crochet then I'd be in with a fair chance. And so that's what I did, but first I dived into what colourway my Kalevala CAL would be.  And yes, I contemplated yellow, but decided this would hopefully be something that would be around for a long time (finished I mean, not part-made) and so an olive green would have better longevity. 

So I ordered the wool and I'm waiting for it to arrive.

Am I mad? Yes!

Will I have a beautiful hand crocheted blanket? I hope so!