We are all feeling the pinch right now and it looks set to continue for some time to come. I don’t know about you but I remember when ‘winter is coming’ was just a phrase from Game of Thrones! For this reason, we thought we would share some of our favourite finds from the high street, supermarket stores and independent shops to show that you don’t have to spend a lot of money to make a big impact.

In this week's blog we tell you how we transformed a tired dining room into an inviting, cosy and modern space. We will take you through the steps we took along the way and hopefully you will agree it is now a great place to entertain guests and to enjoy as a family.

Everyday we meet lovely customers and chat to them about their homes, and their design problems and dilemmas. And although every customer and every home is unique, there are also themes to the questions that we get asked. Below we have answered 10 questions that have cropped up recently in our chats to customers.

Interior Designers are a bit like magpies. We are drawn to all things pretty, shiny and aesthetically pleasing in all manner of unlikely places. We make a visual note and store it away to be used again at the right time. And it’s our homes that become the places that we like to experiment and tinker with the ideas to see how we can use and adapt them - sometimes with more or less success!

A few weekends ago, I enjoyed a birthday weekend away in the beautiful city of Bath. It had always been a place I had wanted to visit and I was not disappointed with its gorgeous buildings, history and of course wide array of lovely home stores to browse for hours!

I have shared with you four of my favourite home stores I visited and loved. It was great to come across so many beautiful stores that I can share with you!

As a child of the ‘70s, I can remember the 1980s quite clearly and it made quite an impression on me. Even as a little girl I remember thinking there was nothing more sophisticated than the combination of grey ash furniture and pastel pink walls (I was always obviously always destined to be an interior designer!). When my parents bought a new build in 1981 we all oohed and aahed over the beautiful avocado colour bathroom suite - complete with brown carpet, of course!

It’s no secret that at The Living House we love plants! Whether in our own homes or in schemes for our customers, we feel that no room is complete without a plant (or two or three!).

The brief for this project was very close to my heart as it was for my twin sons shared bedroom! Not that being this close to it makes decisions easier - I think it often makes it much harder!!

We love adding a mirror to our designs at The Living House. They almost always bring something extra to a room - and perfectly combine both the practical and the beautiful.

It’s that time of the year again when (fingers crossed!) we can all get out in the garden and enjoy some sun!!

We have been writing The Living House blog for the past 18 months on everything from how to hang your curtains to sharing our favourite independent shops with you. Over this time 5 blogs stand out as our most widely read with views in the thousands! These are the blogs that you have found the most helpful and inspiring, tackling advice on paint colour, room layouts and how to avoid mistakes - there’s plenty of top tips here that you might have missed.

I love to combine the old and the new in my home. It adds personality and character, and a history to make your home unique to you. There is something very ‘homely’ about things that tell a story about its previous life; the memories of the person who gave it to you or the place it came from. That’s not to say I want to live in an antique shop (and that would be immensely impractical with my heavy handed children!) but it’s about carefully marrying the old and new to create a beautiful individual home.

Everyday we meet lovely customers and chat to them about their homes, and their design problems and dilemmas. And although every customer and every home is unique, there are also themes to the questions that we get asked. Below we have answered 5 questions that have cropped up recently in our chats to customers.

Interior design can seem very complex, especially when you know what you want but have no idea how to achieve it. And as a potential customer of ours, it’s understandable that it seems complex. That’s why you’re asking for our help!

Wow! A lot has changed since I wrote my blog ‘Living with Sophie’ last year.

I am now officially a homeowner with my boyfriend Liam! We have purchased a two bed terrace house built in 1875. I have always loved older properties and this was the first house we viewed after looking at a few apartments. We knew straight away this was the one for us. We rushed down to the estate agents before anyone else could beat us to it and made our offer… six very long months later we had the keys!!

Big changes have been happening in the way we want to live in our homes over the last 20 years. I can remember when the only open plan living we saw was Madge Bishop's house on the set of Neighbours!

But our desire for separate rooms for each function has been fading. We started to realise the dining room was seldom used and often became the ‘junk room’, and the kitchen was not a fun place to be, isolated from the rest of the house. So we began knocking down the internal walls, extending into the garden and embracing open plan living. Hooray!!

In the spirit of Spring and change, we have rounded up our 10 favourite new shopping finds that we think you’ll love. Take a look at our favourites to get you inspired for Spring.

Everyday we meet lovely customers and chat to them about their homes, and their design problems and dilemmas. And although every customer and every home is unique, there are also themes to the questions that we get asked. Below we have answered 5 common questions that have cropped up recently.

Green is certainly having a moment right now! But with so much choice, what is the best green paint colour for your home?

“It’s been a nightmare to find help, I don’t have £1,000’s for an interior designer.”

“I’ve never had interior design help as I thought it was only for people who earn millions!!”

These are some of the comments we hear from our customers. Thankfully, once they have discovered online interior design, they realise they can shake off these beliefs and get some great help!