Sophie Conran talks us through how she decorated her Bayswater home while a banoffee pie bakes in the oven
As I am shown into Sophie Conran’s kitchen, the interior/product designer and cook is, naturally, putting the finishing touches to a banoffee pie. Smart in a blue jacket, jeans and a ponytail, she’s warm and natural with a big smile.
Sophie's used to having media drop in on her – she holds product launches of her homewares and events in her flat in a classic Bayswater terrace. She says it’s because she grew up, as a scion of the Conran design dynasty, with Habitat shoots happening all around her.
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Her top-floor flat overlooks a gated square filled with light and colour. The open-plan kitchen is something she put in when when she was 20 (“it’s pretty knackered, but it works”) and opens into the sitting room; the whole works together as a homely living space, with burnt orange scatter cushions and hot-pink kitchen walls. It’s peaceful – just birdsong accompanies our chat.
The kitchen where the banoffee pie happens
Over the years she bought the neighbouring top floor flats, and knocked them all together to create a family home. As Sophie talks me through her possessions – children’s pictures, a Patrick Cauldfield, two Warhol Marylins side- by-side, a little set of work tools upcycled by her son, a 1970’s gold-and-glass coffee table – she says she’s not sure what her design style is, but her approach is to ”surround yourself with things you love, with a bit of thought.”
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When working on an interiors project, she says she looks to create a balance between “little moments of excitement with colour and calm spaces. I work with the building, maximising light and the function of the room. We mustn’t be afraid; that’s how we have ended up with beige everywhere.”
Beige, she is not. Her hallway is mad. Guests arrive to a winding staircase wallpapered and carpeted in a colour she describes as “tomato”. She admits it is “quite strong”, and says she had 30 different swatches originally, taking her time to eliminate them one by one.
"Tomato" chairs with Warhols on the walls
Her bedroom, conversely, is simple – light carpet, white bed linen, a couple of sea green comfy chairs. A pared-down cherrywood four-poster that she has had for “absolutely years” is the centrepiece, accompanied by an unassuming chest and side table made by “my father’s woodworking company Benchmark.”
Even more unassuming is a small, neat, rectangular dressing table, an early piece that Sir Terrence made himself, a treasure. One design note worth stealing is to line swag curtains in citrus yellow. “They bring sunshine into the room in the morning. Anyone who stays in this room says it’s such a great feeling.”
She’s currently inspired by Bill Bryson’s ramblings in the English countryside, the timeless idea of “the rectory” and you might find her browsing for antiques in Tetbury, Wiltshire, or at the Battersea Antiques and Textiles Fair. She is a wonderfully English domestic goddess, but far too humble ever to say. But the proof is in the pudding – her banoffee pie is ready before I leave and it’s absolutely delicious, of course.
Sophie Conran is launching her limited-edition 10th anniversary tableware for Pormeirion in August. Visit sophieconran.com