From snoring rooms to doggy showers: Luxury home trends 2016
The five hottest ways to spice up your home this year
Wellbeing gardens
When it comes to a stylish garden, hard lines and formal arrangements are out. That's the word from Chelsea Flower Show winner Sarah Eberle. Instead, a relaxed array of English wildflowers – especially ones that attract bees – is all the rage. "There's suddenly value in the ordinary things that are around us," Eberle told Ham and High.
There's also a growing emphasis on the role of gardening in wellbeing. Planting edible and medicinal herbs, for instance, will ensure your garden is not only fragrant, but useful.
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Keeping it minimal
Marie Kondo has amassed a devoted following with her book The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying, an intoxicating mixture of practical advice, self-help and philosophy for organising your home. Her KonMari method advocates serious root-and-branch decluttering. If an item doesn't "spark joy", it goes.
Snoring room
Suffer sleepness nights no more by investing in a "snoring room" – a second master bedroom specifically designed as a refreshing oasis for those kept awake by a noisy sleeper.
Buying agent Nick Mead told the Daily Telegraph that snoring rooms were becoming a "more and more" common sight – "often with a single bed made up ready for the moment the noise becomes too much".
Doggy showers
The latest innovation in pet pampering guarantees no more muddy pawprints in the kitchen or bathroom. Pet owners can now have a dedicated "doggy shower" installed, specially designed to accommodate pets in need of a scrub.
Richmond Edmondson, the chairman of Edmondson Interiors, told the Telegraph they had already had some special requests: "We recently fitted an Aga in a dog shower room so the dogs could dry off before they come into the kitchen, where the main Aga was installed," he said.
Period perfect
Genuine period features are "increasingly sought after" by purchasers, says Dan Mulcahy, the director of the Melbourne-based firm MCG, so a recent trend for removing lead-glass windows, original skirting and chimneys is "disappointing".
When renovating a period property, he recommends you "brief an experienced architect who will be able to continue the period theme throughout the house".
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