Fired Earth: timeless style

from The Bath Magazine March 2023

A Tale of Two Cities

As a season of new beginnings, spring is the perfect time to refresh your home and to give your interiors a bit of an update

It’s amazing how something as simple and inexpensive as a change of paint colour or an inspiring new palette can revitalise a room, giving it a completely fresh look. The perfect paint will really tie a scheme together, and Fired Earth’s paint range includes everything from hardworking neutrals to harmonious pastels and bold accent colours. In celebration of its 40th anniversary this year, Fired Earth has recently added six beautiful paint colours to the collection, and they’re sure to inspire you to reach for a paint brush. Ranging from the delicate, restful umber of Silver Needle to the vibrant and celebratory burnt terracotta of Taos House, and the lush teal of Hesper, these timeless shades are completely at home in contemporary and traditional interiors.

If you’ve never really ventured far from whites, Silver Needle is the ideal place to start since it’s warm, versatile and complex without being in any way strident. If you’re worried about bolder shades being ‘too much’ or being tricky to match with soft furnishings etc, then why not try them in a small area such as a cloakroom or hallway. You’ll probably be completely won over once you’ve had a chance to admire them several times a day! You could also try painting a tired piece of furniture, giving it a new lease of life and adding a dash of eye-catching colour to a room.

While a couple of coats of paint are one of the quickest, easiest and most inexpensive ways to achieve a spring makeover, a new splashback or floor can also have a dramatic impact on the look and feel of a room without breaking the bank. As with paint, if you usually play it safe with tiling, then a splashback can be a great place to start when it comes to being a little more adventurous. Fired Earth’s latest collections include a stunning Arts & Crafts-inspired tile range called Kelmscott that would be a wonderful addition to any home. The tile motifs are a perfect blend of contemporary and classic so they’re ideal for every style of interior, and the designs have an ageless feel that will really stand the test of time. The Kelmscott tiles are made from hardwearing porcelain – porcelain being a really lowmaintenance surface that’s ideal for busy homes – and can even be used outdoors, so they’re particularly versatile. Working brilliantly for everything from a fresh and pretty splashback behind a bathroom basin to a spectacular kitchen floor leading out onto a patio, the Kelmscott collection is a perfect choice if you’re planning a new look for any room of the home.

Although here in Britain we’ve tended to confine tiles to kitchens, bathrooms and hallways, collections such as the Kelmsott range are undoubtedly beautiful enough to grace living rooms and bedrooms too. Using tiles on, say, living room walls or bedroom floors can be a really contemporary way of introducing eye-catching pattern and texture to a scheme. Designs such as the bold geometrics in Fired Earth’s Azores and Urban collections can be used as a fantastic alternative to wallpaper, and they can be paired with paint in exactly the same way that you might select a paint colour to complement wallpaper. For example, you might choose to paint two or three walls and tile the remaining wall or walls, or you could tile the lower half of a wall and paint the upper half, using tile trims or pencil tiles to create a crisp dado that gives the wall a really finished look. This combination of lower wall tiling and painted upper walls works particularly well in hallways, protecting walls from inevitable scuffs and splashes. Take the tiling slightly above the height where people are likely to touch the wall to balance as they pull off shoes or as they carry in parcels. You’ll then be able to keep paintwork looking clean and fresh until you decide that it might be time for another spring makeover!