Regencycore Design

A VERY REGAL MASTER BEDROOM

From the late Modernist style of the Brady Bunch home to the charming yet chic sets of every Nancy Meyers movie ever made, the backdrops to our favourite TV shows and movies have been inspiring home interiors for decades.

For Faye Anderson and Brant Rumpel, the decadent interiors of Bridgerton, The Crown and The Great were the regal influence behind the design of the principal bedroom in their Brighton area home.

The couple are the first owners of their new home, and bought it after it was finished in the spring of 2019. While the home is painted in “nice, safe neutrals,” they knew they wanted a more distinctive design for their bedroom.

A Dash of Regal

“Early on, we decided we wanted a master bedroom that was unique from the rest of the house,” says Brant. Faye adds, “We wanted it to be an escape—you step into our room and you go

BY: JULIE BARNES PHOTOS: LILLIAN LANE

somewhere else.”

Set in Regency-era London in the early 1800s, Brigerton’s stately interiors caught Faye and Brant’s attention. “In that period, it was a lot of interesting textiles, bright colours, decorative mouldings and trim,” says Brant.

“There was something about Bridgerton and the way they used colour on those sets, that we were just like, ’Yes, that’s it,’” Faye says.

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Fit for a duke and duchess: Faye and Brant’s master bedroom evokes the sophistication and elegance they admire on the sets of their favourite Regency-era TV shows.

Faye loved the look of brush strokes in the wallpaper. “It’s like a French impressionist floral pattern,” she says.

Finding the right furniture was a challenge. Faye says, “We wanted high quality pieces that we will use for the rest of our lives and pass along to our kids.”

Keeping in mind that the project would be completely DIY, Brant says, “We saw these London homes from the 19th century and those design elements were all things that I could do.”

Buy Once, Buy Well

The couple’s first priority was sourcing the furniture. Although they were drawn to antiques, they ran into a few hiccups. “We like the antique look,” says Brant. “But at the same time, we wanted modern. We wanted soft-close drawers and a king-sized bed. Most antique bed frames are not king-sized and all antique drawers are not soft-closing drawers.”

They switched gears and decided to buy new. Faye says the goal was to find quality pieces “that we will use for the rest of our lives and pass along to our kids.” They couldn’t find the quality they were looking for in local big-box stores, and decided it was important to buy Canadian-made.

It took the couple six weeks to find the right fit. They sourced a new king-bed frame, end tables and a dresser from Durham Furniture, a made-in-Ontario brand sold at Sorensen’s in Saskatoon. For each piece,

Brant says the made-in-Canada solid maple furniture was a big investment, which took up 80 per cent of their budget.

they were able to select the type of wood (they chose maple) and the finish.

Brant had meticulously measured the 165-squarefoot room and taped the floor with the furniture dimensions to ensure the perfect fit. “We knew the walkway around the bed was going to be just enough—and that’s fine,” he says.

Decisions, Decisions

The couple knew they wanted to incorporate the wainscotting they had seen on TV, but an image on Pinterest pulled them in a very specific direction. It was a photo of paneling with inset wallpaper, which they decided to mimic above the chair rail.

“Once I saw that, I started seeing it all over the place,” says Brant. “It’s in Bridgerton. It’s in The Crown. A lot of fancy, elegant rooms do something like this.”

Once they had settled on painting the walls a shade of moss green, the next big decision to be made was selecting the wallpaper for the panels. The couple made several trips

The panelling and chair rail divide the bedroom walls into visually pleasing proportions.

to a local paint store— choosing Eastside Paint and Wallpaper—and poured over dozens of wallpaper sample books.

“We are particular people who know what we like when we see it,” says Faye. They didn’t set out looking for a floral pattern, but when they spotted the French Impressionist style floral wallpaper, they knew they had found the pièce de résistance. “I love the look of brush strokes. Even when I’m looking at art, I love it when you can see the texture of the paint,” adds Faye. “That’s part of what really sold this wallpaper to me.”

Brant used Adobe Illustrator to mock up the entire room to scale with trim lines and paint colours. He also found an image of their wallpaper to insert into the software. “We were able to change the paint colour and see what felt right at that scale,” he says. “That was very helpful to make the final decision.”

A Ninety-Hour Investment

The crown moulding, paneling, chair rail, painting and wallpapering took Brant 90 hours to complete over the course of three weeks. “I was thinking it would take three or four days and it took three times that amount of time,” says Brant, who is a stayat-home dad and amateur woodworker.

Faye, who works as a communications professional, says—halfjokingly—if they had to do it all over again, “we would have prepped our parents on the amount of full-time daycare that we were actually requiring of them.”

Brant set up a workshop in the garage, completing the entire project with just a few tools—a mitre saw, air nailer, a caulking gun, measuring tape, level and paint supplies.

The trim turned out to be more daunting than he originally envisioned. “When we were planning, I thought, you just get the trim and you cut it at a 45-degree angle and you glue it to the wall. How hard can it be?”

He was surprised by how much time the finishing details took. “A third of the install time was filling nail holes, sanding the fill and caulking around the trim,” he says. “It took 30 hours just cleaning up the edge around the trim.” But it was time well spent. The result is a professional, polished look of which the Bridgertons would certainly approve.

It turns out there’s a name for the elegant aesthetic— Regencycore—and it’s been called the “regal cousin of cottagecore.”

Although their favourite TV shows and an image found on Pinterest inspired the design, the sophisticated space is truly their own creation. It’s a testament to what can be achieved when two creative people collaborate with patience and determination.

“I still can’t believe we pulled this off,” says Faye. It “came together because we picked it all ourselves. We are not interior designers. But boy, we pulled it off.”

Julie Barnes