Q & A – a word with Interior Designer, Amanda Erritt

Amanda Erritt has 18 years of interior design experience behind her, whether she is re-designing a hotel in the Cotswolds, a Surrey mansion or a bijou flat in Notting Hill, she approaches each project with the same enthusiasm and flair. Amanda’s attention to detail is what sets her apart from other designers, she gets to know the personalities of the clients and includes personal touches that surprise and delight them. With a hands on approach Amanda is always in demand and offers a variety of services which can be found on her website Iddesign. Here we find out how she started on her Interior Design journey and what inspires her!
 
Can you tell us how you came to be an interior designer?
After graduating, I worked in fashion for 15 years until my 2 children were born.  When they were very small I decided I wanted to go back work and to continue working with style, colour, texture, art, & fashion but knew that I wanted to have my own business and be my own boss, so I retrained at night school and did a diploma in Interior Design.  From then on I have been busy creating homes for clients for the past 18 years!

 

What does an interior designer do? What would a normal working day involve for you?
An interior designer will transform a whole house or just one room for a client from early design/mood board stage, through project managing required building work to choosing every last thing to go into a space to make it aesthetically beautiful and right for each particular client, as well as being functional and lasting.  A normal working day will involve visiting clients’ homes to supervise ongoing decorating, kitchen or bathroom installation, a lot of sourcing of furniture, antiques, fabrics etc and A LOT of chasing up deliveries and contractors to make sure everyone and everything is done and delivered at the right time!
 
How does what you do, differ from a photographic interiors stylist?
An interior designer creates a new space for a residential or commercial client (I have designed a couple of boutique hotels) and the space created is lasting, whereas a stylist creates a room or set which is temporary and usually for  for a magazine shoot, or TV commercial.
 
What formal training do you have, do you have to do a course or can you be self taught – how did you learn the tricks of your trade? 
I did do the interior design diploma but the best training is just doing it: always looking at colour, form, fashion, at styles shifting and changing and having a love of making people’s homes their favourite place to be.

 

Where do you find your inspiration for design?
I love looking though magazines, Elle Deco and Living etc, plus movie sets, old houses, watching fashions change and feeling the mood of everything in fashion changing, right from music through clothing to interiors.
 
Describe your home to me?
My home is definitely a home and not a show piece for my work – it is calm with pops of colour and quirkiness but mostly a collection of gathered memories and favourite pieces.  I don’t like clutter so I choose carefully what stays!
 
What was the best advice anyone ever gave you?
Never save anything for best.
 
What is your favourite style?
Eclectic mix of rusty, damaged, worn mixed with new and perfect, all on a back drop of sumptuous colour.
 
What is your favourite Danetti product and why?

 

My favourite Danetti product at the moment is the mustard yellow Eames style dining chairs which I would put around an old oak heavy dining table all sitting on a faded, threadbare Chinese rug.

 

Where is your favourite shop? 
My friend Emma has a gorgeous shop in Totnes, Devon called Busby & Fox which sells wonderful art, mirrors and home wares and a few carefully chosen pieces of jewellery and clothing – she has always had the most brilliant eye for beautiful things!  
 
If you could live anywhere – what would your dream home be like? 
A rambling Victorian house in Devon with a beautiful old garden – I would decorate it with dark coloured panelling and a mixture of some of the new and gorgeous fabrics available covering rickety  old pieces of furniture.  And lots of vases of flowers from the garden!
  Who is your favourite designer if you had to pick anyone dead or alive..
My favourite designers are Rembrandt, Tom Dixon, Abigail Ahern, the vision and bravery of Alexander McQueen, I find that fashion, interiors, art  all roll together so I find it hard to pick a favourite …
 
The Quick Fire Round: Where is your favourite holiday spot? Devon to relax and Italy to watch the world go by
 
What’s in your bag? The usual keys, wallet, phone plus tape measure and a scattering at the bottom of foreign coins which I accidentally put into the pay & display machines, then throw into my bag in disgust when they get rejected!!
 
Favourite film? Little Miss Sunshine How about your favourite paint colour? I am a big fan of Farrow & Ball and my favourite colour at the moment is called Hague Blue.
 
What is your favourite colour? Green
 
What is your favourite book? The Celestine prophesy and The Odyssey