When decorating her rented cottage, Emma Parkes filled every room with florals and bold pastels and used reversible decor tricks to make it her own.
Read on to find out all about the simple but effective DIY hacks Emma used for her gorgeous Shropshire home.
Feature by Maxine Brady. Photography by Colin Poole.
I’m Emma Parkes, 51, a wellbeing officer at a special needs school, and I share my home on Instagram @tallulahcottage. I live here with my daughter Poppy, 20, my son Ralph, 10, and Ned the cat.
Where I live
Our home is a three-bed, semi-detached cottage near Talford in Shropshire. We’ve lived here since August 2020.
What I wanted to change
I thought I might be limited on how I could decorate, but my landlady gave me permission to make some changes. As a single mum, I don’t have lots of cash to spare so I planned to transform my rented home using paint, secondhand furniture and lots of clever DIY ideas.
How I made it my own
Over the years, I’ve given every room several makeovers using paint, wallpaper or murals. One of my bigger jobs was exposing the floorboards in my bedroom by ripping up the old carpet.
My favourite part
It has to be my bedroom as I love all of the original features in there, like the barn door, exposed floorboards, low ceiling and the cute cottage window. The morning light in there is amazing.
‘My cottage is tucked away at the end of a quiet lane and has become my pride and joy. It all started with a stroke of luck, when I found this gem through friends in August 2020. Surrounded by fields, this cottage was a breath of fresh air compared to my old home, which was close to a busy road.
When we moved in, every wall was magnolia, which was too plain for my taste. I’ve always been into DIY and decorating, so when my landlady said I could pretty much do what I wanted if I painted it back before the end of my tenancy, I was thrilled. We moved in the middle of lockdown, and I threw myself into transforming the cottage.
My style has evolved from block colours to more pastel tones and floral prints. Over the years, I’ve given every room a makeover at least once. I tend to jump in at the deep end with my decorating ideas! I once spent hours on a hand-painted mural in my kitchen, only to paint over it when I didn’t like the result! Recently, I’ve taught myself how to hang murals, which I love using to create impact in a small space. My home is always a work in progress, as I love digging out my paintbrush when I get an urge for something new.
When I look at what I’ve achieved, I’m so proud of myself. Every change, every mistake, it’s all part of the story of turning this house into a home.’
Living room
Emma has decorated her living room five times over the past four years. Currently, she’s drawn to whimsical florals with vintage decor. ‘When I first moved in, I was into bold shades and funky prints,’ she explains. ‘Now, I want the tones in my living room to highlight the cottage’s original features, like the beamed ceiling and fireplace. I try to tell a story with my reclaimed accessories and furniture. I love that they have a history. My solid wooden coffee table was only £40 and it’s one of my favourite items in my home.’
To add a fresher feel, Emma painted a feature wall in Johnstone’s Miami Mint emulsion, which is balanced out by the velvet pink sofa she found on Facebook Marketplace. ‘I’m a fan of a gallery wall, so I started looking out for vintage prints and found an Etsy shop selling pages torn out from antique books and magazines, which I’ve framed and hung up with ribbon,’ she says. ‘I also gave an old step ladder from the garden a new lease of life with a lick of paint, and now use it for decorative shelving.’
There are some elements Emma can’t afford to change, like the beige carpets, but she’s been creative with layers of rugs as a happy compromise. ‘There’s a stone floor under there, which I know would look stunning, but for now rugs feel cosier underfoot.’
Kitchen-diner
Despite being unable to make any major changes to the kitchen, Emma has really made this room her own. ‘I inherited a plain cream kitchen and terracotta tiled floors,’ she says. ‘So, I added pinks and greens to achieve that country cottage look.’ She also created a showstopping focal point in the dining area with a bold floral wall mural. ‘This was the first time I hung a mural, so it was good to learn a new skill,’ she says. Emma picked out the colours in the mural with accessories, plants and furniture. ‘To echo the floral motif, I nailed faux flowers to one wall in a grid pattern,’ she explains. ‘I also packed my kitchen with a mix of real and fake trailing plants.’
Emma wanted this space to have a romantic feel so, as well as filling the space with hanging planters, she created a simple but impactful kitchen centrepiece by attaching a painted ladder to the ceiling and adorning it with pretty paper lanterns. ‘My advice is to be brave with your style and take risks,’ she says. ‘You can easily paint over or change something you don’t like. It’s important to decorate in colours you love, rather than following trends.’
Main bedroom
When she’s starting a room makeover, Emma usually paints the walls white and then adds colour with painted or wallpapered feature walls. Sometimes she does both, like she has in her bedroom. ‘As a rule of thumb, I like to create a clean slate by painting every room white, and then I slowly add patterns and prints over time,’ she explains. ‘I used Johnstone’s Miami Mint paint on my barn door and it’s now one of my favourite colours, so I’ve used this shade throughout my home.’
Emma’s used creative DIY hacks throughout her home, like her unusual bedroom window treatment. ‘I don’t have curtains at my window – instead, I have a branch that I use to hang plants off,’ she says. ‘My bedroom is flooded with sunlight, and at night I can see the stars from my bed. I didn’t want to block my view with curtains, so I came up with this idea of using foliage. Luckily, I’m not overlooked by anyone!’
Emma moved into this house with a fair amount of secondhand furniture, but she’s picked up more pieces over the years as she’s revamped her home. ‘I see lots of things I love but, because I’m a single mum, I don’t have a huge budget, so I need to think outside the box and do things a little differently,’ she says. ‘That’s where the vintage and preloved finds step in. I love treasure hunting in the antique stores in Shropshire.’
Ralph's bedroom
Emma wanted Ralph to have input in his bedroom decor, although they did have to negotiate on the colour scheme. ‘He wanted his whole bedroom to be black, so we compromised by painting up to the dado rail in charcoal, and then I hand-painted a slim border all the way around to add a bit of interest to the room,’ says Emma. She kept the rest of this room fairly simple as it’s a compact space. ‘We accessorised Ralph’s room with some of his grandad’s belongings, like a wooden aeroplane and guitar, which we hung on the walls,’ explains Emma. ‘It’s a very small room so we had to be clever with it and keep it minimal.’
Bathroom
Working with the existing grey tiles, Emma styled her bathroom with a bohemian-country look using natural materials and plants. ‘It’s very grey in here, which isn’t my style at all, but as I rent, I’ve adapted what was here already,’ she says. ‘I filled a wall with rattan placemats, a bamboo mirror and a wicker hat, then I pinned on fake plants to add a touch of greenery.’
Eventually, Emma plans to paint the tiles and cover over the floor with stick-on vinyl. ‘I love to take on a new project every couple of months. I’m a restless person, and I’m on the go in life generally, so if I see something I like on Pinterest or Instagram, then I’ll give it a go myself in my home. Sometimes I create moodboards, but most of the time I just get an idea in my head and then I go for it.’
What I learned
- Remember, if you make a mistake with paint, you can always undo it and paint over it if you change your mind later.
- Get creative with your home decor! Pin flowers to the walls, use an outdoor bench indoors, hang ladders to your ceilings – it’s your home, so make sure you let your own personality shine through.
- When furnishing a home on a tight budget, I had to shop around for affordable secondhand buys, but this now means that everything in my home is unique, and each item tells its own story.
