Interior Designer Lonika Chande’s West London Cottage
London interior designer Lonika Chande’s Queen’s Park family home had been stripped of its history by the time she and her husband, Theo Hall, came along. Located in an enclave of Victorian affordable housing not all of which survived the Blitz, the 1876 brick structure was built for a railway worker. Many occupants later, it had an interior that flowed well but felt 21st century sanitized. A fan of layering rooms with art, books, and patterns, Lonika stepped in to celebrate it as the urban rarity it is: a historic cottage in the thick of things, just north of Notting Hill.
A year ago, we featured Lonika’s Apartment Remodel for a Demanding Client (Her Mother). Join us for a look around her own quarters, which she and Theo, a lawyer, now share with their toddler son, baby daughter, and a lot of well-chosen antiques.
Photography by Milo Brown, courtesy of Lonika Chande.
Above: Lonika introduced wainscoting to the sitting room off the entry, and the formerly boarded-up fireplace now has a mantel of her own design. Throughout, she offset colorful textiles with a warm, neutral paint palette. The two-seater sofa is upholstered in Dans la Forêt’ from Décors Barbares. The walls and ceiling are painted Stone IV, and the woodwork and trim is Stone V, both from Paint & Paper Library .Above: “We wanted to recapture some of the cottage’s original character, but we didn’t want it to feel twee,” Lonika told UK House & Garden. She found much of the art and furniture by being a regular at the Portobello Road, Kempton, and Sunbury antiques markets. The foxed mantel mirror came out of a French bistro. The tiger is an old silk embroidery that she framed.Above: The nook under the stair has a window seat with storage. The African carvings are from Lonika’s grandparents’ house in Tanzania.Above: A farmhouse table extends across the kitchen, which the previous owners enlarged and opened to the back garden.Above: The kitchen cabinets are deVol’s Real Shaker design with a Shaws sink and Perrin & Rowe Aged Brass Ionian Tap, also from deVol. The blue is a bespoke deVol color, and the zellige tile is from Habibi Interiors. The counter is Carrara marble. The antique hook-lined shelf over the sink was made for hanging game.Above: Lonika’s mother, artist Lucy Dickens (great-great granddaughter of Charles Dickens), painted the tropical fruit tableau in the center of the dining area, and the watercolor of quinces is by Lucy’s mother.Above: The three bedrooms are cottage size and now bright with color and pattern. The canopy is a mix of washed yellow linen and a block-print from Jaipur.Above: Shades of turmeric are one of Lonika’s specialities—see her yellow kitchen here. The walls are Slate II from Paint & Paper Library.Above: The lone bathroom is newly lined with beadboard paneling and accessorized with a vintage spool table and shelves. Contemplating adding your own paneling? See Remodelista 101: The Ultimate Guide to Shiplap, Beadboard, and V-Groove Paneling.Above: The blue on the walls, ceiling, and radiator is Gravel Pit from Dulux, and the tub—from Aston Matthews—is painted a “neutral red” called Callaghan from Little Greene. The muslin window blind is in Robert Kime’s Indian-inspired Field Poppy print.Above: The baby’s room until recently was Lonika’s office, now relocated off-site nearby. It’s papered in Alice in Wonderland, an archived C.F.A. Voysey Arts and Crafts design from Trustworth Studios of Plymouth, Massachusetts. The glossy trim is Picture Gallery Red by Farrow & Ball.Above: Nurseries are so often new and modern, but Lonika is raising her children with patina. See another bedroom with Voysey wallpaper here.Above: Lonika in another of her layered projects—see Lonika Chande.
