Style At Home is without a doubt my favourite interior magazine. It’s the go to place where hundreds of interior lovers like myself head to satisfy the forever need to know the latest home trends! Every month it aims to showcase stunning real life homes to inspire its readers with ways to update, transform and create interior delights within the home.

When I received the news that this well known, influential publication wanted our home to be featured in their Christmas edition I was absolutely beside myself!!

I could hardly believe my eyes whilst reading that golden email. Style At Home’s homes editor Ruth wanted our House to be featured as a family Christmas home story  which meant that not only would our beautiful home be gracing their inspiring pages, but my beautiful family would also be too!

When we bought The Ryder Residence back in 2015 it was in no way magazine worthy. We had orange walls, fleas in the old dirty carpets and ceilings coated in thick black dust! It hadn’t had a fresh lick of paint since the previous owners bought it almost 20 years ago!

We set to work transforming each room with the hope of creating a beautiful family home fit to delight and inspire, which I’m proud to say I think we did just that.

After a few emails back and forth with the photographer the date was set for our home shoot and we began counting down the days.

On the lead up to the big day Scott and I decided that there’s no time like the present and now was the time to finish any forgotten jobs around the house. We began our Kitchen makeover which you can read about here and finished it just in time for the shoot!

The day before our shoot I began cleaning our home like a woman possessed. Actually I’d say more like a woman obsessed, as I really was obsessed with creating the perfect show home house fit for the beautiful pages of a glossy magazine!

We cleaned all windows, inside and out! The pvc cleaner was put to good use too giving us a new sparkling front door! I deep cleaned all the carpets, whilst Scott set to work on mowing both lawns (we make the best team! ). Not a single corner was left unturned and by the time Monday morning came The Ryder Residence was literally gleaming ready and waiting to be shown off in all its glory!

Being an avid reader of Style At Home I’d like to say I have a pretty good idea of what looks good when it comes to styling our home. Over the last year or so I’ve also found myself showcasing our home improvements on the inspiring little app that is Instagram. I absolutely love to arrange accessories, puff up cushions and even rearrange furniture all in the name of an Insta worthy pic! 

So when it came to styling our home for the shoot I didn’t hold back! My aim was to put myself in the mind of a stylist and make sure every room was perfectly arranged ready to create the perfect photograph. I knew however that our living room would definitely be re-arranged by the photographer as it’s quite a large space and really hard to photograph, unless of course you stand on a chair for a birds eye view (tried and tested by yours truly! ).

Monday morning came and the door bell rang at 9 o’clock on the dot. Filled with over excitement and anxiety I opened the door to be met with two very smiley, very professional and very friendly looking people. Husband and Wife team Annabelle Grundy and Colin Poole have been working in the industry for over 20 years! Colin has had the pleasure of having his work published in the most high-profile magazines as well as photographing the odd celebrity home or two, which made having these two industry professionals in our little home the biggest pleasure!

I began by putting the kettle on before giving them both a tour of the house, starting with the upstairs first. Colin took one look around each room before saying ‘this is what we call in the industry an oven ready home’ which means our house was perfect just as it is and ready to shoot! This was the biggest compliment and meant so much to me coming from such interior industry expert!

After a little chat about the background of our home and another cup of coffee Colin set to work on capturing our home, starting with in my opinion the best room in the house, Amelie’s bedroom. As this was a Christmas family style shoot he wanted to capture beautiful candid moments, this is one of my favourite shots. 

Whilst Colin added some Christmassy decorations and finished capturing the rest of upstairs, it was my chance to be interviewed by Annabelle. I’ll tell anyone who will listen all about how we transformed our home from drab to fab and so I have to say I was in my absolute element during my interview! I cannot wait to see the finished article in print!

In what only seemed like a few short hours we were onto the main room of the house, our living room.

Colin had decided that he wanted a real Christmas tree to feature in our article and so being the start of June real Christmas trees were hard to find! The one they used was a little small compared to the size of our normal tree, but once the ends were trimmed and a few sparkling decorations were added it looked gorgeous and absolutely complimented our decor beautifully.

Like we expected, Colin changed the layout of the room and I have to say it looked amazing! Having just one sofa against the back wall looked too one dimensional and so moving the two sofas opposite each other created a cosy Christmas setting.

Before:

After:

Once the room was ready it was time for our family debut! We felt like real life celebs shooting our article for Hello Magazine! Colin captured some beautiful family moments and got the most gorgeous photos of Amelie. Whilst I’m not allowed to share any of Colin’s work and of course without giving too much away, here’s a few pictures from behind the scenes.

I literally cannot wait to see the photos Style At Home decided to use for our feature, Colin is the most incredible photographer, we’re in love with all the photos we received from him! But the wait is nearly over as we’ll be posing in it’s gorgeous pages in just a few days now! You can read all about how we achieved our home’s look as well as tips on how to achieve a similar look in your own home.

The Style At Home December Christmas  Issue hits the shelves on October 30th, be sure to grab your copy to have a nose around our home and see The Ryders pose in style!

Love

Charlotte

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