following on from decorative bugbears - all you posting there, what DO you actually like?

[basic]

Just curious so have to ask, as it seems to me that on the whole everything is dismissed.
Do you all like and actually have antiques? Where do you shop?

well someone on that thread was deriding white plates

would take with a pinch of salt

but we have mixture of ikea/local shop/ and things gathered over the yrs..nowt special

missed the first thread but I know what I like and I don't let anyone else dictate to me what is "in" and what is "out". Some people might look at my home and go "God what a cluttered old-fashioned place, everything is coloured or dark, how awful!" Others would look at it and like the warmth and eclectic style, yet others would think it's a bit messy and not what they would choose but it suits me.

One of my friends called it Steptoes. Another called it Aladdin's cave. Yet another said she couldn't understand why she felt comfortable in it because it was above her "normal" level of chaos and imbalance, but she did.

I don't care whether other people like it or not, tbh. I choose what I like - I have to live with it (and my family of course), not them.

I have a lot of old family furniture, most of it in dark wood colours. I don't "do" pale beech/limed oak/clean pine furniture. I don't do magnolia/neutral walls throughout. We have got stripped floors throughout but that's the nature of the house (single storey 1920/30s colonial style weatherboard job in Australia). We have an open fireplace with art deco original tiles - so the decor and soft furnishings are taken from those tiles.

If someone walked into my home and disparaged any of my choices, I'd think them mannerless oiks, not some paragon of style.

Buying stuff - mostly in junk/antique shops, garage sales, imported furniture shops (more dark wood, more interesting styles), "ethnic" homeware shops - although I have bought stuff in conventional places like John Lewis, Debenhams etc. as well.

Have never set foot in Ikea, don't plan to - but that's a personal choice - I have no issue with anyone else liking it.

Well, I have white plates so my opinions might not be valid...

Dp calls my favoured decorating style Rustic Clutter-Cottage. I like all sorts of wooden furniture but don't like matching furniture (probably lucky as we live with bits we've been given and couldn't afford to buy others). I like my house to be like a museum of our lives, so lots of bits of tat collected on varies holidays etc, but can't stand ornaments without a story behind them.

We have stripped floorboards throughout (as the carpets when we moved in were vile and we couldn't afford new ones) but I like this as the floorboards are wonky and characterful. I also commit the decoration faux-pas of having a chalky white on the walls throughout with odd walls of other colours (I know this is out of fashion, but it's my house and I like it). Oh, and I use green a lot on the walls, a friend was telling me this is Not The Done Thing either.

Oh, and I love bookcases everywhere. I think they look nice.

Another Australian house here, but early 80s, so brown. Will end up quite pale in the living areas, as we have lots of bookcases, paintings,etc. Lots of stuff, things we've picked up over the years. Comfy, squashy sofas, good rugs.

Nothing matches, except curtains. Can't bear three-piece suites. Nothing symmetrically arranged, either. In fact, now I think of it, I can't be doing with symmetry in the house or garden.

I'd never pass a negative comment on someone's home, but I'm averse to gloss, match-matchy, no books and painful minimalism.

I actually like and have antiques!!

I am the daughter of great collectors and have been collecting stuff myself since I was small - started with a glass art deco dressing table set when I was about 9. We've always had antique furniture as a family, so the idea of buying new is quite alien to me!

I shop at auctions mainly now, as after 2dc my days of taking myself off 'antiquing' round the specialist centres are well and truly over, and ebay is also quite handy, as long as you know what you are doing and don't get ripped off. Interestingly for things that I can't find/don't want elderly versions of I go for the much derided Bridgewater and Kidston, and also Colefax and Fowler, Laura Ashley and John Lewis.

I have the ususal pine dresser full of antique blue and white, mahogany bookcases full of old leather bound books and topped with blue and white ginger jars, and I also like the odd bit of gilt furniture. I go for an 'upmarket cottage' look throughout. I have a solid wood kitchen and fitted wardrobes, and a freestanding bath as I just don't like the more modern looking stuff. I like china and pottery with a story to tell, particularly Staffordshire, and I adore prints and paintings. I have a waiting list for wall space!!

Colour wise, I'm not terribly keen on neutrals, Sitting Room is F and B 'Hay', Kitchen is 'Radicchio' and I have tartan wall paper in my study along with 'London Stone.' This will become our room once DS2 is big enough to be on his own. We're in with DS2 now as we've decorated our room for him now. Boys' rooms are Cath Kidston and Laura Ashley respectively. Next time round (imminent!) Sitting Room will be F and B 'Olive', and Kitchen will be 'Hay' as the red is just too dark in a North facing room. Current project is the Shower Room in Lewis and Wood 'Wildfowlers', and then on to Hall/Landing in Laura Ashley 'Gosford' in paprika.

I love antiques, interiors and my style, and a friend has asked me to 'do' her house this half term so it can't be that bad!

We have various bits of furniture that we've acquired over the years from junk antique shops. Never paid massively much for them but we liked them. It's a happy coincidence that we've seen them in other places since for ££££££. Doesn't really matter, we just like them.

I love that phrase up thread about 'a museum of our lives'. That, to me, is what a home should be. It's a reflection of your personality and taste, not what the latest property-porn mag or programme says you 'should' have.

For example, we have books. Lots of books. If we wanted to sell our house, an estate agent would probably say we need to 'de-personalise' but that would never happen. Why would you want to pretend you have no personality?! In fact when we sold our previous house, it got snapped up on day 1 by buyers who'd seen our neighbours' expensively-renovated and pared-down interior and hated it.

Go with what you like, I say, be it 60's psychedelia or Victorian 'brown furniture'!

I like, and always will, wooden floors, books, retro metro tiles, Farrow & Ball, zinc-topped tables, vintage crockery, grey, green, wooden venetian blinds or shutters, vintage mirrors, retro industrial, 1940s.

And I do have nearly all those things, but mixed in with a lot of Ikea, car boot sale, it'll-do-for-now stuff. The full realisation is still very much the stuff of fantasy...

I like art. Original art, where money allows! I am much more likely to save up for something original than buy prints or limited edition prints. So everything on our walls is from various galleries near where we live, or near where my parents live, or places we've been on holiday etc.

That's what makes our house a home to me.

I also like rooms to be different to other rooms. I don't mind themes within rooms (eg sticking to oak in one room, or sticking to walnut in another room), but I wouldn't like my house to look the same all the way through eg in shades of one colour.

"Every house needs at least one red wall"

Sorry, that did make me laugh like a drain

I would just like to say I love "Rustic Clutter Cottage". I'm going to keep that phrase for our place, which is a cottage but looking bare and newly painted at the moment until we get all our clutter accessories back in!

Sorry, white plates are safe and boring.
I admit to a few interesting shaped white serving bowls.

And I should add that the owner of the white plates is a much more adventurous cook than me and I hope she isn't on MN because I won't get invited again

White plates are timeless and classic.
We are due to move soon, out of rented and into our own home again. I am dying to put my stamp on a place again and want my clutter around me. I am determined that I will have framed all of those posters I have stored, put up my family photographs and have all of the little knick knacks out to look at.
Also plan to have a feature wall in the living room and the children want turquoise/teal and purple respectively in their rooms. Yay!

I am in process of a massive declutter , am getting rid of ikea expedit shelves and have bought oak sideboard from ebay , saw some nice chairs on ebay as well...and I will also get my prints and poster framed!

Am having difficulty knowing where to put the sodding printer though.

I like glitter. And colour-changing lights. We have a lot of sparkly things around - DD has glittery walls in her bedroom, the kitchen, bathroom etc have glittery floors like you get in public toilets and the Post Office, there's a disco ball in the hallway, silver and gold radiators and remote control dichroic colour changing spotlights.

It's more tasteful than it sounds

We want to see photos, Janice!