Blackpool Tower Ballroom To Be Restored After Government Grant

The iconic Blackpool Tower Ballroom is to be repaired after securing a £764,000 grant from the Government. The grant is part of the £1.57 billion Culture Recovery Fund, which is intended to help arts industries affected by the coronavirus pandemic. The ballroom is world famous thanks to its regular occupancy by hit show Strictly Come Dancing.

The money will be spent on restoring the plaster ceiling decoration in the ballroom. The venue first opened in 1894, and the beautiful ornate plasterwork ceiling also dates back to then. It is hoped the work can be completed during the current Covid-19 lockdown, and the ballroom can re-open to the public at a later date this year.

Strictly Judge Shirley Ballas says that "Blackpool holds a special place in the heart of every ballroom dancer all over the world". She adds: "I am overjoyed to learn of the Government's investment to aid in the restoration of one of Blackpool's historic ballrooms, all of which house the memories and history of the ballroom dance industry."

The funding is specifically from the Heritage Stimulus Fund, provided by the Government and administered by Historic England. It is part of the wider package of the Culture Recovery Fund, which is an emergency relief fund providing grants and loans designed to protect the future of Britain’s theatres, galleries, and other cultural venues.

Duncan Wilson, the Chief Executive of Historic England, commented: “In these challenging times, our shared heritage is more important than ever. This vital funding will allow essential repairs to take place, providing employment for skilled craft workers and ensuring that we preserve this much-loved ballroom for everyone to enjoy, both now and in the future.”

The Blackpool Tower Ballroom is one of more than 800 heritage sites and organisations to be awarded a grant during the pandemic, and they will provide a lifeline to venues which are facing one of the biggest financial challenges for a century.

If you are looking for plaster ceiling decoration in London, get in touch today.

Ideas to Keep Your Victorian Home Decor Looking Fresh

Few homes retain the unique character and possibility for a wide range of interior design ideas than Victorian homes. They’re typically well built, with large rooms and lofty ceilings, and prove to be popular dream homes for many people.

If you’re looking to refresh your Victorian property, you may have difficulty deciding how to bring it into the 21st century without losing the charm and features that made you fall in love with it in the first place. We have a look at some tips, from paint schemes to paying tribute to its enviable features.

1. Keep it light

The expansive walls in these properties can hold nearly any shade with finesse, but some modern colour schemes are particularly sleek in Victorian properties. Fresh whites and light neutral tones are the choice for calming interiors that also make use of the natural light in these homes.

2. Or turn to the dark side

Traditional Victorian interiors were typically dark and ornate, and the modern rich and inky shades that are immensely popular were just made for these homes. Look at cool navy blues, forest greens, and lush plum shades, which are ideal for whole rooms or feature walls.

3. Keep up with cornicing

One of the staple features of a Victorian home is the ornate cornicing around the edge of a room and extend to surround lighting fixtures. If your home has these period touches, you can get cornice restoration in London to bring them back to their original state, or perhaps you’d like to change them and use a different design, just don’t get rid of them!

4. Draw the Eyes Up

With your lovingly restored cornicing in place, you’ll want to make sure it gets the envious attention it deserves. Picture rails, which are a strip of moulding which usually sits level with the top of the windows in a room can draw the eyes up the huge walls. The picture rails can also be used to break up wall colours by using a different shade or colour above the rail.

Are you looking for listed building restoration specialists? Get in touch with us today

Our Top Tips For Renovating A Derelict Property

It can be very tricky getting onto the property ladder or finding the perfect house for you, but you can make life a little easier for yourself if you decide to invest in a derelict property, a fixer-upper that you can renovate and bring back to life as you see fit.

Of course, this is no mean feat and you will need to be properly prepared for a lot of hard work, but it can also be an incredibly rewarding experience and one that you’ll remember for the rest of your life.

And who knows what you might uncover when you do start the renovation work - you might have a whole host of hidden period features to discover, for example.

Once you find a house you’re interested in, make sure you have a surveyor give it a thorough going over before you buy, so you know there aren’t any problems that could prove expensive, such as asbestos, subsidence, damp and so on. Knowledge is power, so make sure you have all the information you need before you make a final decision.

If you are lucky enough to have a property with lots of historic period features, it would perhaps be wise to do your best to restore them properly and bring them back to life.

These can look especially beautiful standing out in a contemporary design scheme so just because something seems dated, don’t feel that the best course of action is to just get rid of it. They serve as inbuilt focal points in your rooms and will always be a real talking point for guests.

Wondering how to plaster cornice? Get in touch with Ovolo London today.

Lockdown Fuels Brits’ Home Styling Obsession

The house proud Brits have always loved to tackle a new DIY project around the home, striving to put their stamp on their homes. But the lockdown has created a boom in home styling and remodelling.

Kingfisher, the company that owns B&Q and Screwfix has reported a 21.6 per cent increase in sales, according to the BBC, as the nation has taken to daydreaming about their dream house whilst pouring over images on social media, striving to attain the perfect photo of their own home for the ‘Instagram effect’.

A recent survey by the Home Builders Federation has shown that almost 20 per cent of Brits have spent a significant amount of time tidying and rearranging a room in their homes to create a background for the ‘perfect’ photo to upload to social media.

38 per cent said they would not take photos of, or in their homes if they thought it didn’t meet the same high standards they have set themselves for social media images.

Nearly a quarter of 25 to 34-year olds take to social media the searching for home inspiration, far more than the 45-54 age group, with just 14 per cent. A quarter of respondents said that their lockdown had piqued their interest in interior design.

One in six Brits are likely to document a house move on social media, especially if the new home is a new build. The research has shown that the most popular first photo of a new home is the exterior.

Some interior design and decor jobs, such as Victorian plasterwork are best left to experts, so if you need coving specialists in London, get in touch!

Aspirational Design ‘Key’ For Hotels

Many people have been placing an increasing amount of focus on the interior design of their homes in recent months, given that we’ve all been spending so much time in our own abodes due to the Covid-19 pandemic, that’s hardly surprising.

But now that businesses are beginning to open up a little in the UK and holidays are back on the cards, hotels will need to do everything they can to attract guests.

An article for Hotel Designs recently noted that aspirational interiors are set to become a hallmark of successful hotels.

“We all want our hotels to be more exciting, comfortable and luxurious than our own home. We want to stay somewhere special, create memories and escape our normal lives and dreams,” the news provider noted.

This means that hotels need to offer something different to what we have in our own homes. Properties that have period decor can really enhance this by making sure that features like cornicing and plasterwork is shown off to full effect.

When these interior features are paired with period furniture and other design elements, a room can feel incredibly elegant. If your hotel caters predominantly for foreign clientele, they may be especially keen on having a quintessentially British atmosphere in their accommodation, the publication noted.

As an article for Boutique Hotelier pointed out last month, people are willing to spend more on hotel stays post-lockdown, which means that although you might not be able to welcome as many guests, your hotel won’t necessarily lose out on revenue.

If you need to carry out cornice restoration in London to bring your hotel’s decor back to its best, get in touch with us today.

Stamp Duty Holiday To Boost Property Market

Opportunistic homebuyers are likely to head to their nearest estate agents following the news there will be a stamp duty holiday for homes up to the value of £500,000.

Earlier this week (July 8th), Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak revealed a Mini Budget to help the economy recover following the disastrous impact of coronavirus.

In order to bolster the housing market, he increased the stamp duty relief threshold from £125,000 to £500,000.

This will take effect immediately and will continue running until March 31st 2021, and could see property buyers save as much as £15,000 if they buy a £500,000 house.

By being able to reduce the amount of money they have to raise in order to go ahead with a purchase, homebuyers are more likely to increase their budget, start their property search sooner rather than later, or spend more on renovating it, such as with cornice restoration in London.

Hiring professionals or buying materials to redecorate the new house will also help boost the economy, keeping people in jobs and encouraging everyone to spend more.

National head of residential property at Irwin Mitchell Jeremy Raj stated the changes to the stamp duty land tax (SDLT) “went further than most within the industry had dared hope”, adding: “There will be a real boost to the sector.”

He noted how important the property market is “in relation to the confidence and strengthen of the economy overall”, and suggested the SDLT holiday will have a “significant and immediate bonus effect” throughout the country, leading to greater transaction activity.

Tips to Help You Show Off Elegant Cornicing

The high ceilings and ornate cornicing of Georgian and Victorian era properties have an enduring appeal for many of us. Classic white may be the only decorating option for purists, but there are many colours and techniques to consider when painting your property.

Period homes lend themselves to almost any decor at all, whether that’s sophisticated and classic, or bold and bright, such as this Victorian flat in London. We have some tips for helping you transform your home with a lick of paint.

Look beyond white

Garish shades on the coving might only have limited appeal, but pastel colours from the darker end of the spectrum can appear elegant and appropriate. having the cornicing and ceiling rose in a shade darker than the ceiling creates a soothing cohesive effect.

Tone down fussy designs

If your style is more a modern, muted aesthetic, then ornately detailed cornicing might not fit your theme. By painting the mouldings in the same shade as the walls, the elaborate decoration will be toned down, working effortlessly with contemporary furniture for space with designer style.

Try traditional techniques

Sometimes, the old ideas are the best. To create a broader appeal with a period look, paint the picture rail, upper wall, and cornice in the same shade of while. Add a darker colour to the lower wall to make larger room with high ceilings feel cosier and more intimate.

Be bold with black

Small spaces, such as a hallway a corridor, can accommodate a dark colour that might feel overpowering elsewhere. By painting the ceiling, cornice and walls the same shade, a hallway becomes cocoon-like, and adjoining reception rooms will feel bright and airy in contrast.

Inject unexpected colour

You’re probably familiar with the concept of a feature wall, but how about a feature ceiling? For those with bold taste, try a bright red ceiling in an otherwise white or pale room, perhaps with matching red furniture.

If you need experts in Victoria coving in London, get in touch today!

Top Lockdown Interior Trends Revealed

It seems that everyone has turned into an interior design guru during lockdown in the UK. People have been taking inspiration from Pinterest, Instagram and multiple other sources in recent months in a bid to find ways to transform their abodes.

Living etc recently shared the top interior design trends to emerge during this period, according to a Google trends data study.

Hotel Follower analysed the Google trends from 20 March, just before the full lockdown was introduced, through to June. It found that line art is the interiors trend with the highest volume of searches.

However, the trend that saw the greatest increase in search volume was rattan furniture, with searches for this term increasing by an incredible 809 per cent in recent weeks, compared to earlier this year.

Living walls, love seats and using minimal line art to add interest to walls were named as some of the other top interior trends to emerge in the past six weeks.

However, while some people have been using this period as an opportunity to spruce up their homes with small changes or projects, others have attempted large-scale DIY, with varying degrees of success.

The BBC recently highlighted some DIY disasters that occurred in lockdown, including one man who decided he would attempt to renovate his bathroom himself, only to knock down a wall, break the toilet and flood the room.

Painter Colin McCann told the news provider that he has seen more DIY disasters in the past 10 weeks than in many years working in his trade. The message from tradespeople is to call in a professional if you don’t have the expertise to tackle a job yourself.

If you need help from coving specialists in London, get in touch with us to find out more about our services.