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aving apprenticed under Mary Fox Linton and David Hicks in the early Eighties, and later worked as a director at Sibyl Colefax & John Fowler, Veere Grenney is one of the most respected names in British interior design. As he releases a book of career highlights with Rizzoli, we’ve put together a retrospective of our favourite Grenney-designed spaces, from a sophisticated modern country house in Norfolk to a bamboo-clad beach retreat in Mustique. In our Top 100 Interior Designers list for 2018 Veere sums up his philosophy as “less cool, more beauty”, and the interiors we’ve collected here are some of the most beautiful there are.
Veere Grenney’s new book, On Decorating (Rizzoli, £50), is published September 11, 2018. He will also be in conversation with House & Garden’s editor Hatta Byng on September 18 at Focus/18 at Chelsea Harbour’s Design Centre. Tickets cost £10. To book, visit dcch.co.uk or call 020-7351 5842.
At this house in Hampshire, Veere furnished the drawing room with twentieth-century pieces by Pierre Jeanneret and Charlotte Perriand. From Veere Grenney’s On Decorating (Rizzoli, 2018
Plaster palm trees and circa-1815 plates by Royal Worcester adorn the walls of this dining room, which is decorated with painted shield-back chairs and a fireplace inspired by John Fowler. From Veere Grenney’s On Decorating (Rizzoli, 2018)
The luxurious beauty of a fourposter bed. From Veere Grenney’s On Decorating (Rizzoli, 2018)
The Indian guest bedroom at Veere’s house, the Gazebo, in Tangier, with Moroccan embroidered curtains and hand-stenciled walls by Alistair Erskine. From Veere Grenney’s On Decorating (Rizzoli, 2018
Veere’s library at the Gazebo in Tangier. All the walls were hand-painted by Alistair Erskine as anhomage to Renzo Mongiardino. From Veere Grenney’s On Decorating (Rizzoli, 2018)
The dressing room bed in this house has curtains in a wool felt from Holland & Sherry.
Connected to the conservatory, the kitchen in this house is huge but friendly, lived-in, and includes a child-size table and banquette in one corner. The modernity of this room suits its Tudor bones. The island is from Orwells Furniture and tiles are from Ann Sacks in the alcove above the Aga.
Stalks of wheat are a charming accent to light fixtures on either side of the mirror in the study and compliment the warm beige tone of the walls, armchair, and sofa in this country house.
The light and soft pattern on a plump bed in this guest room evokes the quaintness of the country.
The upstairs landing has all the trimmings of a traditional home, but its golden glow makes it warm and inviting rather than stiff.
In a glorious honeycomb of rooms for the youngest members of the family, there are enough small beds for the most riotous of sleepovers.
In the main building, the 15-metre-long, open-plan sitting and dining room is decorated in similar neutral hues to the bamboo.
Below the sitting and dining room is the TV room, in which the walls and ceiling are clad in the same cured bamboo from Saint Vincent.
The main bedroom, in a pavilion, has a bed from Soane.
A vintage copper free-standing tub from The Water Monopoly sits in a bathroom.
Veere Grenney’s second home is this eighteenth-century folly previously owned by David Hicks. ’When I first moved here, it was quite primitive. Charming, but not comfortable,’ says Veere. ’Of course, it was never meant to be lived in. So apart from the grand salon (pictured), which is the focal point of the house, the rest is rather small. The challenge with the decoration was to ensure that there was a balance between the two. It needed to be formal but comfortable.’
This has been achieved through using an airy colour scheme and clever furniture choices. An 1810 Directoire chair faces an ottoman covered in velvet from Décor de Paris, while the wing chair is upholstered in ‘Temple’ fabric from Veere Grenney.
The festoon blinds in the slalon – made of Fox Linton satin and taffeta from Tissus d’Hélène – disguise the fact that the windows on one side of the room finish higher than those on the other.
’In the main bedroom, there is only room for a bed, but one way to make a room like this seem bigger is to select a compact four-poster. It creates a feeling of grandeur and makes the proportions of the room seem larger.’
It is a property that was built solely for pleasure, says Veere, and that is a tradition I intend to uphold.
In our “Dos and Don’ts of Decorating series, Veere recommends looking for furniture with a sense of history. “My favourite piece is my writing table, which was commissioned by Billy Baldwin for Villa La Fiorentina and made by Maison Jansen.”
Veere Grenney, On Decorating: A Point of View (Rizzoli) is out on September 11, 2018, £50.
