Dulux Trade photography shoot at Rose Cottage

Twitter facilitates collaboration and new relationships in a way that only years at a top school & several expensive lunches out used to. After a few tweeting conversations earlier this year, we organised a photography shoot with Dulux Trade at Rose Cottage last week to highlight our use of the gorgeous Gardenia shade of their paint which I’d used for the interior of the newly renovated Grade 2 listed property.

Cottage owner Hannah aka @pearlsnlacefilm had beavered away getting everything spic n span whilst I picked up supplies from local businesses Didsbury Flower Lounge and cake bakery And The Dish Ran Away With The Spoon. It’s so important to support local talent and put your pennies in the pockets of the small independents if you’re lucky enough to have them on your doorstep, as we are. Not for us buying some supermarket carnations and dried up buns 🙂

I was absolutely delighted when it clicked that the interior / architectural photographer who had been employed for the shoot was Andy Marshall aka @fotofacade. I’ve admired his work for ages via the links he tweets so it was a bit of an honour to have him directing events. And yes, I *know* he shot Rise Hall for Queen Beeny – there’s no getting away from The Curse of Property Ladder 😉

We got to work arranging the beautiful cream roses from the Flower Lounge and some freshly cut sage from my herb garden….

Teddy, as usual, was a great help…

I can’t wait to see Andy’s expert shots, but for blogsterity I took a couple of quick snaps as well. We used Dulux’s Gardenia Vinyl Matt to most of the walls and woodwork in the cottage. It’s a warm shade which provides a stylishly simple backdrop for all of Hannah’s colourful vintage treasures and it’s neither too period nor too contemporary but a good blend of the two.

Often ceilings and walls are different colours but in this bedroom I’d opened up the ceiling to the original roof shape, resulting in various angles and slopes. I decided a single colour for all areas was the best choice, with detail given by the chandelier, the revealed then oiled beam and the newly created recesses.

The bathroom walls and ceilings were painted Gardenia, with the timber panelling’s Eau de Nil inspiration taken from Hannah’s vintage flea-market mirror.

All in all a lovely day, filled with Twitter connections and of course, the best part…. we got to eat the cake!