AT HOME IN EAST LONDON
Dreamers & Schemers
Featuring Ellen Miles
Dreamers & Schemers is the interior makeover series where we invite our favourite creative visionaries to take us on a journey as they bring their interior dreams to life with all things House of Hackney. We met Nature Rights activist, guerilla gardener and writer Ellen Miles at her home in Hackney as she became our latest Dreamer…
Ellen has made a name for herself transforming neglected corners of neighbourhoods into bright, verdant spaces filled with love and life. The East-London native founded Nature is a Human Right, the campaign to make access to green space a universal right. With this project our Design Consultants worked with Ellen to bring her love of Nature into her Hackney home.
With the high ceilings and original features of a classic London apartment, Ellen’s living room provided the perfect backdrop for our vintage creeping ivy wallpaper, HEDERA. Either side of the green fireplace, Ellen gave the recessed bookshelves a pop of color courtesy of the fiery, orange-red hue LANTANA. The collected green ceramics throughout the space echo the verdant, trailing leaves of the wallpaper creating cohesion, and natural elements like hardwood floors, wooden shutters and rattan light fittings ensure the room has a connection to the natural world that Ellen so fiercely adores.
Nature is the red thread throughout Ellen’s home, and to carry this through to her bedroom, she opted for an evergreen House of Hackney favourite, PLANTASIA in ‘Sienna’. This majestic mural of trees is perfectly placed at the head of the bed, so that after a day fighting for the rights of Nature, Ellen can fall asleep enveloped in the beauty of the forest.
The print’s tones are reflected in the CARNELIAN red and warm SKY blue paint shades chosen as accent colors on the walls and doorframe. Using hues from your wallpaper print is a great way to ensure color harmony and pull all the elements of a design together. And don’t be afraid to add color to your woodwork! Layering shades and tones adds richness and depth to a scheme.
Ellen’s work in her books and campaigns weaves together our innate need for Nature and personal stories and collected memories, something that is clearly reflected in the beautiful home she has made for herself, effortlessly fusing the urban London community she has become so entwined with, and the beauty of the natural world.
We caught up with Ellen to find out more about her dreams, schemes and House of Hackney makeover.
HoH: Our HEDERA wallpaper makes quite the feature in your living room. What drew you to this botanical print?
Ellen: I love that the ivy feels like it’s taking over. It reminds me of the opening dream sequence in Hitchcock’s Rebecca (1940), where Manderlay is overrun with vines and brambles. It also has this ancient Roman atrium quality that makes me feel quite cultivated when I’m horizontal on the sofa.
HoH: What is on your bedside table?
Ellen: Currently it’s ‘Frankenstein’, a notebook and pen, Earl of East ‘Nerumae’ spray, and an eye mask.
HoH: What makes you feel at home?
Ellen: Sharing a meal made from scratch with people I love, and a painstakingly curated playlist no one can actually hear because we’re all talking so loud.
“I love that the ivy feels like it’s taking over. It reminds me of the opening dream sequence in Hitchcock’s Rebecca.”- Ellen
HoH: Why is Nature so important to you?
Ellen: Nature is important to all of us – whether we know it or not. As a born and raised Londoner, I didn’t grow up with a particularly strong emotional connection to the wild (I’m working on it) but I do what I do because the science tells us contact with nature is essential to human health and happiness – and no one should be deprived of that.
HoH: What does the future look like?
Ellen: A world where cities are more green than grey. We’ve set up this false dichotomy that “urban” and “nature” are polar opposites. It’s not concrete that makes a city – it’s culture. We can retain everything that makes cities great while making nature an abundant part of the urban experience. In fact, cities alive with nature will become even more alive in creativity, community, soul, and spirit.
In this future, it will be normal to not only see buildings covered in mosses and foliage, but also see communities taking care of the land and life around them, including growing food locally. The Right to Grow campaign, an initiative I’ve supported since its launch in 2022, is helping make this a reality, by advocating for communities’ right to cultivate unused public land.
WHAT DREAMS ARE MADE OF...
A SONG…‘Oysters in My Pocket’ by Royel Otis
A MUSE…Octavia Hill
A BOOK…‘Sinkhole: Three Crimes’ by Rosanna McLaughlin
A PLACE…Slab City
A SCENT…The black pepper, ginger and cedarwood oil by Wildsmith
AN IG ACCOUNT…@spellingmistakescostlives
A PARTY GUEST…Vivienne Westwood
A FEELING…That feeling in the air as the seasons change
A WORD…Eejit
Ellen's Edit
Ellen’s books, Get Guerrilla Gardening: A Handbook for Planting in Public Places, an illustrated, foolproof, step-by-step manualfesto on how to transform grey to green in your neighbourhood and her anthology of Nature writing, Nature is a Human Right: Why We’re Fighting for Green in a Grey World are available now.
If Ellen is a dream you don’t want to wake from; here’s where you can find her next.
FOLLOW: @octaviachill
If you’d like to dream and scheme your way to interior heaven like Ellen, book a complimentary Decorating Consultation with House of Hackney.
If you’d like to dream and scheme your way to interior heaven like Ellen, book a complimentary Decorating Consultation with House of Hackney.
Whether you want to coat all four walls with wonder or need advice on how to introduce the harmonious hues of nature into your space, we are here for you. Our in-house experts are ready to help you with everything from color matching and pairing print to creating your dream interior - no space is too small or project too big.
At House of Hackney, we want to empower you in your creative freedom to go with whatever your heart desires - and to give you the confidence to do so.
Book your complimentary appointment and get ready to turn your dreams into a reality.
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