Homes & Interiors Scotland July - August 2021

Our front cover nails it: this is where we want to be and how we want to feel right now. And it’s no set-up. This place really does exist - a dream come true for its owners, but the stuff of fantasy for the rest of us, alas. But you can at least experience la dolce vita vicariously by turning to page 192. The journey to a warmer place, where life’s a breeze, continues in Trendwatch (page 48) as raffia, rattan and touches of terracotta take inspiration from the Med. Azure blue and pops of primary colour evoke memories of poolside frolics in Sampler (page 64). White, meanwhile, makes a huge comeback. Crisp (not cold) and brilliantly versatile, it’s a colour (yes, really) we couldn’t live without. Its countless iterations mean…

These life-size elephants are part of a public art project called CoExistence that turns city parks - precious fragments of green surrounded by dense urbanisation - into a metaphor for what is happening to our planet. The project was set up by the charity Elephant Family to highlight the plight of these beautiful creatures, whose habitat, like that of so many animals, is being lost as humans and wildlife fight for food and space. The 100 or so sculptures were crafted by artisans in southern India, using the lantana shrub, a notorious invasive weed. Catch the herd as it tours London’s royal parks this summer or buy a lantana elephant at coexistence.org - all funds raised go towards expanding protected areas for creatures who now find themselves living in human-…

I shall begin with a caveat: I am an unreliable narrator. Everything about Orkney is so tinged with magic that I’m incapable of thinking or writing subjectively about it. It is where my mam is from, where my aunties, uncles and cousins live. It’s where my beloved grandparents were. Arriving from Shetland at Easter, summer, October and Christmas, onto this ancestral soil, was hypnotic. The Pier Arts Centre in the Orkney town of Stromness is the most beautiful gallery I know. It sits on a pier, looking out onto the water in a holy trinity of sea, architecture and art. It was set up in 1979 by writer and peace activist Margaret Gardiner (1904–2005) and includes modernist works from her collection alongside contemporary pieces acquired more recently. The permanent collection is…

Ebi and Emmanuel Sinteh do not do things by halves. Even as we chat via Zoom, there’s a lot of multi-tasking going on. Where most couples would be collapsing on the sofa in front of the latest Netflix boxset, this pair are catching up on emails, planning their next buying trip and checking outbound orders - as well as breastfeeding. The husband-and-wife team set up their boutique lifestyle brand Our Lovely Goods in Aberdeen in 2019, not long after getting married, moving house and having their first child, Eliana, and it has been non-stop ever since. It was while 28-year-old Ebi was on maternity leave from her job in occupational health that she first indulged her creative side, exploring the aspects of home and health that she’d always been interested in…

How are you making the planet greener? By simple swaps like using plant wax in our products instead of paraffin. What do you wish for when you blow out the candles? A long and happy life. What are you looking at right now? Our youngest daughter fast asleep. What makes you happy? Good food and good music. Best bit of life right now? More sunshine and more time outdoors with friends. If money were no object… We’d book a long holiday in the Caribbean. A view we never tire of Tree-lined streets. Always in our fridge Apple juice A book we could never lend Emmanuel: Chronicles of Narnia. Ebi: Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. Our style signifier is Cosy, textures, natural fibres. The music played on repeat in our house A Nigerian band called The Cavemen. The…