New homes in London's Zone 1 on a Zone 2 budget
Our exclusive research shows a "price wall" formed by the Northern line, with property values to the east less than half those in the west. We reveal the emerging lower-value districts in Zone 1 for buyers on a Zone 2 budget.
Embassy exodus returns acres of central London to its residents
As the embassies exit Mayfair and Marylebone, their former bases will free up stunning family homes. While the move of many embassies to Nine Elms at Vauxhall is creating a new residential quarter including thousands of new apartments.
Oxford spotlight
The small city of Oxford is famous for its university and honeyed stone architecture, but its huge range of property - from affordable new homes to luxurious Victorian houses - and one hour commute to London, are big attractions to home buyers.
Brighton spotlight
The East Sussex city of Brighton and Hove offers its residents the best of both worlds: a relaxed life at one end of the line within an hour's commute of London, and a good mix of Regency terrace houses, seafront apartments and family homes.
Clerkenwell Design Week 2013
Discover one of London's most creative neighbourhoods at this year's Clerkenwell Design Week. This three-day event showcases the hottest trends in design, architecture and cutting-edge furniture.
Find a rated tradesman
Want to add value to your property, make your house a home, or sell your place fast? With 1,000s of tradesmen nationwide, rated and recommended by previous customers, this is the smart way to find a reputable tradesman.
Buy of the week: Putney Hill, SW15
This glossy new apartment just off Putney Hill has two bedrooms and two bathrooms, plus a bright open-plan reception space with floor-to-ceiling windows and spectacular skyline views.
Out of town: Wigginton, Oxfordshire
This three-bedroom Grade II-listed thatch in the pretty village of Wigginton, near Banbury, is a tempting package of beams, wood burners and cottage gardens.
Life-changer: Tiverton, Devon
A five-bedroom house set in a valley at Cheriton Fitzpaine, Tiverton, surrounded by farmland and sweeping gardens, with B&B potential and a garage block ripe for conversion.
East Grinstead spotlight
East Grinstead in West Sussex is 30 miles south of the capital in the High Weald. The town's exclusive gated estates attract celebrity home buyers such as Tom Cruise, while London families are drawn to the area's good mix of period homes and modern flats.-
Buy of the week: Putney Hill, SW15
This glossy new apartment just off Putney Hill has two bedrooms and two bathrooms, plus a bright open-plan reception space with floor-to-ceiling windows and spectacular skyline views. -
Out of town: Wigginton, Oxfordshire
This three-bedroom Grade II-listed thatch in the pretty village of Wigginton, near Banbury, is a tempting package of beams, wood burners and cottage gardens. -
Life-changer: Tiverton, Devon
A five-bedroom house set in a valley at Cheriton Fitzpaine, Tiverton, surrounded by farmland and sweeping gardens, with B&B potential and a garage block ripe for conversion.
Property search
Top five interiors trends fresh from the design shows
By Barbara Chandler
Striking graphics, bold printing and angular designs shook up the interiors shows in London (Home Show), Paris (Maison & Objet) and Birmingham (Interiors UK) as fabrics, wallpapers and furniture turned to technology for inspiration. We take a look at the top five trends making their way into our homes this year.
1. MATERIALS
Materials abound — inventive and audacious, from tubes of hardened polystyrene to waferthin woods, paper (often recycled), quilted and pleated fabrics, precious metals, 3Dprinted plastics — even fossils.
Top left: the Aoyama by Noé Duchaufour-Lawrance is a delicate-seeming but robust table of toughened fused glass circles; £827 (01494 545910; ligneroset.co.uk)
Top right: Vitamin Knot pendant lamps from vitaminliving.com
Bottom: London designer Nitin Goyal launched his new smocked and printed fabrics in Paris. Cotton cushions cost from £43.50, and silk cushions with cotton backs are from £48 (020 8980 4400; nitingoyal.com)
Materials abound — inventive and audacious, from tubes of hardened polystyrene to waferthin woods, paper (often recycled), quilted and pleated fabrics, precious metals, 3Dprinted plastics — even fossils.
Top left: the Aoyama by Noé Duchaufour-Lawrance is a delicate-seeming but robust table of toughened fused glass circles; £827 (01494 545910; ligneroset.co.uk)
Top right: Vitamin Knot pendant lamps from vitaminliving.com
Bottom: London designer Nitin Goyal launched his new smocked and printed fabrics in Paris. Cotton cushions cost from £43.50, and silk cushions with cotton backs are from £48 (020 8980 4400; nitingoyal.com)
2. REFLECTIONS
Shiny surfaces reflect glamour into light-starved London homes. Shiny metals were less in-your-face — brilliant chrome or burnished brass and copper on small domestic objects including trays and lamps.
Top left: Diamond Lights by young designer Joss Barton are in stainless steel or brass, in two sizes, from £180 for stainless steel, and from £295 for brass (jossbarton.co.uk)
Top right: Octagon Cocktail Shaker by Nick Munro with a flawless mirror finish costs £40 (nickmunro.com)
Bottom: Greenapple's chromium plated steel furniture range splits reflections into strips; coffee table 120cm by 70cm, £399 (01727 872525; greenapple.co.uk)
Shiny surfaces reflect glamour into light-starved London homes. Shiny metals were less in-your-face — brilliant chrome or burnished brass and copper on small domestic objects including trays and lamps.
Top left: Diamond Lights by young designer Joss Barton are in stainless steel or brass, in two sizes, from £180 for stainless steel, and from £295 for brass (jossbarton.co.uk)
Top right: Octagon Cocktail Shaker by Nick Munro with a flawless mirror finish costs £40 (nickmunro.com)
Bottom: Greenapple's chromium plated steel furniture range splits reflections into strips; coffee table 120cm by 70cm, £399 (01727 872525; greenapple.co.uk)
3. JAPANESE
Japanese design is fighting back after the tsunami of 2011, forging grief and hardship into creativity and beauty. And a Japanese aesthetic is emerging in design globally — well-proportioned and refined.
Top: The @-chair by Japanese architect Toshiyuki Kita, is designed to cocoon you while you work at a computer. It also has an upholstered footrest, which doubles up as a side table (01494 545910; ligne-roset.co.uk)
Bottom: handmade by Danish design company, OeO is a pioneering collection of modern design commissioned from six craft-based companies in Japan. Ki-Oke stool (apanhandmade.com; oeo.dk)
Japanese design is fighting back after the tsunami of 2011, forging grief and hardship into creativity and beauty. And a Japanese aesthetic is emerging in design globally — well-proportioned and refined.
Top: The @-chair by Japanese architect Toshiyuki Kita, is designed to cocoon you while you work at a computer. It also has an upholstered footrest, which doubles up as a side table (01494 545910; ligne-roset.co.uk)
Bottom: handmade by Danish design company, OeO is a pioneering collection of modern design commissioned from six craft-based companies in Japan. Ki-Oke stool (apanhandmade.com; oeo.dk)
4. GRAPHICS
Graphic prints are the sensation of the season, colourful and carefully drawn. Wallpapers and fabrics tell the stories that inspired them — from gritty graffiti to botanical prints.
Right: the new Runway collection, launched in Paris, with 12 digital prints by the iconic illustrator René Gruau (1909-2004), who worked for great fashion houses including Dior. Fabrics are from £43 per metre (01623 756 699; zinctextile.com). Complementary weaves and abstract prints complete the collection.
Graphic prints are the sensation of the season, colourful and carefully drawn. Wallpapers and fabrics tell the stories that inspired them — from gritty graffiti to botanical prints.
Right: the new Runway collection, launched in Paris, with 12 digital prints by the iconic illustrator René Gruau (1909-2004), who worked for great fashion houses including Dior. Fabrics are from £43 per metre (01623 756 699; zinctextile.com). Complementary weaves and abstract prints complete the collection.
5. ANGLES AND FACETS
Design blends with art, as furniture, lights and even textiles flaunt a jagged edge, cannibalising the intersecting planes and sharp angles of abstract painting and sculpture. New technologies can cut glass, cut and fold metal, or shape and colour wood, and 3D printing is the new craft. Pattern picks up the theme with prints and even a hand-tufted rug.
Right: on show in Birmingham, Digital Natives by Matthew Plummer-Fernandez is a collection of faceted vessels digitally 3D-printed from a hard plaster composite; prices from £350 (07887 801003; plummerfernandez.com).
Design blends with art, as furniture, lights and even textiles flaunt a jagged edge, cannibalising the intersecting planes and sharp angles of abstract painting and sculpture. New technologies can cut glass, cut and fold metal, or shape and colour wood, and 3D printing is the new craft. Pattern picks up the theme with prints and even a hand-tufted rug.
Right: on show in Birmingham, Digital Natives by Matthew Plummer-Fernandez is a collection of faceted vessels digitally 3D-printed from a hard plaster composite; prices from £350 (07887 801003; plummerfernandez.com).
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