Life, style and body positivity with Siobhan Murphy, @interiorcurve...

Sep 28

Sep 28 Life, style and body positivity with Siobhan Murphy, @interiorcurve...

Instagram is a marvelous app sometimes. Sometimes you find people out of the blue that you just didn’t know you needed to become friends with until… you just knew! They appear to brighten up your feed, serve you all the colour you need and occasionally make you so damn envious of the house they have chosen to call home.

Siobhan is that person for me right now. I started following her (@interviorcurve) a while ago now, before 10s of thousands of other people did, and quickly became obsessed with everything she stood for. Oh, and her INCREDIBLE art deco house, which actually drew me to her in the first place. HOUSE GOALS!

Siobhan put some Instagram Stories out a while ago talking about her body. She mentioned that she feels the best she has about it now for a long time, which spurred me to ask if she’d consider talking about her journey a bit more. She agreed, and I was lucky enough to ask her some questions: about body image, style and that incredible house she lives in. Scroll on to see more!

Me: Can you tell me about your self love journey?

Siobhan: I think I have always been a fairly confident person however a toxic relationship in my 20’s meant that I lost a bit of my confidence and sparkle, after ditching the bad apple and spending time with my bestie I soon discovered myself again and my sense of fun.

I had a mad couple of years going out all the time and partying and then I met Nick when I was 30 and we just hit it off straight away! He makes me extremely happy and is super supportive of everything I do. I think a lot of my happiness comes from surrounding myself with positivity – Negative Nellies are not allowed and I have a group of best friends that I have known since we were five years old so I feel really lucky that I have such amazing friends in my life.

In terms of my body, I have been a size 10 and a size 20 and for me I have realised that my weight bears no correlation to my happiness – like I used to think it did. Right now I am the biggest I’ve ever been and also the happiest I have ever been in my life. Maybe part of that is being older and having more confidence, or just coming to the realisation that what size clothes you wear or the number on the scales doesn’t really matter – being healthy and living your best life is much more important to me.

Me: Your style is loud, proud and confident, both in clothing and at home... where does it come from? Someone in your family?

Siobhan: As a kid growing up in the 80’s playing with my fashion wheel, I dreamt of being a famous fashion designer, dressing up my Barbies in crazy outfit combinations and colouring their hair with felt tip pens. I think I have always liked to be different and to stand out whether that was with crazy make up, different coloured hair or clothes, and as a creative person that was definitely an outlet for me. I have gone through so many styles but one of my favourites was my Vivienne Westwood phase, I still love her clothes but I believe if you do Westwood you really have to do it properly – head to toe – all in! I spend too much on cushions and soft furnishings these days for that to be sustainable.

When I put on something new or a favourite dress it can really elevate my mood – I really believe that what you wear can play a significant role in how we feel about ourselves, I really enjoy the whole transformative process of putting on make up, eyelashes a wig and a fabulous outfit.

Me: Your house is basically a piece of art work, have you always loved art deco design?

Siobhan: I have always appreciated art deco but I always envisaged living in a Victorian or Georgian house and those were the type of properties I was looking at when Chatelaine appeared on my Rightmove search. It was about £100k more than we were going to spend but when I shared the link with my husband, his response was: ‘It looks great, lets buy it!’

I didn’t waste any time getting a viewing and when I first came through those double doors I actually cried. I felt such a strong emotional connection with the house from the very first time and I knew that I had to breathe back some vibrancy and life into the house. I cant believe we have only lived here for a year, it feels like we have been here forever. I always say to Nick that even if someone offered me a million pounds, I wouldn’t move. Chatelaine has my heart and I never want to leave.

Me: Where do you take design inspiration from? And does Nick like to get involved with it all?

Siobhan: I can take inspiration form a variety of sources: a room design can start with a colour, a wallpaper sample or something random like a beautiful silk scarf or a place that I have visited. My master bedroom was inspired by a trip to the Beverly Hills Hotel on our honeymoon five years ago. I have always had a huge love for the Martinique wallpaper and the interior designs of Dorothy Draper so I knew I wanted to create a botanical inspired bedroom with a nod to the Beverly Hills Hotel too.

I have a huge collection of interior design books – I’m currently reading Making Living Lovely by The 2 Lovely Gays. A great book filled with amazing tips. I also read a lot of interior design magazines, and of course Pintrest and Instagram are a huge source of inspiration – in fact sometimes I feel so overwhelmed with ideas that I don’t know where to begin. I do love a mood board and most of the time I start with one to define my colour palette and style for the room – these are not set in stone though and I like to tweak and redefine the scheme as I am going along.

My husband is a minimalist… I know, sometimes I can’t believe it either. Nick’s ideal décor would be white walls, white carpets and everything neutral, no nick-nacks, pattern or print. He really doesn’t stand much of a chance in getting his way with the décor, but he usually can appreciate what I do and I think he can just about live with nearly ever room being pink!

Me: What’s your favourite area of the house and why?

Siobhan: My current favourite is the tower room at the top of the house – it’s probably one of the smallest and weirdly shaped rooms in the whole house – with half the room being a big semi circle with lots of window and the other side leading out to the roof terrace. I bought the most amazing 1970’s vintage cocktail bar from Facebook marketplace and set about transforming it with pink paint and gold leaf. I have painted the walls the same colour – it’s a paint called “Get Plastered” from my pals company Dowsing and Reynolds – I thought the name was pretty apt for a home cocktail bar area! This room is going to be the party room – I have added velvet bar stools, shell backed pink velvet chairs and a whole lot of booze for those cocktails!

Me: What do the neighbours think?

Siobhan: I have had so many people message me from the local area on Instagram – usually the messages will say that they love the house and walk/drive past it all the time and have always wondered what it was like inside – Instagram is great for having a good nosey into people’s homes, isn’t it?

I had a knock on the door one Saturday morning and when I answered it, it was a lady with a watercolour painting of Chatelaine that she had bought in 1984 at a local craft fair as she loved the architecture of the house. She had never framed it and she gave it to me as a gift – I was absolutely over the moon. I had it framed, and it now takes pride of place in the dressing room.

Workmen and even the DPD guy have all asked if they can have a look around when they have been here working or dropping off parcels – they all get the Chatelaine grand tour and they cant believe the size and the amazing views from the tower room.

Me: You're such a positive light, but what makes you wobble, and how do you overcome those times?

Siobhan: This was a hard one to answer. I think sometimes if I feel out of control then I can have a bit of a wobble, or if loads of things seem to all be going wrong at the same time. I wouldn’t say I am a control freak, but I like to know what I am doing and I like to have a bit of a to do list for each day, even if its in my head otherwise I feel like I am doing loads of stuff but not really getting anywhere. Being overwhelmed can stress me out so I like to plan things out as much as I can and have the pleasure of ticking things off my list. I think part of things come down to the fact that I am always busy and always have a million and one projects on the go so for me time is so precious I never want to waste it.

Me: What's the best piece of advice you've ever been given?

Siobhan: My Gran always used to say: “You have fire in your belly girl, never let that fire go out!” What a great mantra that is! In terms of advice, she always said to me growing up: ‘If someone doesn’t make you feel good about yourself then don’t have them in your life.’

My mum’s advice to me has always been TRAVEL! (She was a travel agent when I was growing up and went on to become a lecturer in Travel and Tourism) And that would be the advice I would give to anyone – if you can, then do it – do it when you are young and never look back.