Cottoncast

January 2012

Anthea Turner's Good Housekeeping Tips
- Video Transcript

AT: Anthea Turner

Bedroom

AT: Today I'm going to show you how you can turn any home into a stylish relaxing space with a few quality touches and some natural fabrics. I'm also going to share with you some hints and tips on how you can achieve a blissful home.

The first rule of housekeeping is to de-clutter. Now this is not just because of the way things look, this is because you can't clean around mess.

Why would you want to sleep next to your bills? In fact the only thing this person needs beside their bed is an alarm clock and book – everything else can go.

Look at this surface here, most of these things are not ornaments and yet we've got a draw, so the best thing to do is put them away.

Your bedroom should be an oasis of calm, it's your battery charger, it's the place you go to rest and relax after a hard day's work. And if you're lucky, you can spend up to eight hours between the sheets, so why skimp on quality?

These sheets here are from premium U.S. cotton and you can see how luxurious they are. They are cotton sateen and absolutely beautiful. And the trademark you look for when you're shopping is COTTON USA.

Now if you want to add a little excitement to your bedding then use an accent colour, I've used mink here, which is actually the colour that we have used throughout the entire room.

Little tip for you – when you're storing bedding in your linen cupboard just make sure you get all your matching sheets together, use one of the pillowcases, everything goes inside, then you can always pick it out really quickly.

Here, we've taken what was a very busy space and made it far more sophisticated.

Now this is a perfect example of how a little bit of de-cluttering can give this old dresser a facelift – I love it now!

As you can see by bringing colours together the room has a cleaner, more uplifting feeling and everything flows.

I love mixing old and new. Can you see how this antique set of draws has been transformed with just a modern twist? And the final touch – some fresh flowers. This cluttered bedroom has been totally transformed with a few simple accessories. What did I say a bedroom had to be? An oasis of calm, and now it is.

 

Bedroom

AT: The reason we have bathrooms in our home is to cleanse and refresh ourselves, but they also have to be relaxing places and pleasing to the eye. As with all things, the first thing you do to make over a bathroom is to de-clutter. Find storage solutions to put things in and then you can accessorise – plants, the occasional ornament, a candle – they look beautiful in a bathroom, and accessories that all match – they really bring everything together.

And look at these towels! Towels are so important to me in a bathroom, because they have to be soft, they're going next to your skin, they're there to dry you. And that's why the ones I've got here are super soft U.S. cotton, not only do they do the job – they look stylish as well.

But of course you also need to look stylish in a bathroom as well so why not treat yourself to a nice cozy bathrobe, and the one I've got really tones in with the rest this bathroom.

I hope you can see that these small changes have made a really big difference to this little bathroom and now, it really feels like home.

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