Designing a holiday home

Interior design for your second home

For your private use, a second home should be designed to suit your taste. However, it is a great opportunity to try something different to what you’d normally have in your main residence. Holidays are about fun and spontaneity, and nothing shouts a good time more than some injection of colour and some characterful accents here and there.

A holiday home tends not to have all the paraphernalia we accumulate in our main homes. But you still need to think about good storage so you can put things away, dust free, for the periods the property isn’t being used. You will also need plenty of seating and beds if you want to have family and friends join you.

After a long journey, perhaps late evening, you want to unlock the front door, step inside, switch the lights on, and the property almost speak to you, saying “Welcome, your holiday begins now’.

Your Isle of Wight holiday let

Whether affordable, or high-end, a holiday rental should appeal to most tastes. The interior must be fresh and clutter-free, but at the same time it needs to feel cosy and welcoming too.

For a budget end holiday let aimed at holiday makers and short breaks, you can probably do the interior for yourself, providing just the bare essentials.

However, for a high-end rental with a commensurate rental price, it’s imperative to make it discerning and sumptuous. It needs to outshine not just other local rentals, but boutique hotels too, so it needs to exude luxury and charm.

Offer something that guests might not have at home. A hot-tub, a sauna, an outdoor kitchen, a games room with the latest technology and luxury gadgets, and high-speed WiFi. The outside should have an outdoor kitchen or cooking area, plenty of seating and some outdoor play equipment if you’re appealing to families.

It needs to have stunning lighting, stylish curtains and blinds, carpets that your toes sink into, walk-in shower rooms, and a focus on luxury designer brands.

Artwork on the walls should celebrate local artists and photographers. With a strong sustainable ethos on the Island, careful consideration should be made when selecting furniture and furnishings. People will really appreciate knowing that something was made by a local artisan.

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If at the budget end, provide the essentials, but keep things otherwise simple.

, considering all seasons if you wish to rent it out all year round. It’s important to make it feel cosy in the colder months. Add all those special touches, to ensure guests have everything they need to make their stay really enjoyable and memorable.

Having a holiday let of my own here in Ventnor, I know what to provide for guests. Plus I have installed hundreds of buy-to-let properties for private landlords over the years, so I have a great deal of experience in pulling together a ‘house pack’ of everyday basics, from crockery and pots & pans, to bed linen and towels. Having dressed showhomes for house builders for more than 30 years, presenting a property for visual appeal is something I can almost do in my sleep.

It is important that holidaymakers feel at home and have everything they need. This can just be everyday basics or the full monty so they can cook gourmet meals. But there are also some additional touches that make a holiday extra special for guests.

Home finder service

If you are looking to buy a second home on the Island I can help you in your search. If you are serious about buying a place, then you need to be registered with as many Island estate agents as you can. It’s no good waiting for properties to appear on the likes of Rightmove as you will miss out to other buyers already on agents’ books. The most desirable properties often sell before being listed online.

You need to react fast when a potential property comes onto the market. Yet you may not be in a position to drop everything at a moments notice and make a trip over to the Island for a viewing. To wait until the weekend could result in you losing it to someone else.

I can help you by conducting an initial viewing on your behalf, saving you a wasted trip should a property not be right for you. You would be in control of briefing the estate agent; I would simply view and appraise a property and email you a written report, along with a short video of each room.

With 30 years experience designing show homes, I am well versed in understanding houseplans and architect’s drawings, and I can provide you furniture layouts allowing you to reimagine using the property yourself.

Cheeky as this might sound, if the property sounds perfect after my appraisal, and you’re in a position to proceed quickly financially, then I advise you put in an offer even before you actually see it. Then view it in the flesh at your earliest opportunity. You are not committed to buying it at that stage, but this gets you ahead of the rest and will increase your chances of getting it.