Latest Homes magazine

Add value with a rug from gaff in Brighton

Recent research by Lloyds TSB bank has shown that in order to add value to your home, a good dose of ‘cosmetic’ improvement can add pounds, even more so than a new kitchen or double glazing.

The interior of your home is what makes it desirable either to you or to a potential buyer. A new paint job coupled with a new rug and accessories can really do wonders for the attractiveness of a house and a rug can be rolled up and taken with you if you move!

gaff stock hundreds of rugs in different colours and sizes. From shaggy to sheepskin, or hand-tufted to hides, you’ll find just what you’re looking for.

If you’re looking for something really special why not design a rug to match your décor perfectly? At £120 a square metre the cost is less than you would pay for a painting for your wall, and warmer too!

gaff has been making rugs for customers for nine years and is the destination store in Sussex for those looking for something different or individual. At gaff you can see and feel lots of different designs and textures and the rugs in the store are ready to take away that day.

In fact, with gaff ‘home view’ you can take a rug home and try it in your room before you buy it, just to make sure that it works with your décor, not something you can do with an internet purchase!

gaff has also just launched a range of incredible sumptuous cushions from £10 each.

The new winter ranges are now in, so call in to the Trafalgar Street branch and indulge your inner interior designer!

gaff, 66 Trafalgar Street, Brighton, BN1 4EB.
Tel 01273 819202
www.gaffrugs.co.uk

Building opinions with Robert Stuart Nemeth, the man with a keen eye on Brighton’s architecture

From 7 October, Brighton Museum and Art Gallery will have an exciting new permanent exhibit – all the way from Brisbane, Australia.

“Martha Gunn was ‘queen’ of the dippers and friend of the Prince of Wales”

Sea-bathing had become extremely popular by the end of the nineteenth century and two new professions emerged – ‘bathing’ (the immersion of men by men) and ‘dipping’ (the immersion of women by women). The sexes were required to bathe separately and, indeed, this restriction remained in place in Brighton until the 1930s.

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Emma and Nick, from the Velvet lifestyle and furniture stores, answer your design questions

I’m looking for an occasional chair or sofa for my dressing room.The décor of the room is cream and gold so it must match! What do you suggest?
Jenny Hardy, Hove

Emma says: Wow, it all depends on your budget! The great thing about occasional chairs is you can go for luxury materials that wouldn’t always withstand the daily wear and tear that usual living room furniture goes through.

Our Versailles range is upholstered in a beautiful pale silk and is finished in genuine gold leaf – this is a luxurious range that will blow the budget but is truly worth it! The two seater settee (pictured) is priced at £725. For a cheaper option though, why not take a look at our range of Chaise Longue with prices starting at just £295.

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Andrew Kay steps into a burning ring of fire, so to speak

This year I have written about my parents, ie, child care, and cat-sitting but for the last week I have combined the two in a feat of such daring that even I gasp at the precociousness of it. Imagine, juggling a full-time job, three cats, one dog, two crumblies and a busy social life. I think I deserve a medal.

“I checked all the little shutters and rattled stuff around and pretty soon it burst into flame”

To cap it all, the day I moved in to cat-sit the heating broke down at home, and at the home I would be sitting in – with the parents! So – a full time job, three cats, one dog, two crumblies, a busy social life and no hot water.

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Photographer Diana Frangi meets musician Nik Kershaw

Nik Kershaw is my favourite rock star from the eighties, a great songwriter. He had three international hits ‘I Won’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me’, ‘Wouldn’t it Be Good’ and ‘The Riddle’, and I am sure everyone remembers the UK hit ‘Wide Boy’ too.

Nik is going to be the special guest at The Space at the Latest Music Bar in Brighton on Tuesday 7 October. If you’re in the area you can catch him on 12 November at The Lights in Andover, and you London commuters will find him performing on 16 November at The Luminaire on Kilburn High Road – great opportunities to see one of the truly great British pop geniuses!

Beside those iconic singles, he’ll be promoting his latest album You’ve Got to Laugh which is available via www.nikkershaw.net or iTunes.

How did you get your big break?
After sending out the usual batch of demos to record companies (and getting back the usual batch of rejection slips) I advertised in Melody Maker for a manager. Read the rest of this article »

Daniel Frickelton’s guide to the finest golf courses in Sussex.

In golfing terms we all know what ‘feel’ is: it’s feedback from the club head to our heads – our big golfing brains – telling us how sweetly we hit the shot. Or not. For the most part, visual reference will suffice. The lie of the ball in deep rough, on the adjacent fairway, or next to the ladies’ tee tells us all we need to know.

“At Dewhurst I found myself looking forward to the chance to do better on the second nine”

Feel is sometimes merely the justification for spending that extra couple of hundred quid on a meltingly beautiful set of forged irons when a set of EzeeHitz from the back pages of your golf monthly would have done the trick. “No, really, sweetheart, these irons give me great feedback and feel on every shot and help me to improve my game!”

“Oh, I see. Well, my EzeeHitz give great feedback and feel to my pocket which really improves my shopping potential.” We all have our priorities.

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Daniel Frickelton’s guide to the finest golf courses in Sussex.

A clever git said to me years ago that the quickest way to take someone’s mind off a persistent pain or worry was to inflict a slightly greater pain on them. This distraction technique worked well when I was 11 years old or thereabouts. I had run away from home to punish my parents for real or imagined insults, long forgotten, to my prepubescent pride.

“Greens were true and firm – this has got to be one the best all-weather golf courses”

I made it as far as my favourite climbing tree, fully several hundred yards from our home. There I took refuge and, sulking ferociously, began whacking and whittling away on a stick with my official Boy Scout folding knife. A few hours later it was getting dark and I was running low on everything: luck, courage, food and time. Hot, salty tears filled my eyes and blurred the once clear vision of my recent righteous anger.

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Daniel Frickelton’s guide to the finest golf courses in Sussex.

All right, everybody knows that Mannings Heath Waterfall Course has a big reputation in Sussex and beyond for providing a very special golf experience. I discovered this quite inadvertently several years ago as I was waiting in a Gatwick-based parcel delivery depot for a slack-jawed, acne-scarred youngster with an attitude to fetch a parcel for the exasperated lady ahead of me.

“The Waterfall course is a magical medley of parkland, heath and woodland woven into a wonderful patchwork quilt ”

He had just sloped off for the third time in a palpable cloud of indifference and lethargy, and our eyes were rolling heavenwards in unison when the entry door burst open, barely managing to hang onto its hinges, admitting ‘a man in a hurry’.

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Daniel Frickelton’s guide to the finest golf courses in Sussex.

Character: Moral force; integrity. Integrity: Adherence to moral principles; honesty. Moral: Relating to human behaviour, esp. the distinction between good and bad or right and wrong. (Collins English Dictionary, 21st C. Edition)

Many moons and moans ago, in what now seems to me a previous life in America, I applied for my first serious job as the ink was still drying on my spanking new BA degree. The initial interview was disconcertingly brief: within ten minutes my prospective employer had invited me to play a round of golf at his posh suburban club. Taking this as a good omen, I immediately accepted, but wondered what this had to do with my job application.

“‘Golf is character building’ is a hackneyed cliché of questionable veracity, and one that is usually forced out between grinding molars and clenched jaws”

I met him and two of his business associates in the clubhouse on the appointed day. As the round progressed it became clear that my very average golf skills would be more than adequate to preserve my dignity in this company, and I began to worry about the consequences of eventually beating my future boss. Fuelled by the fearlessness of youth, I continued resolutely to just play my game and not laugh too hard or loudly at theirs.

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