Cathelijne de Vilder is the Interior Design Manager for Siesta Homes. Originally from Holland, Cathelijne speaks several languages (she is fluent in Dutch, English and Spanish, she also has working knowledge of French and German) and having worked for the Marriott and Melia, she is highly skilled at managing and styling property for international clientele.


Siesta is different to most property companies on the Costa del Sol, that is because we are not just an intermediary selling 3rd party properties, we also sell our own developments. My Interior Design department plays a major part in making sure our developments are as aesthetically pleasing and functional for potential buyers to feel at home.

Each month I will give you an insight into what is currently “hot” in the world of interior design in Siesta Homes.

This month is about ANIMALS – as I'm sure you are all aware, interior design trends following the fashion industry trends. So the trends that you see in any fashion magazine start to reflect in almost all your day to day designs.  Animal print been “in” many times throughout the years, I'm not sure it even ever went out of fashion. You see the leather trousers, to the panther coats, matching shoes and wallets and of course the infamous leopard and tiger print we´ve seen some of our best loved celebrities wear over the decades. But this trend has expanded somewhat.

You see in fashion magazines now creating clothing with the use of feathers, or material which resembles feather like material and we are already seeing this reflect in lampshades and curtains.  The texture is starting to assimilate into the world of interior design - animal fashion with a difference.

You can see a lot of this through many shapes and sizes:-

CA04_6_on

There are a lot of bigger animals coming back into fashion for the home such as horses and deer. It´s not something that everyone will like, some may use it more sparingly than others, or take something from it that they like, to make it their own taste. I particularly like the deer wall mount below and we have one on our office wall. It really is a show piece and a conversational starter when you walk into the office.

Whether you are a lover of this or not, everyone is likely to have something “animal” within their house by now – even if it’s just a mug in the cupboard.

Another major element to consider when redecorating is wallpaper. Wallpaper is more expensive than painting your walls, but it also gives you another textures and also warmth to the room or the overall style. You don’t need to buy as many accessories as you´ve added in the texture and character in the walls. At Aloha Hill Club, once of our developments in Marbella, we tend to add wallpaper on the main wall behind the bed, if you add a contrasting headboard it can look really stunning. You can also combine colours around the room to further enhance the wall. The new RASCH 2016 collection invites you to further expand the animal print with wood, nature, jungle green. Perhaps it’s the movement into the winter months that makes it more popular towards this time of the year?

dogAlso check out some new bolder ways to bring animals into your home. Using the pop art feel to the colours and design of the animals is really fresh at the moment as well as the Chinese influence of animals. I bought these because they bring a different way of introducing animals into your home. They are hard material rather than the usual soft or fluffy material; the newspaper looks really retro and provides the humour of the piece.

Bringing in colour and humour to your home is a funky way to bring fun inside the house in the winter. Add an old hat or a scarf to your home accessories to make it a conversation piece!