How Rug Designer Laylah Holmes Moved From Handbags To Homes

House Guest by Country & Town House | Interior Designer Interviews

Interior designer Laylah Holmes discusses her transition from the fashion industry to founding Holmes Bespoke, a luxury rug design company.

Key takeaways

• Laylah Holmes transitioned from a career at Ralph Lauren to specializing in bespoke rugs and tapestries.
• The new Chiswick showroom features collaborative pieces, such as the Aura table created with Hyde House.

Main topics

• Career transition from fashion to interiors
• Showroom opening and design concept

Notable quotes

A rug makes a room and a room without a rug is not a room.

Conclusion

The episode provides an inspiring look at how creative passion can dri

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:01) And I also think a rug makes a room and a room without a rug is not a room. I don't know, there's something about it. And it's art, isn't it? It's artwork Speaker 2 (0:09) for the floor. This week is all about rugs. I went to Chiswick to sit down Speaker 1 (0:17) with Leila Holmes in her fabulous new showroom. Speaker 2 (0:21) This morning I'm sitting in Chiswick, right on the River Thames, with Leila Holmes of Holmes Bespoke. Welcome, Leila. Hello, Speaker 1 (0:31) thank you very much. Speaker 2 (0:32) Creator and founder of a fabulous rug company, and we met about eight years ago, but we'll go back to that because I want to fast forward, because I'm now sitting in your incredible showroom. Thank Speaker 1 (0:46) you. Which Speaker 2 (0:47) you have kind of really only just... finished renovating we have Speaker 1 (0:51) so we opened three weeks ago it's been a labor of labor of love that's what I was looking for yes a labor of love so I got the keys at the end of Jan so it's been about five months of renovation and we're now here and it's almost like a dream come true I'm so so pleased with how it's turned out and I I just feel like this space really reflects the brand and me and what we can do and it's basically your Speaker 2 (1:17) studio And you bring clients here. Exactly. Because the majority of your Speaker 1 (1:23) business is B2B. It is. So most of our clients are interior designers, but it's really nice for them to bring their clients. So, you know, we had a... A lovely working studio before where our clients could come, but this is a real showcase of how you can see our rugs and our carpets and tapestries in a real life interior setting. So in a home setting. So we have a bedroom here. We have a lovely showroom space. We have a kitchen. So we have different setups. So you can really see the rugs in their true home, how they should be. And very good iced oat latte. My favourite. Thank you, Tilly, who I gather also did the mural in the bathroom. Yeah, so my team, we're only a small little team, but we're all designers. So we work together collaboratively to design collections. So when we were designing the bathroom here, I loved the idea of having some murals on the wall. And Tilly is very creative and she drew these lovely kind of silhouettes of women, ladies. And from that, we were inspired to create a new little collection of bath mats. Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah, so we're launching them very soon. So they're inspired by these ladies that Tilly drew on her wall. Tilly. Tell me why Chiswick. So Chiswick is where I live. I've been here for 10 years. I love this part of London. We're right by the river. We're on Thames Road. It's just such a... I mean, it's just a lovely place to be. And for me, I'd walked past this property actually for probably almost 10 years and I'd seen it and I'd loved it. And so when it became available, it was honestly the most exciting day. I just was like, I need it. I have to have it. I need it. And it was a house. It was a house and a home. And it's beautiful from the outside. It's double fronted. It has these gorgeous angels above. So there's a male angel and a female angel. I'm not sure if you noticed that above the windows. at the front and this beautiful front door. It's just, it's a very special building, I think. So it was originally a police station very, very long time ago. Then it became, it was a perfume factory for a while. And then I think, I'm not sure if it was around something like 20 years ago, they renovated this whole section and they created new houses behind and it became residential. So it was, it was a residential property. It was a house. And so we kind of then transformed it, changed, we literally changed everything in here. So there was, you know, obviously the bones of the property were lovely and there's some beautiful little bits like the panelling on the stairs and cornice and, you know, there's some really lovely things. But ultimately, we completely changed everything. Speaker 2 (4:07) Honestly, you have done such an incredible job and you've got rugs on the walls as pieces of art. You've got obviously rugs on the floor, but also I don't think you would necessarily... guess exactly to be honest it looks like it's almost like an interior designer rather than a rug company I Speaker 1 (4:27) kind of that's kind of I guess the concept I wanted I didn't you know I wanted it to feel like an experience you know our working with homes for spoke it's it's very much about the experience as well as the product and I kind of wanted this to feel like that so I didn't want a shop as such or um a kind of I guess just plain white walls and rugs piled up like some companies do I wanted it to really feel like immersive so you're coming into a space and you can really say okay wow I love that rug but I also love that table or that chair is beautiful where's that light from and that's why I kind of wanted to bring together some of the most amazing brands in the industry that you know friends as well as you know brands I admire to work with me and collaborate here and and put their products in amongst my products and I think I hope it works really well. So you've worked with Jo from Hyde House. I have. On a lot of the furniture pieces. Yep so Jo and I have been friends for many years and I love her product and what she does and she's such a creative inspiring woman and so as soon as you know she was one of the first people I kind of approached when I found this property and I said to her look I want my rugs in this kind of setting would you be interested because I know she doesn't have a showroom and so for me I thought it would be a really really lovely way to showcase our pieces together so we collaborated on quite a few pieces here so we actually designed them together so where we're sat right now we're sat on the wave bench with the aura table and the bench is actually upholstered in one of our rugs and it's part of our so we've actually launched a new rug collection called the Thames collection because we're on Thames Road overlooking Thames and this is part of it so this is the collaborative part with Hyde House and then this aura table is beautiful it's using her amazing resonate technique so we have inset here in the top is the aura wallpaper from Philip Jackson which is just absolutely beautiful. And Speaker 2 (6:27) the resonate technique means that you choose a wallpaper and she can have that put into a resin. which is then used on tabletops exactly it's really Speaker 1 (6:39) beautiful really really and hard and she's told me it is hard as nails so you know it's very practical as well which is really important obviously I love the idea of livable luxury so you know we we use this as a working studio we want to have events here we want to host our clients for dinner or you know so it needs to be hard wearing and still look good in you know 10 years hopefully at least So, yeah, it was really important to kind of work with her to make sure that it was something that would last. So, yeah. And one of my favourite little areas, Speaker 2 (7:12) when you walk in on the right-hand side, you've got your Thames Collection rugs, which is beautiful, but you've got a little love seat that you said is... also part of the part of the tennis collection that is so sweet Speaker 1 (7:25) with a little rug underneath yeah so that's one of my favorite little moments and it has our oyster rug underneath which is probably I'd say my favorite from the new collection and then the love seat which Jo has I mean very very sweetly named the Leda love seat Which I just think is like the cutest thing ever, which is this gorgeous loveseat. And I mean, everything about that little setting is just so sweet. So I wanted that space as you walk in on your right. So I opened it up and had an archway. So I like kind of these vistas where you can look in and see this lovely, almost, it's almost like a picture. And that was really important for that room. I wanted it to be almost like a gallery. So not necessarily usable living room space or anything like that, just a beautiful space with beautiful things. Not necessarily to make sense, but just to enjoy. And tell me more about Speaker 2 (8:19) the actual Thames collection because it's, so the colours are very reminiscent of the colours of water and shimmering, but also texture as well. Speaker 1 (8:30) Yes, exactly. So I wanted it to be a very, very textural collection using... lots of different fibres, different techniques, so from loop pearl through to cut pearl, carving, shag pearl, silk, wool and we've also got some kind of bronze and gold larynx in there and but in a subtle way so it's, yeah it was very much inspired by water, by the Thames and by you know those shimmering, so when you're sitting there so there's these beautiful pubs along here, lovely fun pubs in the summer and it's always crowded and you can go and sit down by the pub and you look out and Literally, the way the light hits the water and that shimmering sparkle, it feels like holiday, doesn't it? Speaker 2 (9:11) I think also what I love about what you do is