Defining Style with Ben Pentreath
In a series of interviews with designers featured in our new interiors book Defining Style, we talk to the King of England's designer of choice.
Being the designer of choice for King Charles III is a good way to establish oneself as a standard-bearer of fine English taste. Since setting up his business in 2004, London-based designer Ben Pentreath has created rooms that feel layered, erudite, and utterly timeless.
Take, for example, the guest bedroom of a coastal Cornwall cottage that Pentreath redesigned for a family in 2020. It’s hard to believe the building was once a tired barn, unkindly subjected to a seventies renovation. Pentreath brought in new windows and flooring to fashion a tableau that is both classic and fresh.
Pentreath's Cornwall project is one of 150 contemporary residential interiors from around the world featured in our new book Defining Style: The Book of Interior Design. Organised by 25 timeless design styles, our interiors survey inspires readers to enrich their own spaces by equipping them with ways to identify each style and what elements best speak to their ideal way of living.
Defining Style takes beginners and enthusiasts alike on a journey through familiar themes such as Coastal, Modernist, and Tropical, while including a few surprises like Organic Modern, Spirited, and Textured. Pentreath's work is included in the chapter headed Floral.
“Floral patterns have enduring appeal because they so beautifully relate a room to the nature that abounds just beyond the windows or doors,” the designer says. “It is a language that reverberates through the ages, appearing in historic, medieval decoration, wall paintings, or tapestries that were carpeted with flowers.” By deploying the imagery of flowers and trees, says Pentreath, “we are drawing into our homes the earliest impulses of humanity and beauty.”
The coastal Cornwall cottage featured in the book is a masterclass in the floral aspects of Pentreath's style. For the bedroom - "designed to feel restful and uncomplicated" - he selected a pale olive, willow-patterned wallpaper, and light brown, honeysuckle and tulip- patterned curtains, both iconic, nineteenth-century William Morris designs. He says he favours these because “the balance of scale, leaf, form, and repeat is essentially serene.”
The two pair easily with another Pentreath floral favourite, the red-and-blue Robert Kime Susani print on the Chesterfield sofa. The antique, turned-leg, dark wood side table and the Anatolian kilim layered on top of the heathered carpet add to the room’s cozy and warm feeling.
A trio of drypoint rhino engravings by William Kentridge from the client’s own collection lends a touch of unexpected whimsy. The room’s most important ingredient, says Pentreath with characteristic understatement, is “the bunch of common calendulas, picked from the garden and popped in a vase - they are really the element that brings the scheme to life!”
Phaidon.com asked Ben a few questions about his own style. This is what he told us.
Ben Pentreath, Cornish holiday house, Cornwall, United Kingdom, 2020. Image credit: Ben Pentreath Floral
How would you define your own personal style? I love to base my work on a sense of history, but in our decoration work, especially, also to create something that is playful and fresh at the same time. I do return to the same themes again and again, mixing periods of furniture, with a strong sense of colour and pattern, and with a strong architectural framework.
How has your style developed over time? I suppose each project brings new challenges and experiments, and we have developed a sense of maturity and experience in the projects – old favourites, things we know will ‘just work’, and then always seeking to bring something unexpected and a little different to each project. Our projects evolve with the houses and clients that we are lucky enough to work with. But in many ways the underlying philosophy remains consistent.
How do you work with a client to refine, expand or adapt their style to a particular space? I love working closely with clients, they bring so much of their identity to a project – far more so, in fact, than I do. I start by trying to understand what their likes and dislikes are; if they are unsure as to what they like, I’ll start by making dozens of suggestions of fabrics, papers and patterns that I feel may belong well the project – some of these will chime, and from there we start to build more developed schemes and proposals. Every now and again, this system doesn’t work, but most of our clients love this sense of involvement in the schemes as the develop from that initial germination into the full flower!
What should someone reading this be aware of when incorporating seemingly disparate elements, or mixing different styles or approaches, to their own interiors? I think you need to try to have a sense of confidence in what you love and enjoy, what has personal meaning to you – and then the mix will work. If you love a piece of 60s chrome and a Georgian table or mirror, they can combine beautifully – it’s your love and interest that will bring them together.
How does adding art impact the style of a particular project or space? Pictures change the atmosphere hugely. And I will openly admit – I hate buying pictures for clients. They are so personal. So I love working with clients - for example, the project featured in Defining Style, - where they have a growing collection already – and we work together to position pictures within the house. The choice of artwork can bring a whole different atmosphere to the room. Only very rarely will I start with a painting as the key piece in a scheme – it’s normally something much more subtle and evolved than that.
Is there one key element or piece anyone can add to evoke a personal sense of style? No – I don’t think personal style is about any single element. It’s actually in the combinations that the evocation of personal style is found. And I’m sure you don’t need professional help! Most of our help is spent trying to tease out what people were already thinking – and then making it happen. So if you can’t afford a decoration therapist (which is fine) it’s a question of trying to listen to yourself – and go for it!
Take a closer look at Defining Style: The Book of Interior Design here, read our introduction to the book story here, and look out for more interviews with the designers and architects featured in the book in the coming weeks.