Kitchen Tips: Farmhouse style kitchen

Mix buttercream and terracotta for a warm, sunny feel.

A subtle way to give your kitchen country style is to avoid matching unit doors, tongue and groove with quirky drilled holes inspired by the original kitchen door, open shelving and wall cupboards where the central panel is replaced by chicken wire. The door handles continue the mixing of styles.

Where there is room for a genuine range cooker, choose one of the range-style standard-width cookers with brass trim. Try to fit in a dresser, even if it means sacrificing one wall of standard units. Not only does it fit the look better but a dresser is a very useful piece in any kitchen for displaying anything from pretty china to nostalgic mementoes.

Keep the colours simple. The white tiled worktop is carried up on the splashback and the lovely terracotta floor tones subtly with the cream and the wood, while the deep green-blue Windsor chair looks all the more at home for not matching the units.