Meet The Owner Home Tour

I have owned and run Mon Pote, an interiors and lifestyle shop in Bristol UK, for over nine years now.

The shop is in a vibrant suburb of Bristol, just south of the River Avon and on the corner of an independent shopping street called North Street. North Street is jam packed with independent restaurants, bars and other independent shops and close to the North Somerset countryside (read our locals guide to this part of Bristol here). Conveniently, my home is less than a ten minute walk from the shop so I have all of this on my doorstep.

I've lived in my 1920's mid-terrace house for 14 years now. We bought it from the original owners who had kept in the family since it was built in 1926 which meant that we inherited an Anderson air raid shelter, a loft full of treasures like ceramic jug and bowl wash stands, sepia family photos and sconce wall lights with pink shades. We also inherited vinyl flooring in the bedrooms, a back boiler and many, many alarmingly thin pains of glass which are still in the loft now as we are too scared to move them!

We've made lots of changes in our time here, including a big extension in 2016, and I always get asked if my home is like the shop. So I thought it was high time for a house tour!

The house is a simple 'room either side of the front door' formation and we added extra rooms across the back when we built our extension. It is wide rather than deep which means lots of light from the windows with the living room and kitchen area looking out on both front and back gardens. We included a large skylight and big doors in the extension so this has kept the downstairs light and airy.  It's a quiet road, lots of our neighbours have retained front gardens despite the city parking challenges so it's nice to look out of the front windows. At the back the dining room and another living room open directly onto the garden. 

I feel the house lends itself to a simple, fairly neutrl style with touches of personality.  Partly because it was simply built -  the land was donated to Bristol City Council to build homes for working people after the First World War, and partly because it is occupied by four people living busy lives and the last thing we need is to feel surrounded by clutter or worry about show home vibes.  I get to play around a lot with products and product styling at work so home needs to be simple.  The ground floor is painted in different shades of white from Lick Paints. The front living room has interest added in the form of a green door and original cast iron fireplace also in green and some pink book shelves. I really love the green, pink and blue combination in this room. I found the perfect sconces for the wall at the Malthouse Collective in Stroud - they pick up the peachy pink and the green perfectly. I also added a blue quilt from Mon Pote which complements the delft tiles around the fireplace and the blue and white striped fabric lampshade.

When we built an extension in 2016 we added a dining area (this was originally a playroom but we changed it in 2020) a living area on the kitchen, a utility room and downstairs loo as well as another bedroom upstairs. It was a huge project and we lived on site, plus I had just opened the doors to Mon Pote so the house got pretty much ignored for a couple of years - just builder's white everywhere as I couldn't make any decisions.  As things settled down, I started to add a little more personality to the new rooms.  

I love the dining area as it has a huge skylight and lots of light to grow geraniums. We have Hay dining chairs and a second hand table. The units house all the ex-playroom stuff like lego and boardgames as well as tablecloths, glassware and ceramics for hosting. I have a mixture of ceramics from the shop and second hand and hand made pieces.

I love to collect ceramics and I'm drawn to pieces which are hand painted or have an interesting glaze.  I also love anything made locally.  I have a ew bits including this pink jug from Jericho Studio Pottery  and Tash Fry.  

Here on the dining room shelves you can also see some ceramics from Mon Pote -  drip glazed terracotta bowls sourced directly from Morocco and some pretty splatter bowls from Danish supplier Bloomingville.  

They are so pretty and the perfect size cereal/desert/bowl.

If you are looking to expand your collection of server-ware or ceramics I think you can't go wrong with:

• A large salad bowl or a few: Perfect for family-style meals and entertaining
• Serving platters: Ideal for presenting main courses or nibbles and picky bits;
• Cheese board: a must-have for casual gatherings or wine nights
• Cake stand: I use mine as a fruit bowl too, so we can see the fruit we have and it doesn't linger at the bottom of a bowl
• Pitchers and carafes: Functional for serving beverages and beautiful as decor

Unfortunately we lost part of the garden when we built the extension but we compromised on the needs of the family indoors with outdoors.  I still manage to accommodate nine trees in my city garden, which means that the grass doesn't do so well as it fights for water and light.  We do have lots of inherited plants from the previous family which are very mature now, like this beautiful pink rose, which I unwound from a lilac tree that fell down a few years ago, and pinned to my fence.  A very thorny experience!

The trees provide lots of shade and its still lovely to sit out in the garden - our little oasis of calm in the city.  We have the Hay garden furniture that is so popular, just gorgeous and will last forever we've had it since before Covid and it still looks new.  I use bench and seat cushions from Mon Pote when we are eating out at the table in the summer and also to make the bench more comfortable.

I love to bring the flowers into my home and the shop, they add colour and clipping the blooms keeps them going longer.  We have lots of beautiful vases in the shop but I am a fan of a jug for flowers, much more useful when not being used as a vase.

We have four bedrooms upstairs as we added an extra one and a little extra bathroom  when we built the extension.  Neither of my children's rooms are shown in this article - at 11 and 16 they do what they like with their rooms in terms of decor and they can be a bit messy too!

I recently swapped my daughter into our larger spare room which gave me the opportunity to change up her old room.  I had some old yellow curtains in the loft from a French window that was changed in the extension, as well as the pink shaded wall sconce and some vintage floral prints I used to have downstairs.  I am a bit of a horder, I can't bear to get rid of things if I still love them, even if they aren't working for me at that moment in time.  I use a lot of the Mon Pote vintage style quilts on beds and sofas.  They are really easy to wash so protect furniture but also add extra layers of warmth when needed.  Such versatile products, you can also use them as picnic rugs, for sunbathing on, curling up under with a book... the list is endless.

The spare room has a pink and yellow pallet and my room has a blue and red pallet with prints and frames from the shop, contemporary pieces like the Moustache chair and Hay mirror.

I would say that all of our bedrooms are on the small side although adequate.  A few years ago I made a big change to my bedroom when I stole part of the room to create a walk in wardrobe.  A stud partition was built and I used Ikea fixtures and fittings to create the wardrobe space.  

We also changed some old built in wardrobes on the other side of the room and installed new Pax wardrobes which were topped by a carpenter to create a built in look.  The Pax wardrobes are in an alcove so they are  set back from the room.  Although it makes the room smaller it is so much better as we have less fewer big furniture pieces and everything is stored in the wardrobes.  The functional storage has made such a difference to the room.  

To save space I used wall lights instead of bedside lamps and furniture and accessories in the room are kept to a minimum  to reduce a cluttered look.  I just need to lower the curtain rail so the wardrobe curtain meets the floor!

The most important thing about my home is that it works for us as a busy family with a teenager and a tween and all of their lives and friends and all of our lives and friends.  It's not trend led so there's no need to feel pressure to update it.  Overall, its comfy, easy to keep clean and tidy and in a great location which works well for the kids as they find their freedom and for us in terms of very short commutes.  As for stye it doesn't change very much - I love a rustic look but also like to keep things quite simple - is rustic minimal a thing?  I hope that this article gives you a little bit of insight into the person behind Mon Pote if you are a regular, and maybe to encourage you to visit Mon Pote or Bristol if you are new to us!