Now that the teenagers have taken over the den, you need an extra entertainment area, where you and your friends can have a dinner together; a place where you can kick back, relax, chat, and have sundowners in the evening.  You need an adult place where you can express your individual style and be snug in winter and cool in summer, and a place that can expand on lovely summer days, and then hug up close in winter.

You’ve thought about renovating the house, bashing out walls, but you know that you can’t take the chaos. So you’ve taken to looking at other properties, but nothing quite offers what you have already in the home you love. If only you had another room to use for entertaining.

On those cold winter nights your outdoor patio doesn’t get used much – but wait, what if you transformed the space by adding a wooden gazebo with a dining area, and perhaps a seating area with a small bar? And your dream, a luxurious wooden hot tub.

This could be a sanctuary where you can escape to read a book with a glass of wine. You can fill it with palms and plantation style wicker couches with comfort in mind.  You can picture the fresh, breezy, cotton chintz fabrics for the canopy. A gas heater would add warmth.

Now it’s a visual asset to your home and adds a touch of class and style.  All lit up at night, with the lamps and candles glowing, the wood gazebo has completely transformed your home.

This is a building project which is squarely in the DIY category. Removing old coving may result in damage to the walls and ceiling, so be prepared for some plastering, painting and decorating. But unless it’s part of a major property development project, you’re not going to need expert tradesmen or architects.

Whether you’re using polystyrene, paper-covered gypsum, plaster or new ultra-light SuperCove, begin by cutting off 100mm of cove. Use it to mark the edges on the walls and ceilings at regular intervals and join the marks together with a pencil and straight edge. Score the area between the guidelines with a craft knife in criss-crosses to make a key for the adhesive.

Use a mitre box and fine toothed saw to cut the angled edges of the cove or cornice so that the corners can be fashioned accurately (use reverse angles, of course, at either end). Use a filling knife to ‘butter’ the back and top of the cove with adhesive, press it gently into place against the ceiling and the walls along the whole length, taking care to line up with the guidelines. With long stretches, support the cove against gravity temporarily with the occasional galvanised nail (you might need some in the ceiling, too, to prevent it sliding forwards).

Beware: external corners can catch you out unless you’re wary – they need to be cut at the same slope, rather than opposite angles, at each end. Measure the total length from the bottom edge of the cornice or cove, not the top, for these corners. Finally, invite the family to give you a round of applause.

The term “magis” means in Latin “for the greater glory of” and designer label Magis is all about designing products that worship every room of the house, using the latest functional and sleek storage solutions.

Since its founding in 1976 by then unknown Eugenio Perazza, Magis has embraced the creativity of an international design team that includes names such as Richard Sapper, Jasper Morrison, Stefano Giovannoni, Marc Newson, Konstantin Grcic and Achille Castiglioni.

The company elegantly combines simple design with sophisticated style, with a very heterogeneous range of products that covers every room of the house.  The company in fact promotes a return to simplicity, using modern innovative technology, taking three or four years to turn a single complex project into a deeply creative and clever technical success.

Some of Magis’ most recent works include the “Fuoritema” creations, which include new and previously untouched themes, such as products for pets.  Magis’ Me Too Collection, launched in 2004, includes children’s designer furniture, involving nine designers for more than 20 objects.

One product in this line, Chair First, a chair made by air moulding, was awarded the well deserved and prestigious Compasso d’Oro.  Other notable contributions include Stefano Giovannoni’s Bombo Stool, a huge international hit, and the Magis “Bottle” wine rack project, which won a number of design prizes.  Bottle has also been a part of many museum contemporary collections in both New York and London.

You’ve dug deep into your old, dark bathroom cabinets for the last time, only to come up empty-handed. Where is that spare bar of soap or the shaving crème? One of the fastest ways to make your bathroom more accessible and enjoyable is to rip out those old cabinets and replace them with new ones.

A bathroom cabinet dates a room, so if yours are from a bygone decade or even a bygone era, you may be creating more work for yourself than is necessary. Today’s bathroom cabinets come with all sorts of conveniences and amenities to make your life easier and the mornings much more pleasant. 

Slide-out drawers and racks allow you to reach everything, even that extra soap bar at the back, with ease. Built-in organisers keep everything in it place and easy to find and recessed lighting means even on the darkest winter morning you can see the things you need. New bathroom cabinets are also a wonderful way to update your decor. Choose from every kind and colour of wood imaginable or consider more modern touches of chrome, steel or glass. 

Pre-built cabinets, in standard sizes, can save you quite a bit of money. If your bathroom is an odd size or has non-standard angles, consider installing pre-built cabinets for the bulk of your transformation and adding one or two custom pieces to fit into those odd corners.

Whatever you decide, you’ll love the transformation of your bathroom once the new cabinets are installed. As an added bonus, the ability to find everything easily will get your mornings off to a much better start.

You want a new look in the bedroom but can’t afford to replace your entire bedroom set.  One option that might meet your needs is to just change the headboard—or add one if your current bed doesn’t have one. The headboard of a bed sets the design theme for the entire bed, and often the entire room. A light, airy, open-weave white metal “princess” style headboard can be replaced with a chunky wooden headboard stained dark brown, and the feel of the entire room changes.

Headboards can also give you extra storage space. Some are up to a metre thick, with lift-up tops and hidden storage below. Others offer small shelves for books, tissue boxes, or other necessities. Then there are designer headboards that make a statement about you. Are you a musician? Order the headboard that’s a curved music staff with notes on it. For kids, Disney or cartoon characters dancing across the headboard can welcome them to bed when they’re tired.

A “new” favourite is old headboards that have been refinished and re-purposed. Brass headboards are a perennial favourite, but antique doors, WWII hospital bed headboards, and even old window frames have been beautifully refinished and fitted onto bedframes to create a unique look. The best part of these is that you’re not creating any new manufacturing waste in their creation—it’s the second part of the reduce, re-use, recycle trilogy.

You can find headboards that create a mood or atmosphere, as well. Loved that honeymoon in the Tuscan hills? Look for a headboard in shades of terracotta, olive, and brown, with touches of gold and blue. You’ll start relaxing the moment you enter the room. A well-chosen headboard can not only finish off your bed, it can also make a statement about you.

Just as you wouldn’t imagine having a bathroom without a bathroom suite, you equally wouldn’t expect to have a bathroom without a bathroom mirror. These items are useful in many ways and if you haven’t yet decided what type of bathroom mirror you should be looking for you should give some thought to what will work best for you. For example, you can buy heated bathroom mirrors, which are harder to steam up than standard ones. The big advantage with these is that the mirror is never misted up and therefore doesn’t have to be wiped before you can use it.

A well-chosen bathroom mirror can finish off a bathroom and make a statement in ways that many other items cannot. You will find that a good mirror will become the focal point of the whole room, so it is better to purchase something attractive rather than a basic and plain model. In this sense it is worth investing what you can into a good bathroom mirror. Some have additional features such as lights and once again this can solve two problems for you. Not only will you will have a nice mirror to look at, but you will also have a neat solution if you need more subtle lighting in your bathroom.

Always remember that it is worth shopping around, not only to get the best design, but also the best price; UK Bathrooms have a wide range of bathroom mirrors in stock at affordable prices and can help you make the perfect purchase.

In any busy household or even for people living on their own in small studio flats, space is at a premium. In fact wherever you live, over a period of time you’re likely to naturally to fill up whatever space you have and saving it is something of an art form.

Bedrooms in particular, often suffer from a surfeit of furniture, which can very quickly leave you feeling oppressed as you have to negotiate your way around dressing tables, wardrobes, chests of drawers and most of all, beds, when you’re often half awake and not in the best of moods.

It is in situations such as this where you can save space by choosing a suitable bed. Pick one like a divan bed, which looks and feels like a normal bed, but has space underneath to store blankets and sheets, instead of having them lying around.

As for the kids, why not try a bunk bed, they’ll love it? As well as keeping them amused you’ll be halving the space taken up by the bed, although there may be some arguments over who gets the top one.

Sofa beds used to be a real pain, with clanking metal frames that seemed designed to take your fingers off when you tried to open or close them. Now, however, the technology has caught up with demand and they’re the height of fashion as well as a joy to use.

Even if you’ve got the smallest bedroom imaginable, there’ll be a bed out there that’s just right for your decor and your needs.

Many older homes have artexed ceilings – that is, ceilings that have been treated with a water-based coating that has then been textured and painted. Quite fashionable in its day, nowadays ridding themselves of the artex “look” is one of the first tasks many DIYers face when remodelling a home or building. While removing artex is fairly simple, in cases where artex was applied pre-1980 (and may contain asbestos) or was applied to cover a damaged ceiling, it may be wisest to leave artex in place and plaster over it.

The first task in plastering over artex is preparing the surface. Loose and flaking bits must be removed, along with all of the bigger stipples. It is strongly advisable to wear protective eyewear (goggles) while doing this to avoid injury.

Once the surface is prepared, two coats of diluted PVA adhesive (1:1 water/PVA) should be applied; leaving an hour of drying time between each coat. Do not be tempted to skip this step and go straight to skimming. Artex is extremely porous and without the PVA, your plasterwork will be a disaster. The PVA coats will seal the Artex, thus giving you more time to work.

Once the PVA coats are dried, it’s time to apply your skimming plaster. Plastering is a difficult art, so work in manageable areas. Mix your plaster using a wooden stick or mixer drill, adding the water first and then slowly adding the plaster until you have a creamy consistency. Because plaster dries quickly, always work in a cool room.

Wherever we live, be it a tiny studio flat or a large detached house, we’ll sooner or later come up against a space problem as the junk accumulates. Children and teenagers, especially, tend to live in over-crowded rooms, but all of us could do with imaginative ideas for freeing up space in the home.

The bedroom area tends to suffer the most in this respect and is often crowded out with wardrobes, dressing tables, chests of drawers and other furniture, which can be a nightmare to navigate around, especially in the dark.

Modern sofa beds are very stylish items of furniture, with many models and designs to choose from that will fit them in with your existing decor. They work just as well in either of their capacities and are popular choices for the living room, where it’s impossible to know that they double up as beds.

Sofa beds are available as corner units or settees that in the space of just a few minutes convert into comfortable beds. Chair beds are a type of sofa bed designed for odd corners or for small rooms, where they just fold out to make a convenient place for any unexpected guest to sleep.

Consider bunk beds, especially for kids’ rooms, as these are great fun as well as being very effective space savers. The kids will love them and have the added benefit that, if the need arises, they can be separated and turned into regular beds.

With the drop in property prices, many people have chosen to remain in their current homes; however, the reason they wanted to move originally has not gone away. As a result, there has actually been an increase in the number of people taking on DIY projects and bathroom renovation is leading the list. 

New bathroom cabinets are a quick way to give your bathroom an entirely new look and feel. Sleek, modern cabinets with built-in or recessed lighting can update your bathroom in a weekend. Add a fresh coat of paint and perhaps a new light fixture or two and an old, small and dark room can look completely different.

When choosing bathroom cabinets, look carefully at the design and construction, and compare that with how long you plan to remain in your home. If you intend to be there for a number of years, spending a little more for higher-quality construction is a good choice. This is also a consideration for children’s bathrooms, which tend to take much more abuse than adults rooms.

A bathroom cabinet can have a wide variety of options, such as slide-out drawers, recessed lighting, hidden storage and shelves in a variety of configurations. If you find an exterior or face that you love, very often the interior can be modified to suit your needs. This is known as a semi-custom cabinet and is a wonderful option for those who have specific needs, but also want to save money. 

Measure your space, consider your needs and then find the bathroom cabinets that do everything you want. You’ll be amazed at what a difference it will make.