Back in 2016, this Edwardian villa in Parsons Green handed me a basement that was very much a time capsule of the 1980s. Not in the cool, mixtapes and shoulder pads sense, but in the beige, bulky and visually fussy way. The owners had left it untouched after purchasing the house, which meant I got to deal with thick, intrusive foundations, a visually restless layout and a brief that asked for the impossible: calm, storage, flexibility and discretion, all in the same space.

The main room had to overcome a small identity problem. By day, it was a therapy space for reflexology clients. By night, a family TV snug. The challenge was not just making it multifunctional, but making sure it never felt like it was trying too hard.

The answer was bespoke joinery that did more than store. It became architecture. Every awkward structural intrusion was absorbed, softened and redefined as part of a continuous, calm envelope. Storage was not added, it was integrated. Reflexology equipment, seating and the inevitable clutter of real life could disappear entirely, allowing the room to shift personality without changing its mood.

Trends come and go, but the calm that comes from a properly designed space around its inhabitants, which is the whole point of interior design, tends to be far more durable.

Ten years on, the client still calls it her “zen space”, which feels like the most useful design metric of all. Consider this my 2016 contribution to the anti-ageing industry: no fillers, no filters, just very good joinery.