The questions we’re asked the most

Every project is delivered through The Sunday Desk?, a private portal created for your project. You share photographs or a video walk-through, your measurements and a short style questionnaire. The studio then designs your space, and the boards, layout and lists are returned to you there, each one directed and approved by Rachel. From there, you order what you wish, when you wish, and bring the room together at your own pace. There are no site visits. Room Ambience is conducted entirely in writing, in your own time, with no calls or meetings to fit in. Signature Interior Design includes one 60-minute live concept presentation call, and Whole Home Virtual Design includes a 60-minute live vision call at the start as well. Each call follows a set agenda, shared beforehand, and the recording is sent to you afterwards.

Yes, and a video often tells us more than photographs can. A slow walk around the room or garden shows the light, the awkward corners and the way you move through the space, all of which is difficult to read from stills alone. You are welcome to talk us through it as you film. Simply add it to The Sunday Desk? with your measurements. A minute or two filmed in normal quality, rather than 4K, uploads most easily.

Yes. Sunday Ambience is an online interior design studio, so there are no site visits and everything you receive is digital. It makes no difference whether your home is in England, Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland.

That is precisely what the concept stage is for. It comes first so that the direction can be changed before any of the detail is done, when doing so costs you nothing. You tell us what to keep and what to change. Room Ambience includes three rounds of changes, Signature Interior Design four, and Whole Home Virtual Design four per room. A design is not finished until it feels like yours.

No, and that is deliberate. Your list is clickable and kept to the figure you set, whether for a sofa or a rosemary bush, and every purchase remains yours to make. This allows you to spread the cost over time, plant across a season, or find your own pieces along the way.

No. Rented homes, small rooms, north-facing balconies and awkward corners are all welcome, and they are often the projects where careful design makes the greatest difference. If you rent, this is built into the brief from the start: nothing structural, finishes that keep your deposit safe, and containers in place of borders.

Room Ambience takes two to three weeks from the point your questionnaire, photographs and measurements are all in, and Signature Interior Design three to four. If you add a second or third room, or book Whole Home Virtual Design, the turnaround is agreed at booking, depending on the number of rooms.

One. The studio specialises in rustic luxury, which you may also hear called luxe rustic or rustic luxe: honest, matt materials, rustic warmth, generous empty space, and fewer but better pieces. The feel is quiet luxury, understated and never shiny or flashy. It is a timeless look, not a mix of styles, and it sits as comfortably in a British period home or a country cottage as it does in a new build. Outside, the planting is relaxed and naturalistic. Not sure it’s you? Tell us the feeling you’re after, and we’ll say honestly whether this is the right studio for it.

No, and it’s better to be straight with you about that. If your design goal genuinely needs structural work, knocking out a wall, moving a window or repositioning a door, that needs a detailed analysis by a structural engineer, on site. It is beyond what the studio can help with, and we would rather say so now than take your money for a design that cannot be built. Assuming no structural changes are needed, the design starts from what your space already has, its proportions, light, sightlines and existing features, and works from there to reach the goal in your brief. That often means altering or improving how those features read, using colour, lighting, layout, materials, scale and pattern, rather than moving anything. A room can change completely without a single wall coming down.

Digital documents you can act on: a concept board first, so nothing catches you off guard, then the final design once you’ve had your say, with a layout drawn to scale, a colour, finishes and lighting plan, and clickable shopping and planting lists of ethically sourced pieces and peat-free planting, all kept to the figure you set. Signature Interior Design and Whole Home Virtual Design also include photorealistic visuals of the finished scheme. A design, in other words, rather than a build.

Both are a complete design for one room, in the same rustic luxury style, directed and approved by Rachel. Room Ambience is delivered entirely in writing: a concept board, a layout drawn to scale, a colour, finishes and lighting plan and a clickable shopping list, with three rounds of changes and thirty days of questions afterwards. Signature Interior Design goes further. It adds photorealistic visuals of your finished room, a 60-minute live concept presentation call with Rachel, Classical Feng Shui guidance and a fuller, more detailed sourcing list, with four rounds of changes and sixty days of questions afterwards.

Yes. Room Ambience includes thirty days of questions afterwards, Signature Interior Design sixty, and Whole Home Virtual Design ninety, because most of the real ones only surface once you start moving furniture or digging.

Two or three rooms can each be booked as Room Ambience, and a garden, rooftop or balcony counts as a room. Alternatively, a second or third room can be added to Signature Interior Design, at £995 each, designed in the same depth and presented in the same concept call as the first. From four rooms, Whole Home Virtual Design is quoted for the house as a whole, so that each space sits comfortably alongside the next.

Yes. It is part of both Signature Interior Design and Whole Home Virtual Design, at no extra cost, and it can be added to Room Ambience for £95.

Through The Sunday Desk?, which is also where your design and every message about it lives. Nothing is taken until you have chosen a package and told us you’re ready to begin, and the studio will never ask you for card details by email or message. Buying the furniture and planting on your list is separate and stays with you, directly with the retailers.

You have 14 days from agreeing to go ahead to cancel and get your money back. If you ask us to start straight away and then stop part way through, you pay for the part already done. If you would rather keep the full 14 days first, just say, and we’ll begin on day 15. It’s all set out on the terms page.

Only if you say yes. The site uses Google Analytics so the studio can count visits and see which pages are worth writing, and that sets one cookie. You’re asked first, and if you haven’t agreed then nothing loads at all: no script, no cookie, no request to Google. There’s no advertising, no Meta pixel and no profiling, and saying no is every bit as easy as saying yes.