Relaxing on the chintz sofa in this vast living space in Singapore, you could be fooled into thinking you were sitting inside an English country home, and that is fundamentally the point. ‘My clients are British, so I wanted that sense of familiarity and a home-from-home feel,’ says interior designer Elizabeth Hay.
The exterior, too, has a vaguely British feel to it, with its mock-Tudor-style black-stained timber and whitewashed walls. ‘These historical houses really lend themselves to that classic country look for that reason,’ explains Elizabeth. Colloquially known as ‘black-and-whites’, these late 19th-century properties, built during British colonial rule, have an English aesthetic blended with Malay house design features, including wide verandas, tall shutters, and a topsy-turvy layout that prioritizes living spaces on the top floor.
