EDITOR'S NOTE: The interview with Sarah Corbett-Winder originally appeared in the Feb-March 2025 edition of H! Fashion
An adult stepping into Sarah Corbett-Winder’s five-bedroom Edwardian home in north London is akin to a child entering a magical realm. Mesmerising in every sense of the word, it’s a space that captivates, leaving you wanting to take, touch, ask questions and explore every meticulous little detail.
The most fascinating part? Her house is steeped in eccentricity in every corner. Art created from a lone school shoe. A bar made from a kitchen sink. Raw plaster on the kitchen walls. Brown as a foundational hue. Yet once the front door closes, time seems to pause. The bustling, almost kitsch interiors somehow form the most serene and comforting atmosphere – a stylistic balance that is certainly no easy feat.
“I really didn't want to get bored of the bones,” she says, “I know it’s bonkers, but it's also quite calm.”
This is exactly what she and her husband, Ned, were aiming for when creating the house: “We wanted to create a world that you walked into, left your baggage from the outside world, and come into a safe place. I think a house is a journey, not only for the person that lives in it, but also for those who come into your home. You just want to keep everything a bit different and a bit interesting.”
Every inch of her home is a vivid reflection of her personality, making it truly one-of-a-kind. She follows design rules, but strictly her own rules. From bold colour blocking in her children’s bedrooms to endless striped wallpaper (no exaggeration), a dedicated handbag wall and whimsical cat figurines from eBay on her fireplace, she describes her space as “organised chaos” – and in the most delightful way.
Those familiar with Sarah on social media, where she’s known as The Wardrobe Whisperer, will instantly connect the charm of her interiors with her fashion choices. She agrees that her approach to both is parallel: “There is an element of playfulness in both my interiors and my wardrobe.”
“When I look to buy things, I think, ‘Is that a forever piece?’ ‘Am I going to be able to wear that more than once and enjoy it still in six months’ time?’ It’s the same with interiors too.”
After previously living in a flat with a subdued design, ensuring she wouldn’t tire of the became a priority when designing her current home, where she lives with her husband and three children, Lion, Nancy and Celeste.
“It was so Pinterest,” Sarah recalls of her previous residence, “Everything was blue and grey and within about four weeks with my husband and I said, ‘we don't like it’. We got bored of it so quickly.” She describes her current jaw-droppingly cool house as still classic and traditional, “but with a bit of a twist. There's loads of stuff everywhere, but where everything is positioned is all very considered. It’s kind of organised chaos.”
Naturally, when seeking inspiration for her new home, Pinterest was out of the question, Pinterest wasn’t a question: “I didn't want to look at Instagram and Pinterest because I really didn't want to be influenced. I wanted to work out what we were about and what we wanted to create.”
This personal approach infuses every piece of furniture in Sarah’s home with a unique story. One piece that immediately caught my attention was a single one of her son’s school shoes perched on top of a frame: “That shoe up there? I had just bought my son a new pair of shoes and I’d invested quite nicely in them. I was livid when he lost one as soon after I’d bought them, but I thought this can be a piece of art and it’s a memory.”
“With art, anything can be art.”
Also, her fireplace is made from leftover tiles and her drinks bar is actually an ingeniously repurposed luxe white marble kitchen sink from Duvall.
The made to measure piece, which was measured too large for the actual kitchen sink area, couldn’t be returned, therefore it found a new purpose: “it's now our bar, which I love.”
Her favourite piece in the house? The grand pink chair in the living room. “My husband designed that and then we had it made. We’ve probably had it for about 12 years.” She also favours a William Yeoward bench that sits in the adult bathroom, which was a wedding gift, “you can put it in so many different places, it just brings happiness and I feel like it'll be with us forever.”
The couple decided not to use an interior designer: “My husband and I very much did it together. He was on the structural components - the pillars, the architraves, the door frames and the layout of the rooms. I did the colours, the fabrics etc. We worked closely together, but we were respectful of our departments.”
The most challenging aspect, she notes, was the structural setup, though her greatest hurdle turned out to be her greatest advantage: “It took about a year to get planning, which was a nightmare, but actually it was the best thing because it meant we had so much time to think about the interiors and actually the layout of the room. Things like which way the kitchen island should face, the layout of the bathrooms, whether to remove the wall between the hallway and the kitchen. I really wanted to ensure we didn’t regret the way we laid it out – it takes time. I think if it hadn’t taken that long, we would have made decisions that we'd have regretted.”
While every room in the house is meticulously detailed, Sarah was particularly intent on making the kitchen “the core and the heart of the home.” This is also where she cherishes the most memories: “Whether it's with having friends for supper, having a lazy Saturday breakfast with our kids, the children painting here, my husband and here having supper on our own, or hosting family and friends. I feel that this is the heart, and it’s where the most memories have been made. We also love a good dinner party, but we’ve collectively decided to only host on Fridays and Saturdays from now on – it’s too much in the week, we’re getting older!” (I’m currently plotting how to snag an invite to one of those…)
Sarah’s home is a dream come true for those who love a non-trend-following, fun-loving, anti-minimalistic style, but balancing such a vibrant mix of patterns and colours requires thoughtful planning – some of Sarah’s aforementioned own rules.
When incorporating a trending style into the home, Sarah advises, “you need to listen to the house and only pick out the odd trend instead of following them all,” to maintain a harmonious balance between timeless elements and contemporary styles. “For example, I love rattan – we have bits of it sprinkled around but not too much. Also, try and ask yourself ‘is it going to be over soon?’ If so, you’re going to end up selling or getting rid of it. So be honest with yourself, filter through what you like, and pepper it in.”
For Sarah, the secret to effortlessly mixing and matching patterns lies in connecting them through colour. “Not having too many is key. If you're going to break the colours up, just stick to two different ones.” She also finds that using a single colour theme in specific rooms, like in her children’s rooms (one red, one pink), “is helpful because it can be quite overwhelming when you've got so many rooms.”
“There's not much print in the house - only in our daughter's bedroom, which is floral. We decided that stripe would be our ‘print’ but we kept the colours with it tonal and mature, but with added bits of playfulness.”
So, where does one find such inspiration for interiors without relying on social media or an interior designer? When it comes to sourcing products, Sarah says, “Vinterior is good if you’re after something specific, and so is eBay. I also love an antique shop, and charity shops can have great finds.”
As for the overall design, she believes inspiration comes from within. “Of course, we’re constantly being inspired, but what I try and do is then feed it back through myself.”
“Work out what your family is,” Sarah advises, referring to the style or colour that will anchor the rest of the design. In her home, that anchor is the colour brown.
“My parents-in-law said ‘you can't have a brown staircase’ but it's actually a colour you don't get bored of and it's quite mature, classic, and grounds everything. You need to work out your base, then you can move a lamp here or a chair here, but it all still sits and works with each other.”
Putting things that together that others might not expect won’t work, but actually do, is Sarah’s bread and butter. Her distinctive approach to fashion agenda has earned her over 260k followers on Instagram, despite only having been a full-time content creator for three years.
This innate flair for fashion makes it no surprise therefore that her favourite room in her house is her walk-in wardrobe. “It makes me so happy. I'm obsessed with clothes, I work with clothes, they're my tools and my art. The ability to have everything on display is amazing and it makes getting dressed fun for both of us. For me, clothes are something that we should look at, embrace and enjoy. My kids often come in and try on my heels or sit at my dressing table and profusely use my expensive perfume, this room creates those special moments.”
Sarah recalls her flair for fashion starting at a very early age, but never imagined it could lead to a career, prompting her to studying Fine Art at the UCL Slade School of Fine Arts.
After graduating and moving into a studio flat, she recalls loneliness and “craving stress” which ultimately led to an internship at Conde Nast. She worked her way out of the Fashion Cupboard to become a Fashion Editor for Vogue Russia — a role that speaks volumes about her meticulous eye for visual design.
After leaving the publishing house, Sarah dipped her toes back into art, moved to Paris, then returned to England, where she met her husband, Ned. Through her mother-in-law, she was introduced to womenswear founder Johnny Boden and ended up working as Boden’s in-house stylist for six years, helping to transform the brand into a more youthful, less “mumsy” label. She was also instrumental in introducing the white trainer. “He’s amazing,” Sarah says of Johnny. “It was so much fun, and I learned so much.”
Three years after leaving Boden, Sarah has become the internet’s favourite eclectic dresser and the founder of her own tailoring label, Kipper, after spotting a gap in the market for affordable tailoring.
She weaves stories through the components of her home just as she does with her clothes, embracing her individuality in a way that has made her a highly sought-after content creator.
“People appreciate you being yourself. No one else can wake up and be you. So, I couldn’t be happier that this has now become my way of work.”
