IDM Episode 2 Decoded

And then there were nine... What really worked, and why.

Notes on the designs from my perspective as Head Judge, Interior Design Masters

This week’s challenge was to design hotel bedrooms for romance and special occasions, set within the dramatic backdrop of Peckforton Castle in Cheshire. With its Gothic-style architecture, heavy curtains, dark wood furniture and expansive views over the surrounding countryside, the building itself already carried a strong sense of identity. Which is precisely what made this task so revealing.

Because the question wasn’t simply what does a romantic room look like. It was how to design within a space that already has such presence, without either fighting, or flattening it. From the perspective of the guest aka the client here, you have already arrived somewhere extraordinary; the role of the design is not to transport you elsewhere entirely, but to deepen that experience. The strongest schemes understood this, extending the language of the building rather than replacing it, allowing the fantasy to feel believable rather than imposed.

The best rooms offered escapism without losing their connection to place.

Sophie's bedroom was an awkward shape that she used to her advantage. The bed fitted well in its own nook, but to prevent the rest of the room being bare, she repeated the wallpaper on the opposite wall, added intrigue with the repurposed vanity unit (dodging the temptation to paint all the other furniture cochineal red too), and united the whole with her signature lime wash wall finish which perfectly evoked the views outside.

1. Determine a focal point

A hotel bedroom begins and ends with the bed (your bedroom too). It is the focal point, the promise, the reason you are there. And the rooms that worked understood this immediately. Rather than scattering attention across multiple moments, they anchored everything to one central idea and allowed the rest of the scheme to unfold from there. From the moment you entered, your eye was guided, given somewhere to land, and crucially, nothing distracted from it. In a room designed for rest, intimacy and escapism, this clarity matters. What you see when you first walk in, what you feel as you cross the threshold, and what remains once you are in the bed, looking back out into the space. Does it hold you? Does it calm you? Does it feel resolved?

What separated the strongest designs from the rest was a clear idea, followed through with conviction. In a space of this scale and architectural weight, there simply isn’t room for hesitation. Every additional gesture risks dilution, every competing idea adds noise. The most successful rooms chose a direction and stayed with it, whether that was rooted in heritage, softness, or a kind of quiet theatricality, carrying that decision consistently from palette through to material and detail. The result was a sense of immersion, rather than assembly.

Ben created a masterpiece of a bed with a his and hers repurposed bedheads echoed by the facing portraits, all set against a gloriously luxurious wallpaper, the contrast of the contemporary lights, and the bed dressed to perfection (even if he did karate chop the cushions, which is forbidden!).

Duran took the original headboard and completely transformed it by adding the modern floating side tables. Vivid gloss green really shouldn’t have worked against the mango sorbet walls, and the canopy was placed too high, but they did, and the overall impression was deeply inviting. It was also the right move to have replaced the curtains, which now elegantly frame the window.

2. Work with what’s already there

Equally important was how the designers responded to what was already in place. The existing furniture, headboards and curtains were not obstacles to be removed, but opportunities to be reinterpreted. Some of the most effective moments came from working with these elements rather than against them: a reimagined headboard that felt intentional, a vintage piece that sat comfortably within the architecture, or subtle edits that elevated rather than erased.

This is also where sustainability moves from being a “nice to have” into something more fundamental. It cannot remain a trend, or a visual signifier to be applied at the end. It has to become part of the thinking from the outset. Recycling, repurposing, reusing — not defaulting to shopping as the first solution — often leads to more inventive outcomes. Some of the most thoughtful responses in this challenge came not from having more, but from doing more with less.

Because good design rarely starts from nothing. It begins with seeing what is already there, understanding its potential, and building from that foundation.

Kate took on board the lesson from Week 1 to have one main idea and run with it. As such she achieved a beautifully nuanced design full of clever detail without being distracting. My only tweak: I'd have hung the framed picture above the bed to essentially be the headboard, and made the actual headboard therefore lower and louder so as not to cut into it, but to also hold its own against it.

Elastic webbing on the back of an old picture frame = a framed flat screen television!

3. Don’t confuse romance with decoration

Where the designs faltered was often in the interpretation of romance itself. It’s easy to mistake romance for decoration — more cushions, more objects, more visible effort — but this quickly tips into something else entirely. A hotel room cannot feel occupied before the guest arrives. Creating a narrative around a fictional occupant, layering surfaces and filling every available space, does not work for a hotel room. Because, while the individual elements were certainly appealing, the overall effect was constricting. There was no room left for the person actually staying there. True romance lies in possibility, in what a space allows you to project onto it, rather than what it insists upon.

Ajeet's room was grounded and classy. He'd taken inspiration from the castle motif and found a way to incorporate it. He kept his material and colour palette refined but invited contrast, managed to skilfully accommodate all the existing storage while also adding in a generous chaise longue. My tweaks: the headboard was the thing to reference the octagon motif (in contrast it looks rather plain), and the panelling details might have worked better in more tonal shade and less blingy gold, just to knock them back a smidge.

4. Make it work, not just look good

At the same time, the practicalities cannot be ignored. Even in a room designed for escapism, the fundamentals still matter. Where does the suitcase go? Where do you sit? Where do you get ready? Where do you hang your clothes? If these questions are not resolved, the illusion breaks almost immediately. The strongest designs addressed these needs quietly and intuitively, integrating storage into the architecture, ensuring storage didn’t block the main event, incorporating seating that felt natural rather than imposed, and making the most of the views through considered window positions. Nothing felt forced; everything simply worked.

Because ultimately, to really underline this point, design is not only about how a space looks, it is about how it makes you feel, how it supports you, and whether it allows you to fully arrive.

Now read on…