Step inside the French farmhouse of Vogue’s former fashion director Lucinda Chambers

It’s really nothing from the outside, like a child’s drawing of a house with a door and windows on either side. If I’d seen it in an estate agent’s window, I probably would have passed by,” says Lucinda Chambers, with quintessential British understatement, of her 19th-century former farmhouse in Toulouse, where she lived with her husband Simon and their three sons for the past few years. 22 years old.

The plain exterior of the property gives no idea of ​​what awaits you inside. Chambers, former fashion director of Vogue and co-founder of fashion empire Collagerie and sustainable label Colville, confesses that when it comes to decor, she “loves everything.” As such, her home is a warm plethora of maximalist brocante finds that reflect her magpie tastes or, as she puts it, “where I like to go freestyle.”

In the sitting room, geometric rugs complement wicker chairs and mirrors, and elsewhere there are mismatched ceramics, beaded bottles and throws from local thrift stores. Red and white striped fabric is a common thread woven into curtains, cushions and tablecloths. She laughs: ‘I’m picky. I wish I were tougher, but I like stripes, patterns, Moroccan influences and objects that I come across during my travels.’

It was a fluke in 2000 that led to her and Simon getting their French vacation. Over dinner at a friend’s house in London, they learned that mutual acquaintances, Cindy and Richard, were selling their house in Toulouse. ‘Thirty-five years ago I had a small homewares shop in Shepherd’s Bush, London, called Swallows and Amazons. Cindy had come in one day and bought a rag rug and said it was “for the blue and white room in Toulouse.” It sounded so romantic, and the house had stuck in my head. So when we knew it was for sale, we flew out the next day.’

In the kitchen, vintage chairs are scattered around a table that belonged to the previous owners. A rug from a London pound store adds a pop of color, as do the brightly colored woven carafes from a local thrift store. For a similar chandelier try Curiousa.co.uk

Chambers was delighted to find that everything in the house was also being sold: the comforters, the hats on the wall, the car. “That’s how I sold it to Simon – I told him we didn’t have to buy anything!” A few decades later, only the kitchen table and an ashtray remain.

The first thing she did when she moved in was paint the attic space white and enlarge the outside patio, with oversized pebbles on the floor. She then built what she calls ‘Nando’s’, an outdoor kitchen where everyone cooks.

Striped fabric from London’s Portobello Road has been made into hallway curtains, check out ianmankin.co.uk. The hats belong to family and friends who regularly come to stay. Try frenchconnection.com for a similar rug

She attributes Chambers’ hunger for a decoration project to her mother. As a child she moved every 18 months, but she always stayed on page 50 of the London AZ (around Knightsbridge) and her mother decorated each new home in a different style, from rococo to ultra-modern. “She was incredible – she could build stone walls, paste wallpaper, tear down ceilings. I think, like them, I’m good with my hands.’

From her home in Toulouse, Chambers concludes that it is constantly evolving, ‘a very up-and-down valley’ and also like a Tardis sleeping ten. “I’m always adding things, bringing things from London, traveling with inappropriate luggage and wearing lampshades on my head.”

• For more information, visit collagerie.com