New RTE Player Show “The Good Room” Takes The Fear Out Of Choosing Colour

We all know what colours we like and dislike but creating a complementary colour scheme for your home is tricky to envision – there’s nothing worse than painting half a wall before realising it simply doesn’t work. We sat down with Jo Linehan, one half of design duo GAFF Interiors as they prepare to take the fear (and hassle) out of choosing a paint palette and many more interiors woes with their new RTE show The Good Room by teaming with the Moda, created by Dulux range.

Tell us about yourself and Caroline, your co-founder of GAFF Interiors.

Caroline and I met when we were working at IMAGE, I was in print and she was in digital. We both decided to go freelance and were looking for a project we could work together on. Caroline had just bought a house and was really getting into buying stuff online and trying to do things on the cheap, and we realised there was a gap there. We decided to establish an online interiors magazine that focused on’the high street and DIY elements, and in’the summer of 2016, we launched GAFF Interiors.

One of the finished spaces in The Good Room, featuring Moda “Coastal Calm” palette of Venetian White and Renaissance.

What was the idea behind your new RTE show The Good Room?

Obviously, GAFF is our baby, but we have other work projects on also. Caroline was doing a lot of work with RTE, where they are putting real focus on the RTE Player. She pitched them an idea for an interiors show with a Changing Rooms kind of vibe where we’d overhaul a room in under twenty-four hours.

We’re two very normal people who just have a passion for interiors. The idea is to go in without dictating what a house should look like, but instead meet people and understand what they need. We wanted to help them transform the space but also give them the tools to go do it themselves long after we are gone. RTE loved it and then Dulux came on board with their Moda collection, which is all about making painting your home way less scary, and it seemed like a perfect match.

The GAFF girls were given twenty-four hours to give this living room a modern edge.

Tell us about Dulux’s Moda collection.

We all know the experience of getting to the paint aisle and then getting completely overwhelmed by all the paint colours and finishes. And when you do eventually pick a colour, you get home and you’re too afraid to put it on the walls in case it’s wrong. So the Moda range is actually quite small, five palettes with five expert-selected complementary colours in each so you know these shades will look good together. It was actually the perfect starting point for all the rooms on The Good Room, we chose a palette with a homeowner and then selected complementary colours based on their selection.

They completed the transformation using the Moda Mineral Glow palette with Tilbury Teal on the feature wall and French Mists on the right wall.

Do you have a personal favourite amongst all of the Moda palettes?

Yes, we used the ‘Him + Her’ palette in the house in Clontarf and it was so cool because we used three colours from the palette. We used a gorgeous colour called “Foxglove” in a little alcove, that we turned into a cosy space for the family’s little girl, where she had a little tent and it worked really beautifully. It was an old Victorian house so it was really able to hold the rich grey “Backdrop” on the rest of the wall. Another favourite is “Coastal Calm”, there are lots of pale blues and a light yellow in there, and it works in every room. You can add a bit of colour with that without going too bananas.

Moda “Him & Her” palette of luxury washable paints

What advice would you give someone who is thinking about transforming a room in their home with paint?

It’s like anything, finding a makeup palette or refreshing your wardrobe – it is a learning curve. People think they don’t know what they want, but trust me, when you show them something that they don’t like, they know! Painting is the easiest and cheapest way to completely change up a room, and it has the biggest impact. Just make sure you get your tester, bring it home and put it on the wall because it is amazing how different colours can look in different rooms at different times of day. Even if you’re only brave enough to paint one of the walls, give yourself a feature wall in “Tilbury Teal” or “Gatsby Blue”, and just do it for yourself. I think most people, when they make it that far are like, ‘Okay now I can handle it, now I can start changing the accessories’.

Check out all the Moda, created by Dulux range here and catch the first episode of The Good Room on the RTE Player here.