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I have a lot of open tabs and not much bandwidth right now (both literally and figuatively), so just looking at stuff without feeling any pressure to do anything about it is my idea of fun atm.

These are things which have caught my fancy recently. I am not going to buy any of them soon (apart from the one I did!), but the reason they have caught my fancy is that they are categories of things I always have an eye out for, and if/when I do decide to buy them in the future, I’ll tend to go back to things I have already clocked rather than search randomly. And some of the things are just there for ongoing inspiration.

I am obsessed with this floor lamp and chair from H&M Home, even though I think I am not after floorlamps (two in one room is ample), and while I do want an armchair, I want a big squashy one I can curl up and take a nap in. Also, I’m not very into green in interiors, but I do just love how this picture feels. Actually, both of these items would look far nicer in my daughter’s house than they would mine, because her taste is more restrained, which means wilder items get a chance to shine - and she loves green.

These are the ones I'm eyeing up.

These six are not even all the ones I own… But I still love the one on the top best, patches and all.

As someone who has never not sat on a sofa with a throw or blanket to hand, I was an early adopter of the Italian brand Bassetti’s Granfoulard plaid. Bassetti has been producing home textiles since the 1830s, but they launched the Granfoulard Plaids in the ‘80s and I discovered them in the early ‘90s (a foulard is a scarf, and a plaid is a throw). The early models that I remember drew heavily on Indian textiles for their designs, and the quilts consist of two layers of soft brushed cotton over a thin polyester wadding: patterned on one side, with a contrasting back and border. They are the perfect size and weight to make a decent sofa throw, or a light bedcover. Over the decades, while they have still been produced, it has become harder and harder to track them down, but you can bet I am always on the lookout, trying to weed out the duller colourways that seem to have become more prevalent. My original 30+ year old ones are held together with patches now, but I’ll still pull one over me on chilly evenings. I’m always looking out for one of these because you can never, ever, have too many comfortable blankets (a hill I’m prepared to snuggle up and die on).

I don’t entertain very often, so I cannot justify another salad bowl, but if I ever do, I would like it to be one of these. I am a long-time fan of Jars Ceramiste, and have quite a good selection of their wares, and I love this particular collection. I have deep pasta plates and smaller bowls from the Maguelone range, in the dark green and the dark blue, and I love the glossy crackled insides with the pure white textured outsides. I’d like the salad bowl in the cachemire colour, which is a soft grey-blue. I mean, that’s what I think I would like now, but I love all of the colours. And, look at this jug! I am actively trying not to hoard collect stuff, but I do love jugs, both for serving drinks and for displaying flowers. I could see how hoarding collecting both jugs and vases could be an issue, especially when I try to apply William Morris’ Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful: jugs and vases, obviously, are both useful and beautiful, but you only need so many of them, and I already have some beauties.

I actually have a Bassetti throw covering up the ripped and paint-stained vinyl on my little 1940s wooden-armed sofa, and having it reupholstered is rather far down my list of priorities. But I am obsessed with the idea of covering it in this Liberty linen.I just love the dark aubergine background, and the pinks and blues. I love how Arts and Crafts it is, even though the sofa is much more Modernist. The fabric would be best suited to my other wooden-armed beauty, a graceful 1930s Swede, but she’s going to have a more modern new dress. I like the idea of that little bit of tension being set up between them. I pulled all my fabric samples out the other day and had another look at the ones I want to use. Strangely, the heat made me question my previous conviction (formed this winter) that everything should be covered in velvet. Anyway, gazing at this sample makes me very happy.

I while away many a happy half-hour or so on the Piglet In Bed website creating fantasy perfect linen bundles, and this blue and green combo is the one I fancy at the moment - last week, when there was more of an nip in the air, I was very into the cosy pink. I swapped out my duvet for sheets at the very last minute last weekend - when I was sleeping with more limbs out of the covers than under them - and currently have a sheet and Bassetti cover, and a fan, and I’m not sure I have any covers over me at all at night. So looking at that duvet plus sheet situation makes me feel slightly stressed: I love the idea of lots of different bits of bedding, but when its hot I want the minimum weight on me, and when it’s cold I want to just roll myself up in my duvet without having to arrange other bits and pieces as well.

This lamp! I love it so much! I don’t own anything orange! I am definitely yearning for the shapes and colours of my childhood recently. We moved to Italy in November 1970 and were in rented accomodation for a while. When my parents had to buy their own furniture, they leaned hard into the contemporary. We had a brown cord modular sofa that was always sliding apart on the tiled floors, and glass and chrome coffee and side tables, and at one point there was a low slung leather and chrome chair. The dining table was a big black glass and - you guessed it! - chrome desk which I now use as my kitchen table. As they got older, my parents started buying more traditional furniture, and most of the old 70s stuff was given away just before it came back into vogue. A vogue, I’ll note, that I avoided like the plague, as I got on with inheriting and acquiring bits and pieces of battered brown furniture. Most of my stuff is either solidly mid-century or leans into an older aesthetic, but as I’ve said before, I haven’t gone out and bought most of it, so I never really know if I would choose it again given a blank slate. To be honest I suspect I would - I love a bit of well-loved and well-lived in over-varnished wood - but I’ve noticed I’m much more drawn to the colours and shapes of my childhood than I used to be. And there’s just something about this lamp that makes me long for it.

And finally, inspired by Lucinda Chambers’ picks on Home, I ordered this laundry basket. I have an awkwardly sized space for a laundry basket in my stupidly-designed bathroom, and have never had a decent one in the 25 years that I have lived in this flat. For some reason I can’t make myself buy a straightforward rattan one, and I can’t afford the one I really love, which is this Hiro one (also, the washing machine is right next to where the washing basket would be. Do I really need one on wheels? Sadly not!) so I feel as though this one might be a good solution, just funky enough to satisfy my need for something a bit less boring than the traditional, but still big enough to take a couple of duvet covers.