Journal

Inside Jessica Wright’s Essex Home AS Featured in Hello Magazine

When Jessica Wright and her husband William Lee-Kemp opened the doors of their newly renovated six-bedroom Essex home to Hello magazine, we were proud to be the studio behind the interiors. Here we revisit the project, the brief and the kitchen we designed in collaboration with Smallbone.

In January 2024 Hello magazine stepped inside a quiet country village in Essex to photograph Jessica Wright’s dream home. The former Towie star and her husband William had spent more than six months renovating the detached three-storey property, and the feature gave readers an exclusive first look at the finished rooms. We were delighted to be named as the interior designers behind the project.

The brief was family life. Jessica and Will wanted a home that would hold the everyday rhythms of raising their young son Presley while still feeling elevated and considered, the kind of house that could move easily from a quiet Tuesday breakfast to a Sunday with extended family. With Jessica’s parents in the next road and her brother Mark Wright and his wife Michelle Keegan five minutes away, the home needed to absorb a lot of comings and goings without ever feeling chaotic.

The kitchen became the heart of that idea and the room we are proudest of. We worked with Smallbone on a classic shaker-style scheme, choosing warm timber internals to bring softness and texture to the interior joinery and to break the expected crisp-white palette of a traditional shaker cabinet. Small decisions like this are what give a kitchen its longevity. A pot filler was installed directly over the hob, a detail we specify often for clients who like to cook at home and a trio of Eichholtz pendants was suspended over the island to anchor the space and introduce a note of quiet glamour. The island itself was designed to work hard. The brief was somewhere to eat breakfast, where Jessica prepares dinner and where family gather when they drop in unannounced.

Beyond the kitchen, the wider home was a collaborative process that brought together Jessica’s own eye and a number of her existing relationships with brands and makers. The result is a home that feels unmistakably hers, a soft palette of pale walls, his-and-hers walk-in wardrobes, a hand-painted playroom for Presley and a dedicated glam room for Jessica to get ready in.

Speaking to Hello, Jessica said it was a dream come true and that she pinches herself every time she walks through the front door. For us, the project was a chance to design a home for a client who genuinely entertains in it, and to see it photographed for one of the country’s most loved magazines.

You can read the full Hello feature here.

Credits:

• Flooring Parquet Flooring London
• Kitchen Smallbone
• Kitchen Pendants Eicholtz
• Photography as featured in Hello magazine, January 2024