The Salvage Squad: Cobh homeowners' sustainable budget makeover

TV series The Salvage Squad pairs interiors pros with homeowners. We talk to designer Cathy Angelini and the Cobh family she worked with

Sat, 28 Oct, 2023 - 11:21

Carol O’Callaghan

The Salvage Squad got off to a flying start on Virgin Media One last Sunday night with a trip to Cobh, Co Cork, to revamp a sitting room in the home of Naomi and Nick Murphy and baby Iarlaith, which they purchased less than a year ago as a fixer-upper.

Drafted in to help was interior designer Cathy Angelini, along with builder and handyman Trevor, to get the job done with a budget of just €1,000, a strict brief to buy only preloved items, and to complete the project in just three days.

“I think I actually spent €1,011,” Cathy tells Home, after making the funds stretch across purchases of paint, furniture and accessories.

But it’s not a new experience for her as she’s already proven herself adept at finding bargains on Facebook Marketplace, Done Deal and Adverts.

“The premise of the show is right up my street,” she says. “Nearly all the furniture in my own house is second-hand or vintage or hand-me-down.”

Presenter Brian Dowling and builder Trevor get busy with a transformation project at the home of the Murphy family.

You might think this would give her a distinct advantage over the other interior designers participating in the series, but there were difficulties too, which she turned her design eye to overcoming despite being pregnant at the time of filming.

“Trying to bend down to paint a skirting board was challenging,” she joked, although the design challenge for her was how to make a long, narrow room work while retaining a somewhat dated coral-hued, wall-to-wall carpet in the interests of budget and the all-important sustainability drive. We even hear show presenter Brian Dowling comment on how so much carpet contains plastic and ends up in landfill.

“Like a lot of narrow rooms, the furniture was pushed back to the walls,” Cathy says. “I knew I had to divide it up and do some zoning, and come up with a paint colour that toned down the carpet. It was a bit of compromising and complementing.”

But it was Cathy’s experience at sourcing preloved furniture where she came into her own, locating a new-looking, mustard sofa second-hand on Adverts for the bargain price of €280.

Overall, she says of the look, “I love the design. It is risky, bold, brave and colourful.”

If you haven’t yet seen the first episode (it’s available on Virgin Media Player), Cathy found a pale fleshy pink paint colour which is a perfect companion to the coral carpet, although she admitted to being worried about whether Naomi and Nick would like her overall design. It turns out she need not have.

“Cathy has the amazing ability to take a colour and pull it through the entire room,” says Naomi. “In the grand reveal, it was those details that Cathy brought that elevated the room more than we could have imagined.”

The Salvage Squad's presenter Brian Dowling with interior designer Cathy Angelini and the Murphy family, at their home in Cobh, Co Cork.

Avid viewers of TV home makeover programmes might be sceptical about grand reveals and just how genuine they are when they see the homeowners actually helping out on the project, and we see Naomi and Nick being hands-on, dying curtains and painting coving and lampshades, but Naomi points how good Cathy and Trevor were at hiding the bigger aspects of the project.

The Murphy family's new-look sitting room.

“It was genuinely a big reveal,” she says. “All we knew was the colour of the walls, curtains, couch and lampshades, but we didn’t know how it was going to come together.”

When first approached to participate in the series, the Murphys had just moved in and were in the throes of unpacking. But now, months later, the experience has shifted Naomi’s attitude as to how they will buy for their home in future and how they dispose of what they already have.

“We would have ripped up the carpet,” she says. “A wooden floor would have been more practical in the long run, but the carpet is lovely for Iarlaith playing, and all the furniture has soft corners so he can play safely. Cathy was very intentional about it being ours. The first evening we sat in it, it felt it was ours.

Series presenter Brian Dowling is put to work on the Murphy family home.

“We’ll think not twice but three times when we’re buying new furniture again. Sometimes in a furniture shop you’re just getting what’s on-trend but on Marketplace or Done Deal you have a larger selection. We’d be happy to have the crew back to help with the kitchen next,” she laughs. “I have friends asking how they can get on the second series.”