Wood you believe it?

London property recap: 14 November 2025

Rather ominously for the prospects of our future cohabitation, my girlfriend and I don’t agree about much when it comes to living spaces.

She says most of the properties I forward to her either look like hospital waiting rooms or agricultural cowsheds. They are not ‘cosy’, apparently. Whereas I think she’s got a Victorian’s love affair with conventional and pokey rooms filled with clunky furniture and clutter.

Send your thoughts and prayers. 🙏

Anyway, the latest thing upsetting the otherwise unrelenting torrent of our everyday romantic bliss (she’s a Propegator subscriber…) is timber and wood.

Apparently I’ve been sending her Rightmove highlights that look like the inside of a cardboard box from IKEA, that don’t seem to have been finished yet, or that are gloomy because they are overwhelmingly, well, woody.

Okay, on the first case we actually agree. I had sent her a link to the property below to demonstrate that while I do have a ticket for the timber train, I also have my limits.

Somebody might want to live in a kitchen clad with cork tiles OSB [see comment below] beneath exposed two-by-fours. But it’s not me:

This mews house in E2 is for sale at £650,000 if shipping crate vibes do it for you.

The increasing use of timber that I admire is much more measured. Wall-to-wall cork panelling is still rare – though cork has undergone a PR makeover on the back of its environmental credentials. But ‘wood-drenching’ more broadly is officially a thing in 2025.

Wooden floors have been essential for decades by this point, but panelling on the floors and ceilings is getting trendier too. I think it can still look very 1970s, when it doesn’t look like a ski lodge. (Perhaps there’s hope for a meeting of minds yet!)

Going with the grain

If you’ve got a Financial Times subscription then check out an article it published this week about a timber-lined flat in East London that’s an experimental ‘test bed’’:

The FT interviewed the home’s architect owner Benni Allen:

With fewer walls, contrasting timbers are used to zone spaces: reclaimed mahogany parquet extends from corridor to study, while Douglas fir ply is used as flooring elsewhere.

“I’ve been obsessed with Douglas fir for a while,” Allan admits. “The stripiness, warmth, the grain. It’s a softwood, not obvious for floors. I’ve always wanted clients to try it, but haven’t convinced anyone yet, so I tested it here. It’s to a very high standard and it works.”

You can be pretty confident that where the insiders lead, the rest of us will first laugh and eventually follow. Not always but very often.

Here’s a few more on-trend examples from (where else?) The Modern House:

• This 1976 house in North Yorkshire has retained its original wood panelling from the first go-around. Recently sold for £675,000 – The Modern House

• Here’s a £965,000 property in Ealing that alternates natural grains with projected white surfaces to create a crafty-Jenga look. The sort of place that appears a bit odd now but may well seem ahead of its time in a few years – The Modern House

• This £1.55m flat in the Barbican restrains its wood-drenching to the kitchen, to good effect today as well as (presumably) tomorrow – The Modern House

• Sticking with both this week’s timber theme and the ‘I can’t believe he’s not sponsored by The Modern House’ subtext, I’d say this three-bedroom house in Gospel Oak is pretty gorgeous. The young developer has deployed bespoke joinery throughout its 1,381 sq ft, with cupboards to match that ubiquitous mid-century furniture. I imagine it’ll need to grow into its £1,650,000 asking price though, even on the fringes of Hamstead Heath – The Modern House

The links

Shortcuts for the discerning property fanatic.

News

Budget blues have put housing market on ice, RICS survey suggests - This Is Money

Property experts urge Rachel Reeves to abolish the ‘sin tax’ of stamp duty - Guardian

Huge £3bn canalside housing scheme in West London gets the go-ahead – Standard

Another £1bn neighbourhood is coming to London, but at what cost to locals? – Metro

Sales at housebuilder Taylor Wimpey fall amid (yep!) Budget uncertainty - Guardian

Pocket Homes (of 38sqm) to replace former synagogue in Streatham – Southwark News

How does London’s housing crisis affect the UK economy? – BBC

The capital’s boroughs where not a single affordable home is being built - Standard

Five major mortgage lenders cut rates – This Is Money

Mortgages, moving, and other money matters

Cost of moving home surges 27% in a year due to stamp duty hike – This Is Money

The unintended consequence of a ban on leasehold flats – Landlord Today

The rise of renters in their 60s – Guardian

The price for a big country house has fallen sharply – This Is Money

London congestion charge to go up by 20% and apply to EVs for first time – Autocar

Find more investing and money insights at our sister site Monevator

The investing angle

Confirmed: no-fault evictions will be banned in England from May – BBC

What National Insurance on landlord income would mean for you – Landlord Today

Rightmove’s fees account for 13.5% of agent’s commission – Property Industry Eye

More landlords remortgage amid cautious buy-to-let market – The Negotiator

Buy-to-let’s strategy pivot [Advertorial but interesting] – Investor’s Chronicle

Good bones

Interior design hacks for different stages of life – Guardian

17 design ideas for office/spare rooms – House & Garden

How ‘visual rhythm’ can enhance your interiors for free – Yahoo Life

Clever ways to make the most of a basement – House & Garden

London’s most stylish new interiors boutiques – Standard

A Clerkenwell rooftop transformed into a minimalist urban abode – Wallpaper

A former vicarage in south London enlivened with colour – House & Garden

Your great outdoors

13 flowering plants to sow now for blooms next spring – Country Living

How to make the most of your greenhouse in winter –Homes & Gardens

Property picks, home…

Look for the red, white, and green of the Ealing Village complex as you travel towards the Broadway. I remember it seeming out of place and time – as if a monstrous child from early 20th-Century Austria had lost their doll house south of Hanger Lane. Close, but no cigar – turns out the flats were designed after actors’ residences in Los Angeles. That tracks when you hear it… but it also it doesn’t on a damp November day, with the elements lashing at exposed balconies and Crittal windows and fuelling a nearly £6,000 service charge. Hefty for a 629 sq ft flat, even with a swimming pool and tennis courts to live the Hollywood dream. Only £495,000, mind - The Modern House

I loved the various times I lived in south London. It seemed friendlier, roomier, and more like ‘old’ London – all characters and corners. And then I’d head back over the river and basically never return until the next move south. Ho hum. When I look at little Pond Cottages in Dulwich, I’m recall a ‘Mews House’ (just a converted garage) I once lived in off Coldharbour Lane, and my mate who had a caravan by a windmill in Brixton, and a sprawling home to dozens in Tulse Hill. But you’ll see a period piece exterior with magazine-quality interiors, though only 656 sq ft for £775,000 – Inigo

It’s been a while since we’ve had a signature brand school conversion on Propegator. So how about a re-up of this 1,281 sq ft two-bed two-bathroom number in near-east London – but at a lower price? Double-height ceilings but no mezzanine gives the place a church-like quality. The interior design is odd though. (The obelisk of a TV unit that’s dwarfed by the space it’s in reminds me of the end of 2001: A Space Odyssey.) At £1.15m it’s £100,000 cheaper than three months ago. No floorplans – Douglas Pryce

…and away

It’s just been announced that Cardiff will stage the opener of Euro 2028 ⚽ Swap your terrace in Putney for this £1.2m seven-bedroom semi in the Welsh capital’s trendy Pontcanna district, and you could host all your mates by the time kick-off rolls around. Sprawling over five stories (including basement and loft) and at nearly 4,500 sq ft, this is not a house to buy if you hate vacuuming. Nor, I’d suggest, if you don’t have the bodies to fill what could be a boutique hotel. The interiors do need some TLC; they currently look like the backdrop to photos in those old catalogues selling gadgets for getting your shoes off or keeping away the squirrels – Hern & Crabtree

One benefit of a youthful migration from the provinces to London is that if you decide to return home after doing your Dick Whittington bit, your money will go far further. Head back towards Newcastle, for example, and £1.5m buys you this beautiful six-bedroom barn conversion of over 5,500 sq ft. There are two ground floor wings off the main spaces, with most of the bedrooms on the first floor – and even a restored gin gang. No, not a bunch of boozy Geordies but a threshing barn that’s now a circular social space. The only downside is some attached neighbours. £1.5m – Fine & Country

Out of house

The all-new Olympia: ‘like Vegas without the sin’ – Standard

London’s lesser-known Art Deco gems – Londonist

£100 on-the-spot fines for abandoned Lime and Forest bikes – Standard

London ranked the best city in the world, again – Time Out

The ‘mind-blowingly good’ plans for new cycle lanes in central London – Time Out

Government commits to preserving Covid memorial wall by the Thames – A.P. News

The biggest urban winery in Britain is coming to Canada Water – Time Out