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Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen launches new collection LUX with Artisan Furniture

Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen has launched a "witty, highly educated and addictively elegant" furniture collection.

The 55-year-old TV star – who is best-known for appearing in ‘Changing Rooms’ – has joined forces with Artisan Furniture, a London-based manufacturer, to help create an exciting new range of products, LUX.

Laurence was eager to collaborate with the company due to its focus on artisanal prosperity and the sustainability of timber.

The venture is intended to yield as many as 50 products, with the new range featuring a broad array of design styles.

Laurence’s overarching ambition behind the project is to ensure that his designs are accessible to all, despite their opulent feel.

The collection is set to be released this summer and will be available via independent retailers and most large online platforms.

Laurence rose to public prominence during his time on ‘Changing Rooms’, but he recently confessed the show felt "a bit like panto".

Looking back on his time on the home-improvement show, Laurence explained: "I was a real designer with a proper practice and it was a bit like panto for me.

"Having spent all week doing Lady Fra Fra’s curtains, I was being let loose in a council flat with a ton of brightly coloured emulsion and a staple gun.

"I got that rep for being the rat king in the panto, but in more than 100 programmes there were only three where the people didn’t like it.

"Until that point interior design was an incredibly snobby and upmarket discipline. Suddenly it was something people were watching at home after ‘EastEnders’, and trying out for themselves.

"I didn’t last long in the American version. The designers were deliberately being produced to get things wrong."