Nina Campbell on the Art of Outdoor Design

There are few voices in the world of interiors more authoritative — or more entertaining — than Nina Campbell's. So when the British design icon stopped by the Munder Skiles Garden Shed during a busy schedule of Design Destination London appointments, it was always going to be worth pulling up a chair and listening.

And that, quite literally, is exactly what she did.

Who Is Nina Campbell?

Born in 1945, Nina Campbell OBE is one of Britain's most celebrated and influential interior designers, with a career spanning more than five decades. She began her journey at the age of 19 as an assistant to the legendary John Fowler at the prestigious Sybil Colefax & John Fowler — a formative apprenticeship that immersed her fully in the traditions of English interior design. From there, her trajectory was swift and dazzling. An early collaboration with Annabel's founder Mark Birley — designing his famous private members' club in Berkeley Square — put her firmly on the map, and she never looked back.

In 1972, Campbell founded Nina Campbell Ltd, and in 1984 opened her now-iconic shop and design studio on Walton Street in London's Knightsbridge. Her client list reads like an international who's who: the Duke and Duchess of York, Ringo Starr, Rod Stewart, members of the Jordanian royal family, and five-star hotels including The Connaught and The Capital. She has authored five books on design, holds an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Middlesex, and was awarded an OBE for her services to the industry. Her annual fabric, wallpaper and trimming collections, distributed internationally through Osborne & Little, have become staples of the design world. In short: if Nina Campbell has an opinion on how a space should feel, you listen.

The Garden as a Room

Seated in the Munder Skiles Argyle Chair — a beautifully crafted piece combining bronzed brass and premium marine-grade nylon rope, with a gracefully curved back and a gently angled, flexible rope seat — Campbell shared her instinctive approach to outdoor spaces. And her starting point is disarmingly simple: stop thinking of the garden as "outside" and start thinking of it as another room.

"I think it's very important to think of it as if you're doing an interior," she said. "You want a little bit of everything. You don't want it to look as if you just bought masses of the same thing."

It's a perspective that cuts right to the heart of what separates a truly considered outdoor space from a merely functional one. The tendency, when furnishing a terrace or garden, is to default to uniformity — a matching set, ordered from a catalogue, ticked off a list. Campbell's instinct runs in the opposite direction entirely. She wants eclecticism. She wants personality. She wants a garden that looks as though it has been lived in and loved, not assembled in an afternoon.

Comfort Is Non-Negotiable

But eclecticism alone isn't enough. For Campbell, the other pillar of great outdoor design is uncompromising comfort — and she's refreshingly practical about what that means.

"You want furniture that you don't have to worry about, that is practical, comfortable, the right scale, doesn't need moving, and is just beautiful to look at," she explained.

That last phrase — doesn't need moving — is more telling than it might first appear. Outdoor furniture that demands constant repositioning, covering, or fussing over is furniture that quietly undermines the ease of a space. The best pieces, in Campbell's view, earn their place by being both effortless and enduring.

She was equally direct about the physical experience of sitting: "This chair that I'm sitting in right now is incredibly comfortable. It needs to hold you well so that you can just sit in it and not think, 'Oh, God, I want to move.'"

The Argyle Chair she was seated in is a fitting illustration of the point. An homage to the iconic mid-century modern designs of Walter Lamb, it features a lower seat height and a flexible rope seat that moves with the body — the kind of chair that invites you to stay, rather than reminding you to leave.

"I like these chairs and sofas that are quite short," Campbell added. "You've got to think you might be sitting there two hours later."

The Wisdom in That Detail

That final observation is, perhaps, the most quietly profound thing Campbell said. Two hours later. It's a test worth applying to every piece of outdoor furniture you consider: not how it looks in the showroom, not how it photographs in the golden hour, but how it feels when the conversation has stretched long past dinner and nobody wants to be the first to go inside.

Great outdoor design, in Campbell's world, is design that makes staying easy. It's furniture with the right scale, the right materials, the right depth of seat. It's a space that feels curated rather than catalogued, personal rather than prescribed. It's a garden that, like the very best interiors, tells you something true about the people who inhabit it.

As ever with Nina Campbell, the advice sounds simple. The execution, of course, is everything.