“When you play the game of thrones, you win or you die.

There is no middle ground.”

There’s nothing like an evil Queen to ruin your night and make you wish you’d gone to bed early, except this is the evil Queen Cersei Lannister. Whether you love her or hate her, you can’t help get drawn into her scandalous battle with Daenerys Targaryen in the battle for the Iron Throne, or her unusual penchant for brotherly love. Watch at your own peril because once you watch it, you’re gonna be hooked. Cersei’s character is played by the talented British actress Lena Headey. I remember first seeing her in Merlin and then again in the 300, which call me sad but I actually enjoyed that movie. Maybe I enjoyed Gerard Butler….I don’t know anymore. Lena Headey recently sold her Sherman Oaks, 2,992-square-foot, 1950’s mid-century modern home making a bucket load in profit. In 2014, she bought the property at the nice price of US$790,000 (AUD$980,000) and sold it at a final price of US$2,050,000 (AUD$3,300,000), getting a higher price than what she had originally listed it for. Happy happy days. Lena bought the property as a fixer upper and envisioned a home that didn’t have what she calls “grand Los Angelean” features. “It’s not my vibe,” she says. It has an open-plan layout with exposed beams that are so hot right now and which I imagine might have made her feel slightly more at home in the US. In the end it wasn’t enough to make her stay, and now Lena and her family are all packed up and heading back to the English countryside. I love that the home has a slight Moroccan feel to its modern look which gives it some easy character that’s pleasing to the eye. And I love those blue and white geometric floor tiles.

Even though I love to hate Cersei, I absolutely love Lena. She is so real and speaks openly about mental health, another topic I happen to be hugely passionate about…From her twitter account she has shared some great pearls of wisdom, “Anxiety. Depression. It’s real and It’s chemical. It’s also spiritual… stay with me everyone (and before you ask, yes I’m ok)”, and also this great piece of advice which is just grand, “Let’s REMEMBER that. Don’t be afraid to let someone really SEE you. Magic happens when you are vulnerable and truthful and HUMAN.” Beautiful advice.

Lena asked Ted Broden of Envision Design Build of West Hollywood to leave the structural beams that were installed during construction in the kitchen and family room as is. The herringbone flooring is reclaimed oak from a Kentucky tobacco farm. Lena says, “It feels so good on your bare feet; it’s really soft wood.”   Look at those amazing Swedish patterned tiles. They look great next to the white subway tiles.