The thing that’s most surprising about the home of London florist Nikki Tibbles is neither the hot-pink front door in a street where most are painted fashionable greys and blacks, nor her rather sparse back garden. It’s the absence of flowers.

There is not a single live bloom anywhere in the four-storey home in which she’s resided for 18 years – no sign of the decadent clusters of velvety-red roses she’s known for, nor the classic bunches of peonies mixed with fragrant sweet peas and rich hydrangeas. In their place are dozens of empty vases: Fulham pottery from the Twenties, a limited collection of 15 square vessels by Tom Dixon, curvaceous glass objects by Nigel Coates, Murano glass, crystal, porcelain, pottery and ceramics, on shelves, floors, tables, landings. But not an actual flower in sight.

“It is a bit bizarre, I suppose,” Tibbles grins, perching on her pink-lacquered dining room benches, made in France for her new Pimlico florist and interiors shop, Wild at Heart. “But I’m surrounded by them at work. And I’d want them to be perfect if I had them here, not just throw something into a vase.”

Instead of fresh blossoms, the youthful 50-year-old makes do with the floral designs all over her three-bedroom, two-bathroom home. When there aren’t pictures of her first love, dogs, on the walls, there are depictions of nature: a pair of romantic autumnal photographs by RCA graduate Danielle Mourning, a Jim Lambie black and white of Siouxsie Sioux covered in a multicoloured collage of blooms, a giant Marine Hugonnier photograph of palms on a beach, a moody Matthew Usmar Lauder monochrome still life of flowers in a vase. And in her dining room: sensual, rich, mushroom and dusky pink floral wallpaper with colours brought out by fuchsia velvet chairs with dahlia-orange throws.

This room, she says, was created to be inviting and cosy with shots of warm colour, because it’s the one room that has a fireplace. “In spaces with fires I think there’s nothing nicer than dark walls and velvety furniture,” she says, pointing out the dusky plum ceiling, the black-painted wooden floors, the scatterings of plum sheepskin rugs from Tanya Thompson at Made. “I’m about to redo this room, and I’m already dreaming of battered leather chairs and black and yellow walls. I love that Oriental look. With lots of books and no TV. My idea of heaven.”

As a child, her father accused her of being flighty, reducing her to tears. But he was right, she says now. “My concentration span is very limited, which is why flowers are perfect for me – you do them, they die, then you do them again. That’s how it is with my house; I find new things and change it. I like the creativity of it all. Arranging flowers and rearranging my house is how I express who I am.”

She clearly has an eye for colour and tone. The Sanderson Grey Squirrel paint on her living room walls, for instance, is given warmth by her use of old-fashioned, dusky rose-bestrewn fabric on the contemporary sofa. Cushions contain soft plums and greens, complementing the sisal-grey Day Birger et Mikkelsen rug, and art is carefully placed to bring out the colours in the room: the blues, greens, creams and blacks of photographs by her friend Martyn Thompson; a painting of a grey dog lent by a friend; an almost monochrome Jake and Dinos Chapman portrait of herself “with ginger hair and sticky-out ears”.

In an adjoining sitting room the vibrant Mediterranean colours are all artfully mismatched. Wild Missoni cushions clash with a wall-sized striped abstract in neons. Shelves of vases are arranged in groups of bright shades: greens, yellows, oranges, purples.

A brightly striped rug throws up light from dark floorboards. To keep it from becoming a jumble, the furnishings are clean and contemporary: an Eileen Gray-style metal screen by B&B Italia, a leaf-green leather and aluminium Seventies armchair, a glass tabletop balanced on a silver metal “sculpture”, each simple shape acting as an anchor in this sea of colour.

And there is plenty of colour in this house – whether it’s on key pieces such as the pink velvet chairs in the dining room, or the art, both old and new, that hangs throughout the house. Bright photographs sourced by her friend, the gallery owner Max Wigram, are hung beside old oil paintings bought for “a tenner or so” at Ardingly and Kempton Park fairs. Antique stuffed toy and sculpted dogs lie near vibrant contemporary drawings. With Wild at Heart Pimlico – Tibbles’s third London store – now open, punters will be able to buy similar items sourced from markets, brocantes and antique fairs, as well as pieces commissioned from current designers.

Once things calm down, Tibbles will have more time to devote to revamping two entire floors of the house, turning the basement office into a kitchen/diner and creating a library/snug on the ground floor. Given that some of the flower bills at the parties she provides for reach £350,000, she isn’t worried about expanding and renovating at the wrong time. “If it was a high street brand, I would panic more,” she says, shrugging. “But it’s a luxury brand. And keeping moving on is what I do. I’m creative.”

Time will tell what this creativity will bring to her house’s next incarnation, with its yellow and black Chinese-style sitting room. If anyone can pull off bumblebee shades, it will be Tibbles.

Nikki Tibbles’s house is one of 28 featured in New London Style by Chloe Grimshaw, published by Thames & Hudson, and available from BooksFirst priced £17.95 (RRP £19.95), free p&p, on 0870 1608080; timesonline.co.uk/booksfirst

Times recommends

• Second homes: credit crunch casualty or money-spinner?
• How I built my own sliding house
• Top 10 incentives for house buyers