Flashback Friday: Swatch Madness

Okay, I had to go off script again for this week's flashback.  Digging around in my picture files, I found these images from a couple of years ago, and I found them so hilarious, I just had to share.

For the record, these pictures were taken LONG before I had a blog that talks about decorating and such, so why, why, WHY did I need a photo of a bunch of swatches?  It's one thing to use photography as a tool when, say, finalizing layouts for a gallery wall--a photo can help you see things you don't necessarily see in person.  But swatches?  Swatches are so much about color and texture, and a photo (especially with a little point and shoot digital, especially taken by a crappy photographer such as moi) can not communicate these things.

Perhaps I was sending it off to get a second opinion from a far off collaborater (like my mom).  We were thinking about a new couch, and looking at coral upholstery to go on a piece in a room with that rug.  The chartreuse was a possibility for throw pillows or curtains.

We never did go with any of it, and instead, several years later, invested in a brown sofa instead.  I did end up doing chartreuse curtains with that rug, though, in this house, which is two houses later, and I love it.

Sometimes it takes a little time to process, right?

I would love to think that this is normal, though blogging about my decorating process seems to be exposing some of my, um, quirks.  Do tell: do you photograph your swatches?  Do you ruminate for years at a time?

Please say you do!

Fabric Madness

I have always thought I loved this fabric.

Parish, from Ballard.  I say "thought I loved" instead of just "loved" because really, who can tell from a thumbnail swatch online?


I recently ordered a couple of swatches from Ballard for the x-benches in the New Jersey living room, and since there's a 10-swatch allowance, I threw in one or two for myself.  They came the other day and guess what?

I.  LOVE.  IT.

Which may seem silly, because it is not glorious or dramatic.  It is not a statement fabric.  The scale is quiet.  But I love it.  (The brown is richer than it appears on my screen, the contrast to the black and white is crisper.)  Looking at it, I realize that in one thing at least, I am consistent.

Remember the guest room headboard fabric?

Oh, and then I got some of that in green, which will likely go in the girls room.

And then when I was digging around in the fabric bin, I found this cotton sateen from a million unfinished projects ago.

Are we sensing a theme here?  The Parish is more of a quatrefoil to the leaf/artichoke design of the others, but still.

Do you do this?  Are you drawn to the same things over and over without even realizing it?  Who knew I was so predictable?  Now the question is: does it go on the cocktail table turned ottoman that I'm working on for the living room?  Or just a couple of throw pillows for the loveseat? Truth be told, I was reading Ashley Hicks' book about his father yesterday, and it made me want to layer on the pattern even more than usual, and take this fabric to the ceiling for drapes.  Plus throw pillows.

Meanwhile.  While I was at Ballard, I saw some nice, small scale buffalo check in indigo on sale for $4/yard, and somehow I ordered up a yard to accompany my swatches on their journey.

Weird how that happens.  I love a good classic check, and kept buying my husband shirts from J Crew in this pattern last spring.  Makes me think of this amazing "Gustavian Fantasy" from Ines de la Fressange.

[Domino, natch]

And those awesomely expensive mattresses.

I figured this would work in the guest room on those lampshades that I wanted to cover in ticking, if only the most common fabric on earth was not eluding me so.  Like ticking, the check has a traditional, classic, and linear feeling that is a nice counterpoint to the block print headboard, the silk draperies, and the Turkish rug.

Loving these developments.  Better get the sewing machine tuned up!

What about you: what projects await?  Also, while I'm asking questions, would you like me to be slightly more focused in my posts?  You know, a little less process-y?  Fewer words, more pictures?  Let me know: I can take it.

Accidentally On-Trend

I saw this story on Apartment Therapy a few days ago.

Trying on a Trend: Green and Orange Rooms.

Guess what I've got going on in the living room? You guessed it: green and orange. (Okay, and red and blue and brown and white and black and gold. Did you ever watch that show Find Your Style on HGTV? I loved it--except I could never understand how anyone could build a room using only 4 elements.)

I wouldn't have chosen green and orange, but I had the rug, and I had the chair, and I ran ot of budget before I had it recovered, so I'm embracing the combo.

My new fabrics just arrived, and I'm excited to get to work finishing things up in there.



Well, not finishing-finishing, but, you know, completing the next step.

Textiles tie it all together

Happy Monday!

It's so fun coming back to design-blog-land at the beginning of the week to see what kinds of projects people got up to over the weekend. Looking forward to seeing what Danika came up with for her kitchen countertops--faux marble or no? As for me, I may have cracked the color code in my living room.

Usually, when starting in on a room, I need to start with the busiest, most colorful element, which for me is generally the rug or a textile, and pull my other colors, patterns, and textures from there. I'm sure lots of people work this way (and others probably have better methods, but it works for me.)

In our current house, the dining room's teal and chartreuse scheme built from this rug

The guest room's navy and raspberry scheme came from this rug


The girls' room is completely built around this fabric


And the master bedroom started with this duvet.


Oh, but what about the living room?

It has taken a while for the living room to click, especially when the new loveseat changed the vibe for me and I had to shake loose the old vision in my head to make way for something new. Over the weekend, I refined the color palette a little bit with some minor editing (and some new lamps!), and then realized that part of my problem was that I was working backwards from my normal methodology. I already had my furniture, my art, my rug, and while each thing related to at least one other thing in the room, I didn't have the one piece that tied it all together.

I needed my textile.

It needed to fit with the Moroccan tile pattern of the rug, the mid-century furniture, and the 70s art. Already a tall order, if you ask me! It also, I realized, needed to have green and raspberry and, ideally, blue, orange, and brown. Whoa. That's some funky jewel tone magic happening there, not my normal thing.

I figured ikat was my best bet. It's ethnic enough for the Moroccan-inspired rug (and a different pattern scale), timeless enough for the retro stuff, and colorful enough for the crazy combo of hues I've got going on in here. Many searches later, and I found this throw pillow, from an etsy seller I have actually bought from in the past.

And I could just go ahead and buy this pillow from her. But that might be too easy. Also, I figured that if I could track down the fabric, I could make a pair of pillows for the same cost, or less. Well. Guess what? My awesome sister-in-law Maud, of Union Place in Excelsior, found the fabric at Duralee. So my options open up.

How about going beyond pillow, like recovering a pair of lampshades??? I love this post about customizing lampshades, at Isabella and Max Rooms. What do you think? lampshades on these new green lamps,


Or the old brassy ones?


The green lamps need a little change up on the old silver bases, and the brass lamps could get sprayed something more in the black family. OR the throw pillow(s) on the brown couch. I'm taking votes. Democracy in action.

Just kidding. I guess it's a sensitive time to be flippant about democracy, what with the turmoil in Libya and the rest of the Middle East. But I do still want opinions.

What say you?

Quilted

I've been kind of into quilting lately, when it shows up in unexpected place, like these leather chairs from overstock, kind of like a Chanel handbag (only cheaper! ha.)


This quilted headboard is underscored by the simple quilted-silk coverlet (I almost bought a remnant of black quilted silk like this for the guestroom headboard, but ultimately decided it would be too dark.)

[decorpad]

A geometric quilted version of the ubiquitous garden stool

[decorpad]

And this insane vanity. (Okay, in this case there's a fine line between "tufted" and "quilted" but I'm just going with it.)



Last time I was at S.R. Harris, I asked for some samples of quilted silk. The Russian guy who always thinks I'm crazy gave me the teeniest sliver of this pink one, (it's $60 a yard, well minus 50%, but that is WAY high end for this place.) It's not really for any specific project, I just felt like I had to have it.


The woman who mans the registers was a bit more generous with her cutting of this green woven-look quilted silk, which I would like to put on the headboard in a guest room, if I can get the "client" on board with the project (Mom?)

The scans totally don't do them justice, but believe me, they are gorgeous.


And so, when the most recent House Beautiful came out featuring this crazy sunroom, where the designer Rob Southern had this salmon Brunschwig & Fils chinzt hand-quilted for all the upholstered pieces, I nearly died and went to heaven.




So old fashioned, yet somehow fresh, and, of course, pretty over the top.

Maybe I'll get myself some quilted chucks to satisfy the craving, for now!

Kantha

Is kantha the new ikat? Feels like it's popping up all over the place.

Elle Decor featured these pillows from Jayson Home and Garden in the last issue
And West Elm is offering a very similar version for much less money (though if you live in the Twin Cities, you're out of luck: they only have two left in the store and they won't get more until June. Plus, if you ordr online you have no control over the color or pattern that you get. Booooo.)


These came from TJ Maxx (but they're too pink and will be going back)


And this screen was on display at Home Goods yesterday.


"Kantha" actually refers to a type of embroidery popular in Indian, and while all of these pieces are embroidered, it seems that the most "authentic" take on kantha uses vintage saris that have been embroidered. If you want to be authentic, try these, from ebay.


What do you think: will this be a flash in the pan, or a global trend with staying power, like suzanis, ikat, and beni ourain rugs?

Speaking of Calico Corners

Just got this card advertising another 20% off sale.

I have to say, I love the fabrics they used here--kind of unexpected for them. While it's not a palette I'm normally drawn to, I'm into it. Especially those zebra ottomans, of course, and the large check in pale blue on the couch cushions.

Hey--is it helpful when I share sale info? Or is it annoying? I figure helpful, which is why i pass it along, but if it's annoying just say the word....

Sometimes it pays to pay

Those of you who know me well (and/or read my other blog) are probably not surprised that my posts are getting longer and longer. Have soapbox, will proclamate. (I know that's not a word and that the correct command form is just "proclaim," but proclamate feels closer to what I mean.) Rest assured, I think I will probably get back to sharing pretty pictures soon, but for now, I guess I've got things to say.I learned a valuable lesson while creating the headboard for the guest room. If you're not into all of this process stuff I insist on sharing for some reason, I'll just go ahead and tell you now: sometimes it pays to just spend a little extra to get what you really want.

If you recall, I was super stoked to find a professionally upholstered headboard on craigslist for less than the cost of materials to build a new one. I originally planned to cover it with some navy mattress ticking that I already had, but it read a bit too Swedish or Cape Cod, and definitely too casual once I put silk drapes in there. So I pulled a bunch of fabric samples. I eventually fell in love with this one, from Calico Corners,


but it was $21/yard and I had budgeted $7.50 (since I was originally planning on free).I happened to have some off-white upholstery weight fabric and a bottle of navy blue RIT dye lying around from unfinished (um, unstarted) projects from years ago, and the wheels started spinning. Then, the January issue of Lucky came (yes, I get Lucky, but only because some magazine that I used to get folded and they started sending me that instead. It was probably Domino, come to think of it, I probably had, like, a 5-year subscription.) Anyway, there was a whole fashion story about dyeing old clothes to make them new again.

Kismet, right?

And so I dyed my fabric. It has a sort of traditional damask pattern, and I though the dye would bring it out nicely. Actually, first I stressed about dyeing my fabric. The hubs was not interested in having a dyed-navy washing machine, and every single how-to video I could find on youtube and eHow featured people using the stove top method, but I do not have a pot large enough to hold three yards of 60" wide upholstery weight fabric. As is often the case, I searched for evidence that it was okay to do what I wanted to do, and when none was forthcoming, I did it anyway. Nervously.

It also took a while to decode the instructions on the bottle (and to cross reference them with the instructions I found for adapting them to a front-loader washer). I pre-soaked the fabric, put it in the machine, poured half the bottle of liquid dye into the detergent cup of the washer and immediately flushed with hot water. I set the machine for a 30 minute wash cycle (I had to read the owner's manual to figure out how to do this. No joke.) I lined the floor with a dark blanket to catch any possible drips. When the 30 minutes plus spin time were up, I tentatively pulled the fabric from the machine and rinsed in the sink until the water ran clear. I put it in the dryer and ran bleach through the washer cycle.

And.


Epic fail.

I had noticed in the youtube videos that all the dyed fabric came out looking kind of faded and dingy, but I figured that was because of the inferiority of the stove top method. When my fabric came out a kind of washed denim shade (faded and dingy), I wondered if perhaps RIT dye just doesn't work that well. But the Lucky magazine article! It worked for them! They even dyed leather! So maybe it was because I did not add salt to the wash. Or maybe it was because the dye was about a decade old. Or maybe I didn't shake it up well enough.

I'll tell you, I'm crazy determined if nothing else, and sent that fabric through a second cycle with the rest of the dye. But no difference. Washed denim. Maybe a look for someone, but not for me.

Meanwhile, I was carrying around this fabric swatch in my purse.


Like, all the time. Crazy, I know. Anyone who would listen, I'd make them tell me what they thought of it. But when the dye project failed, do you think I bought the 2 yards of this that I needed? No I did not. First I searched ebay for a similar hand-carved block to print a similar pattern myself (because my first round DIY on this went so well), but they were about $10 and by the time I bought fabric and ink and put the time in, well, I'd be making major trade-offs in the time/money/value spectrum I went on and on about yesterday.

Instead I made one last trip to the fabric outlet, where I happily found three different possibilities that I thought would work, all within budget. I carried them around the store. I laid the bolts out on the cutting table and stared at them. The Russian guy who works there and often looks at me like I'm crazy asked if I needed help, and when I said "no, I'm deciding," he just looked at me like I was crazy. I should mention that the fabric warehouse is far away from my house. My girls' school is about halfway there, so that helps, but it's still a trip. So I did that thing that I would always tell people never to do: I bought two yards of a fabric without bringing the swatch home first. I just needed to be done with this project. The craziest thing (I know, it's all crazy) is that I BROUGHT HOME SAMPLES OF THE OTHER FABRICS, even though the whole point was to be done, and to be done at a substantial savings, and buying two rounds of outlet fabric would be nearly the same price as simply buying the fabric that I really wanted.

The yardage I ended up buying looked Navy in the store, with gold, and bright blue embroidered stripes.


It felt a little Indian in a way that I liked. It had just enough sparkle and shine. Naturally, at home the fabric revealed itself to be black. And the stripes got lost. And it was all a little masculine hotel room tragic.


I considered one of the other samples,

and truth be told I'm still in love with the Ralph Lauren velvet teal and taupe toile, but it wouldn't have gone with the rug, and, um, the rug was the starting point for the room.

So I finally did it. I gave in and bought the fabric that I wanted. It was even on sale, for $17/yard.

And you know what? I love it. I'll show you how it turned out tomorrow. Clearly, it would have saved me both time and money if I had just gone ahead and bought it in the first place (except that it wasn't 20% off in the first place). But I wonder: would I have been so clear, so sure in my love for my choice, without all the drama?

Who can say?

Oliver's Nursery

I'm doing a nursery! So excited. Here's the before:

The space is under the eaves of a charming tudor, presenting some challenges/opportunities in all those angled walls. Originally, I was thinking we would do a map treatment on the big angled wall when you enter the room (to the left of the crib in the last photo above), kind of like this.

[via House Beautiful, 2006]

But coming into the space again, I was struck by the crib nook,

and now we're thinking about tenting it.

[Tobi Fairley]

[via Material Girls Blog]

[via The Captive Reader]

So cute, right?
Maybe awning stripes?

[fabric from Ikea]

We are keeping the green paint and roman blinds, and originally thought about bringing in navy as an accent, though Oliver's mom is thinking it might be too dark, and found this inspiration room, from the HGTV 2010 green home, to offer an alternative palette.



Well, you know I never say no to orange.

I'm thinking about vintage school posters for art

[available at Hunt and Gather]

Or maybe some typography

[Ikea]

Some great storage, a sweet spot to sit, a lamp or two. The creative juices are flowing. Stay tuned!