Let's take it outside...

This time of year just begs for us to go outside.

For me that means just another excuse to decorate!

Before the daffodils have finished blooming my head is

reeling with ideas and dreams of what I would like to see in my garden.

Not surprisingly, most of my thoughts turn to nooks; places to sit, read, sleep or eat. I covet outside rooms where I can be with friends or just sit and watch the day go by.

My grandparents lived in a row house when I grew up. The garden behind the house was a perfect rectangle, about 20 feet wide by about 40 feet long. Little concrete paths leading to compact, tidy shapes that were filled with vegetables and flowers. A compost pile and a greenhouse were neatly placed at the very back, next to a wooden gate that led to the neighbor’s garden.

My grandad would be considered a Master Gardener by todays standards; it came easily to him, and he knew instinctively how to combine the art of design with the necessity of function. I loved that garden. To me, it was crammed full of adventure, constantly changing and filled with places to explore.

In the middle was the perfect patch of mown grass, often scattered with daisies and the occasional toadstool (just enough to keep the fairies occupied). But, the most special part of all was the secret garden.When you walked out the back door, to the left you were met with a rose-covered wooden structure. Another turn led you to an opening. Inside the opening was a room completely filled with roses. I can still see the room in my head.

There was a bench inside, and I would sit and try to break off the thorns on the roses without hurting myself; when successful I would drop them on the ground, forgetting that later on one of us would probably step or kneel on them. When Summer was at its fullest the room was like a beautiful cave that transported you to another world. You were hidden from view, surrounded by the almost overwhelming scent of tangled roses. Winter made it harsh and cold looking, still beckoning, but not quite as friendly to small children.

All it takes to create an outdoor room is an idea. It doesn’t have to be literal, it just has to have a feeling. Think of what you would like it to be, then dream about how you will get it there.

(of course, if dreams don’t do the work for you, feel free to use plants, furniture or structural pieces)

Possibilities...

I have papers pinned to a corner of my office wall. It started off in an organized way, but has slowly grown into a happy mix of things that I just like to look at. My first thought was that I wanted a vision board, but that made me feel too controlled by what "should" be there. Then, I thought of a design inspiration board - again, too restricting. So, I started a "possibilities" board. The word, to me, conjures up ideas of infinite dreams and thoughts. No limitations.

Everyone should have a space to display wonderful, papery things. All it takes is a tiny bit of wall space. Don't stop to analyze their significance; choose anything that you like and encourage the randomness of it all.

Here are a few of the things that I have posted.

- A funny childrens book by John Lithgow called "I am a Manatee" .

- Old picture, torn from a magazine, of men diving into a swimming pool, the Eiffel Tower casually iconic in the background.

- Email from a dear friend telling me how much I had brightened her day.

- Newspaper article about Roger Ebert; discussing his illness and how he tries to live each day with dignity and as much joy as he can.

- Photograph of the delightfully crooked Serendipity Cottage (the Inn that was featured in Nights in Rodanthe) as it begins to collapse into the sea. Just looking at it's fragile beauty transports me to a fairytale state of mind.

- Handwritten note from my favorite designer in the entire world, Alexandra Stoddard.

- Nighttime photograph of an old house in a field. A scene from the movie "Casablanca" is projected onto the side of it (now, that is a date I want to go on).

- A swatch of the most perfect mustard yellow that I have ever seen.

Embrace the Elephant

I have a vintage necklace with a metal Elephant on the bottom of it. As it’s quite bold I can only wear it with certain outfits. I like Elephants, but I don’t have an unusual affection for them. It was my mother-in-law’s, Anita, she passed away many years ago. After she had gone, her husband gave me some of her more unusual pieces of jewelry; he recognized that side of me before I did. At the time I was a little unsure about being known for originality, it bothered me a bit. I preferred to blend in.

Now, I like originality; nothing makes me happier than to go into someones home, to see a collection of personal treasures that are filled with meaning for the person that lives there.

I have a friend who loves Elephants. What started off as a pair of Elephant earrings, turned into an obsession that knows no bounds. She will buy anything that has an Elephant on it, or is even remotely in the shape of an Elephant. Elephants make her happy.

When you first go into her home it is a little startling to see the old-fashioned etagere’s filled with hundreds and hundreds of these creatures. They are made of every substance imaginable; some of them exquisite and colorful, others clumsy and dark.

Initial thought is that she may be a little mad. But, she’s not. It is a collection of her beloved things, and she is not embarrassed to show them off. This is one of the things I love about her; she embraces her Elephants, and her own uniqueness. She displays them with no apologies, amassed together, in a room that is used every day.

When we display what we love, people react. It is a feeling; regardless of whether or not we love what we are looking at, we are swept up into what is important. It is a privilege to peek inside someones personal belongings, and a joy to imagine what they see.

Make mistakes, they're good for you!

Remember the stairs that I painted a few weeks ago? Well, I finally finished them. But, in my haste I forgot to plan the rest of the space; the space that also had a blue and red hutch, directly beneath the newly painted red stairs. When I was done I was left staring at two painted pieces that were very similar - a bold red and blue. It just looked like I had spent an afternoon with a lot of extra time and paint on my hands. Together their extreme "paintedness" overpowered the room. At that point I could either go in the decorating direction of a cartoon, or try to scatter the color throughout the room, incorporating the other, more subdued pieces that I had.

So, here's what happened. I had a glass fronted hutch and a green, distressed buffet. All in different corners of the living/dining room. I moved the green one out and replaced it with the glass one. Moved the blue one where the glass one had been and the green where the blue one was. The green one was too small, so I bulked it up with vintage hats and accessories until it looked like I lived in a millinery store. Lived with it for a few days and decided the scale and content was wrong, I hated it.

The next morning, newly inspired, I moved the blue hutch back to it's original home. Pushed the green dresser into the place where the blue one had been (formerly home of the glass hutch). The blue was still too jarring, but the scale was right. I painted the blue hutch cream!

After painting it cream it became more of a country piece than an art piece, which led to another reassessment of the room. The balance was off again, and I needed to balance the negative spaces with the vintage and colorful.

Less than an hour later and I was done. The room looks refreshed, and there is a good symmetry that flows around the space. I didn't buy anything new but I did bring another chair down from upstairs, to give me more seating.

Like a lot of my decorating, I didn't intend to write about this, and I didn't plan on redecorating my home, but sometimes it happens. Painting the steps seemed like a very small, innocuous thing to do, but the depth of color became an additional strong element in the room that threw off the entire space. When I realized what it had done (admittedly unimportant in the larger scheme of life) I thought at first that I had made a horrible mistake, and I would have to repaint them. Then, as I lived with it, and went through the process of redoing the room, I knew that it was the right thing to do; a learning process to help me make the space more of what I wanted it to be.

The Art of a Bookcase

I love old books. The thing that makes me coddle and sigh over a vintage handbag, is the same feeling I get when I look at an old book. Especially children's books, with handwritten notes inside, pages so worn you're almost afraid to turn them. I hastily try to find the dates they were written, but many of my books don't have them. They are from a time when it was simply enough to say "The End".

This week I decided to redo the bookshelves in my living room. They had been the same way for too long, and the display had become like milk, important but bland. A hodge podge of crafts, paintings, books and collectibles; none of them valuable, all of them precious.

I took everything off (the shelves :-) and thought about it for a while. What did I want to see on there instead? What feeling did I want to evoke? I wandered my house looking for things that I had not noticed in a while, things that maybe needed some attention. I didn't know what I was looking for.

I began to find the children's books, scattered in piles, in different rooms. I hadn't taken the time to look at them lately; they were all so beautiful and different that they had to be appreciated, if only by me. I had forgotten how many I had collected. All my favorites, comfortably loved.

They became the inspiration for my shelf decorating. I collected the books, then began to look through what I had taken off the bookshelves. My intention was to edit out some things, but I quickly realized that my optimism was not a reality. Within an hour I had covered the dining table and the sofa with my "stuff". Instead of minimizing my collections, I seemed to have added to them. This wasn't what I had planned, but I was determined to try and fit everything back on the shelves.

I began with the books, as they were the largest group of items. I loosely divided them into categories - old and worn, poetry and fairies (yes, I know, but I'm being really honest), decorating and design, inspirational and modern. The old books I stood in a row, at eye level, because they were my favorite things at the moment. I didn't line them up according to height; I wanted them to look a bit disheveled, collected over time, with no apparent thought as to how they looked on a shelf. The other books I either stood up or laid down on their side, depending on the size of the book and what their topic was.

After that I took the paintings and placed them so that their scale coordinated with the books (eg. large pile of books, small piece of art work). Once I had the large items in place, it was time to play with the accessories. Small objects can be placed anywhere, but once you start to really look at what you have, you will see that themes have already begun, and it becomes easier to play with what you have. A small tree in front of a painting of a tree, a bird on top of a fairy book or a handcrafted, aged piece of clay nestled against a worn copy of Treasure Island.

An easy way to create interest is to place things at different depths and levels. Lining things up in a row creates a sort of visual indifference, but if our eyes have to dance around to look at things our brain is tricked into thinking it is looking at something more interesting. Try to think of it as an Art composition, rather than just sticking things on a shelf.
If you can't find an apparent theme, emphasise the opposites. Fine bone chine next to an old flower pot, or a birds nest next to (or inside) a sleek, modern bowl. One of my favorite pieces is a crystal Tiffany bowl filled with real cotton buds that have just popped open from their casing. The soft, naturalness of the cotton inside the gorgeously, brilliant crystal takes the formality away, encouraging people to touch it.
If you do have a collection, and you don't want to play with opposites, group them together, deliberately,with no apology, in uneven numbers. Or, for more interest, add an unexpected element. For example, twigs, feathers or rocks lying next to a Lenox collection. Grab something from outside if you need to. Fill a plain glass bowl with dirt as a whimsical counterpoint to the fine china.

When you look at my photograph, you may not like anything on the shelf, and you may think it cluttered, but that's my point. Regardless of how you feel about the items, they are displayed with deliberation. My goal was to display my treasures in the most decorative way possible.

I want you to see that it does not matter what we have, it can all be appreciated and cared for. It is not a matter of style or taste. With a bit of thought a bookshelf can be an interesting (and changeable) part of our home. It can reflect who we are in a provocative way that makes people want to take a closer look.

The End