design | dual personalities

If you are, like me, someone who falls asleep going down instagram rabbit holes (I know it is terrible and rotting both my brain and my eyes, but I can’t help it), you might have noticed the great disservice House Beautiful has done to those of us who prefer classic design like chinoiserie and brown furniture by giving us a clever name: Grand Millennial. [insert Liz Lemon eyeroll gif]

These days, it seems like everything has to be classified or given some cute nickname. Every neighborhood has to be called something–usually a dumb amalgamation of two neighborhoods or street names–and we all know that this is just so that the people who live there can feel special or superior to those in another neighborhood two streets over with another dumb nickname.

I mean, yes, I get my sense of style from my mother–and there is validity to the idea that decorating the way I do reminds me of home–but to whittle the centuries of design that go into decorating down into a name that combines grandmother and millennial completely misses the point. And House Beautiful should get that.

To begin, our grandmothers weren’t always grandmothers. And it’s not like chintz (which I don’t have in my home BTW) has always been for old ladies. Because old ladies aren’t old their entire lives (except maybe me)–they start out young ladies who like chintz because it’s the trend that year.

How much do you love this rug?

I prefer to think of my decorating style as TIMELESS (I think seeing that pic of me in the Friday post has made me extra dramatic). And the fact is, needlepoint is timeless, blue and white china is timeless, cloth napkins and china plates are timeless, brown furniture and oriental rugs are timeless.

Anyway, enough of my rant. To quote Jane Eyre, “I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will.” And I won’t be contained in a label made up by the twenty-something in the House Beautiful dotcom department who thinks she’s clever.

Too much? Never.

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January 17, 2018

“If you want to be neutral, move to Switzerland.”

by chuckofish

I have been following the Madcap Cottage gents for years it seems, long before they were even on Instagram.

I love their vibe. They like elephants and needlepoint and chinoiserie. They like to reupholster vintage furniture with good bones in jazzy fabric. They love a good estate sale or flea market find. They like collections.

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Last week I finally bought their book which was released last fall.

I like wiling away an hour or two looking at a decorating book full of lovely photographs of beautiful rooms, don’t you?

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This book is full of good advice as well as pretty pictures, advice from the gents and from their style icons: Sister Parrish, Dorothy Draper, David Hicks, etc.

Dip your toe into the world of pattern mixing and throw caution to the wind by setting your dining table with mismatched china. Not only is this an easy way to explore the power of pattern, it also will give your dining room a fresh look without a makeover.

Haven’t I been saying this for years?

Anyway, I think the gents would approve of my recent decorating choices, especially my dining room wallpaper:

and my newest estate sale renovation:

So take this as a reminder to do what pleases you when it comes to decorating your home. You live there. Outside of work, it is where you spend most of your time, right?

Right. Have fun feathering your nest. “Be brave, be bold, be gutsy!” The gents would approve.

4 Comments

August 29, 2017

Revolving art galleries

by chuckofish

Recently I bought a used copy of Novel Interiors by the blogger Lisa Borgnes Giramonti.

It is subtitled “Living in Enchanted Rooms Inspired by Literature,” so you can see that it is right up my alley. (My DP recommended it when it was published back in 2014!)

Anyway, one thing she wrote that caught my fancy right away was: “A kitchen windowsill is a revolving art gallery for favorite treasures.”

Amen to that. I mean, who doesn’t collect interesting things on the windowsill over the kitchen sink? Of course, not everyone has a window over the kitchen sink–the house I grew up in did not–but everyone has a windowsill/catch-all somewhere…

The welsh dresser in my Florida room also serves as a catch-all for favorite things.