bellaflora, I could have written your e-mail. LOL I'm the same way, loving so many styles and have difficulty staying focused. This could be why I have three, maybe four different styles going on in different rooms of my new house. I am a traditional/shabby chic/French, kind of girl at heart, but other style have a pull on me also.

Maybe you should decorate the various rooms in your house in the different specific styles you like.

This is what I'm doing so far in my new house. The office is going modern-traditional, the master bedroom is going glam-?, the master bath glam/country/traditonal/the guest bath all the way antique old style, guest bedroom shabby/antique. The great room/dining room will be a mix of antique traditional with a touch of country. Oh and the kitchen is modern-traditional.

See, I have quite a mix of styles going on, but if I keep them in the right proportions with accessories I should be alright.

I'm not a decorator and go with what my eyes tell me looks good. Hopefully it will look good to other also. LOL

Hope this made sense and is of some help. Have you seen photo's of my house? If you need to see them I'll be glad to post them again. It's still in the works.

Me too! I love cottagey, french country, thrift and CL stuff. Comfy cozy look. But I also have my DDs paintings hanging and they are decidedly more modern than that.
I am trying to tie it all together with fabric and patterns although I am not sure I have anywhere near succeeded. I am bound by college tuition and now bad economy bugetary restraints so I am all about thrift shops and CL.
I decided that if I love it, then it doesnt matter. I just keep moving things around til they fit.
The great thing about "eclectic" and CL and thrift finds- the furnishings evolve over time, and reflect our personalities, not a vendors.
I am not married to anything except our family antiques and accessories, oriental rugs, and DDs paintings. everything else is on borrowed time and can evolve with my taste. LOL!

You've just described me perfectly.

I can't seem to help myself. When I see something I think is beautiful...that's what I want. It would be so much easier to just go into a store and buy everything at once, but, depending on the place, I usually don't like the look of a room that is perfectly coordinated. It just seems like something is missing. Maybe the soul of a room?

It certainly provides a challenge, however. Each space is then continually evolving and, in my case, with no apparent end in sight. :)

Buying what you like and decorating in a way that suits you and your family is what makes your home uniquely yours as opposed to a sale look in a store window or magazine. Yours is yours. Be thankful that you care to have those wonderful wants and desires. It is what makes us individuals. Let's quit caring what the masses want and care about our own little niche and our own little abode. Its our own little sojourn, our own little space we carved out.

This is me to the *T* also :) The inside of my home is very eclectic, full of things that just jumped out at me and I had to have.

>>

I'm the same way CB. Stuff will get moved around several times before it finds the right 'home'. I live with it in one spot for a while and if it doesn't 'click' it gets moved some where else. Rinse, later and repeat until it finds the perfect nitch. It's not a fast way to decorate at all, but on the up side .. all of my 'stuff' makes me happy and I feel like it all reflects my personality.

Thank You for starting this thread! At times I think I'm the only one here with no distinct style or a mix of styles, & although I know that's me, & it's just fine, it often feels like I'm bucking the flow here.

& yes, it does make it harder to decorate, because you don't have any "rules" to follow & guide you (thank heavens, really! I feel like I have more than enough "rules" to follow in my life lol!)

My favorite rooms to look at here are always the ones with an eclectic mix of styles, or a very distinctive & unique style. Frankly, I find the places that are "perfectly" done so often look exactly like 17 other perfectly done places, & while it may be beautiful in its own way, I know I wouldn't be comfortable living there.

I also know that if/when I ever sell my house, I'll need to do a whole lot of painting & editing & staging in order to appeal to the masses lol!

I am the same way! Then I end up getting rid of what I feel doesn't fit and wonder why I bought it in the fist place! LOL

We're all attracted to what we really like, and sometimes(but not always)get lucky and love the finished room or rooms. It's so easy to stray from a certain style, but *know* where you will be using something before purchasing, and try to get a visual~that seems to work for me. I very seldom buy anything, including accessories, unless I know where it will be going, but it's taken me years to get to this point!

I'm a traditionalist, but with a 'yearning' for country French, and like moonkat, don't like or want, perfect. Comfy/cozy is a style of it's own~it doesn't get much better than that! ;o)

I am thinking this is a perfect Magnaverde thread...calling Magnaverde...come in Magnaverde...

I like contemporary and I also like a cottage/shabby chic look. I do try to keep from combining them in the same room, but to tell you the truth I don't think anyone I know would actually notice.

I'm a big fan of rusty metal, chunky wood and pretty much anything that's distressed. My house is also eclectic, but I try not to buy anything unless I have a plan for it, unless I really, really love it and then I figure that I'll find a place for it. This used to result in some now-why'd-I-do-that moments but I've gotten more selective over the years(and I have three covered porches which helps with any overflow!).

I think the only way I've had any success mixing styles is by acquiring things that merely suggest a certain style, rather than screaming a certain style. I have a chair that's vaguely French...except the fabric on the cushions really isn't. Then, we have a club chair that's well...clubby, but not overly so. No nailheads. Not too big and bulky. Fairly smooth, refined leather, not distressed. So, it seems to play nicely with other things. Same with a table that's somewhat Asian without being a caricature of itself.

I am also drawn to theme-y decorating when I see it elsewhere, but I know that getting sucked into one thing or another would limit my options and orphan most of what I already own. I had a thought that I would go more contemporary in this house but I realized that I'd basically have to start over. No matter how I try, I still keep coming back to my second-hand lovelies and hand-me-downs and all the stuff that looks good with them!

I read somewhere a few years ago that if you love a thing, you will always find a place for it. Within reason, I think that is true. The key is being able to move the lesser objects through the pipeline -- sell them or donate them.

When I moved to FL, I met a woman who proudly showed me her home, all decorated by a supposedly fancy furniture store. She was delightd to tell me she had sold all her northern furniture before coming down. Indeed, her home looked just like the store. No creativity whatsoever. No soul. Tragic, IMO.

wow - you make me feel so much better :-) Here I thought I'm only the schizophrenic one, especially after seeing how polished the rooms are on here.

Right now, the hardest thing for me is to make every thing fit. I tried to make every room a different style (DD's room - shabby chic/Francophile/cottage, DS1: modern rustic/CA surfer chic, our bedroom: 1930 inspire modern) but in the main floor, we have open floor plan so it's a bit difficult.

DH says the cure is (1) stop going to thrift store (2) stop going on CL (3) stop going on GW & design blogs :-D

Amy, I couldn't have said it any better! A home needs soul before it can truly *become* a home. ;o)

I say if you can't go to the thrift store, GW or CL, then whats the point in livin'? LOL

cooper: you are so right! that's one poison pill I do not want to swallow. :-)

Ah cooper, bella, I love being among those who understand my passion LOL

Yes, the answer is already there in several posts above. Don't worry about themes or naming various styles. Some of the best rooms of the 2Oth century were those done for the National Trust in England by the great decorator John Fowler during the Depression, during WW2 & in the 195Os, when postwar rationing was still in effect in Britain. Today we call Fowler's loose, informal look--a comfy mixture of valuable antiques & museum-quality artworks with second-hand curtains (in some cases, old army blankets dyed red & disguised with antique fringe from a set of sun-rotted silk curtains) & threadbare orientals rugs over sisal--the "English Country House Style" but here's the thing: if you had asked his clients what style their houses were, that's not at all what they would have told you. 'Traditional', sure, but giving Fowler's apparently offhand look a catchy name would have seemed unneccessary to them. And I can pretty much guarantee you that no one who grew up in a villa in Tuscany would have ever gone shopping for a ceramic rooster or an assembly-line painting of some rusty scrollwork to hang, nor would he have had a clue if someone asked him what style his place was. Nor would Miss Marple have cared for it one bit if a visitor to her charming cottage ever said "Ooh, I just love Shabby Chic!"

Labels may be convenient, but they're also limiting. I mean, I like the spare, gray Gustavian interions of the late 18th century as much as anyone, but I liked them a long time before most non-professional decorators ever had a clue who Gustav was (not that they do now) and even so, and as much as I like those rooms, I would never design a true Gustavian-style room--not to live in anyway--because, frankly, they're not very comfortable. Neither are the rooms in another of my favorite historical styles: Empire. The gorgeous ensembles of the Music Room at Malmaison & its American counterpart, the Red Room at the White House are stunning in their beauty & the artistry of their appointments, but they're museum installations, not rooms you can sit in & be comfortable--even if they let you, which, of course, they don't. Too, I love icy all-white glamour of the sets of old Fred Astaire movies, but those sleek, slick interiors were never made to be lived in. No, just because a particular style looks beautiful in a movie or on the glossy pages of a magazine or--worse--a catalog doesn't mean that it's suitable for you--or for any of us. That's why I've never designed a true period-style room for anyone. I could, but what would be the point? And just because somebody paints a room gray & hangs some gauzy curtaisn & arranges some white dishes on the wall doesn't qualify said room as "Gustavian", either, regardless of what the DIY magazines tell you, any more, say, than slathering some orange-tinted joint compound all over the walls makes a room "Tuscan".

The fact that I don't create period-style rooms at home doesn't, of coure, mean that I don't use antique furniture, because I use a lot of it. At home, in fact, I don't own anything new, and I mean anything. Everything I own used to belong to other people, and some things belonged to a lot of other people. My dining room table is from the 193Os, my bed is from the 183Os; the urn on a pedestal in my dining room is--I am told: I'm an expert on furniture but not on this stuff--a Roman piece dating from the Second Century. If it is, it's priceless. The massive stone urn in my living room, on the other hand, is worthless: it's a cracked plastic streetlight globe that I picked up in a gutter in Peoria & painted it to look like aged limestone. My slipcovered down-filled sofa is a 198Os Baker version of a Chippendale design from the 175Os. The bookcase in my living room is nothing more than a set of metal industrial shelves with a Victorian door frame screwed to it. My dining room chandelier is made out of plastic shower rings & a plastic dish from the deli at the grocery. My summer curtains are my great-grandmother's linen bedsheets. My winter curtains were a gift from my former cleaning woman who was given them by one of her big-money clients to use as a bed for her new puppy. After I saw them wadded up in her back seat & begged her for them, she gave them to me. What's my style? Do I even have a style? And if so, what would you call it?

Actually, it doesn't matter, because here's the thing: whatever catchy name somebody might hang on it isn't going to be anything you could ever Google & then go out & buy, or, if because of clever marketing & product placement somebody ever did market the Magnaverde Collection, no single item--no Magnaverde equivalent of those roosters in every allegedly "Tuscan" decor, or of that big rusty tin star over every mantel a few years ago, or those birds-&-branches chandeliers would, in itself, be enough to mark a room as a Magnaverde Style room. In fact, the idea that the presence of any single such easily identifiable item--say my streetlight/urn--would mark said room not as a Magnaverde style room, but as exactly the kind of room I wouldn't like, because it would be too thought-out, too arbitrary, too much going after an effect, as though purchasing that one out-of-contect item would somehow turn an otherwise dingy abode into a Magnaverde marvel; whereas a room that had not a single thing that I also have in my room might very well fall into the same stylistic species as my room. In other words, style results not from the things--valuable or junk--that are in a room but from the way those things are arranged, and how they relate to one another. That's why the Donald's penthouse in New York, despite its spectacular viwew & its presunably valuable contents, looks so trashy. He might as well have collected Beanie Babies.

Anyway, some people have called my place "Timeless". In fact, that's the word that Axel Vervoordt used in the title of his book: "Timeless Interiors." And maybe that word does apply to my rooms. Then again, maybe not. Either way, it doesn't matter, and that's not what I was after. All I wanted was a comfortable, informal room, one where I could put my feet up on the sofa, and if somebody came in with wet shoes--which is hard not to do on a night like tonight--I wouldn't have to freak out about my precious carpet. I bought no artwork just to fill up space & I never went out looking for lamps, because the lamps found me, at estate sales, at yard sales, at Goodwill. And because I already have a slew of mismatched woods in the room--oak, mahogany, walnut, bird's-eye maple, painted, gilded--and because there are a dozen colors & fabrics--red-green-&-purple 194Os cretonne on the dog-bed curtains, 196Os silk velvet on the Barley-twist chairs, moss green mohair on the barrel chair, copper-&-gray striped satin on a lounge chair, raspberry red paint-imitating-leather on the sofa, oyster leather on the Chippendale chair, charcoal-&-plum corduroy on one stool, moth-eaten brown needlepoint on another, a bunch of pillows in odd silks & velvets & chintzes--all of that means that everything, every wood, every fabric, every color is alway welcome to join the mix at any time.

One piece of heavy Mission furniture in dark fumed oak can sink a Shabby Chic room like a stone; a lipstick red bombe' chest does the same thing to a room full of wire-&-plastic MCM pieces. But because it avoids any narrowly defined self-imposed stylistic labels, my living room could take either of those things without setting off the alarms. It could--if I had one--even take a TV, and although I doubt I'd ever get one of those humongous screens, it could accept a table-mounted flatscreen without a qualm. I'd put it right where all those mercury glass globes are right now, right out there in the open. None of that hiding it away in an armoire. As Thoreau said "If you would be wished to be thought not to do a thing, don't do it." In other words, have a TV or not--it's your choice. But don't hide it.

Anyway, a club can be exclusive or inclusive. A room can be friendly & welcoming to everybody & everything or it can be coordinated-to-death, so perfectly arranged that it refuses to accept--or even acknowledge--what it deems a 'clashing' style or a color that's not on the approved guest list. Who needs that nonsense? Here's my advice: unless you live in a perfectly preserved historic house, or get hired to do an authentic Directoire salon or an Art Deco nursery, forget about labels--especially those labels created by mass marketers who conveniently enough, happen to sell watered-down mass-market versions of legitimate items in that style--& stop worrying about what goes with what. If you choose from your heart, and not from the same popular catalogs that everybody else does, you can't go wrong. And once you give up on following popular trends, life gets a whole lot easier. Not to mention cheaper. Best of all, when your friends come over--or when new friends come for the first time--they won't find it quite so easy to instantly pigeonhole you & your style, or to slap somebody else's cliche'd marketing term on it.

Regards,
Magnaverde.

Magnaverde Rule No. 3O If nothing is in style, nothing can go out of style.

Thank you Magnaverde for a delightful read. And, in spite of your advice to not give a label, I'm happy to say that I now have a label for my style: it's informal ;-D

That's my label & I'm sticking to it.

And where are the Magnaverde home pics? They must be posted here somewhere, yes? I would love to see them!

moonkat, they're in the only issue of O magazine I've ever bought :)

Ah! Then my house is done up in "style Rule No.30." Works for me!

I think eclectic is one of the hardest styles to pull off (ie my library) but one of the best. I personally am often turned off by rooms that are very specific in a certain style. I find them so much more interesting to look at if they throw in a piece of unexpected whatever to shake up the staidness of a one style room.

But maybe I just say that to cover for myself :oP

flyleft thanks! A quick google brought up some pics, & I'm curious enough to see if I can find that copy of O.

A vintage door-framed bookcase! LOVED it! Lots of inspiration there :)

If you commit only to a certain style you may find yourself changing your mind a lot over time. Changing styles completely may end up costing you a lot of money. So developing a personal style that gently mixes various pieces that you love over time helps you keep the items you love from the past while adding new items that you love now.
Love your posts Magnaverde! I am originally from the Chicago area too.

Magnaverde....you are so eloquent! What a joy reading your post.
I am happy to admit that I, too, follow your Rule #30. Everything in my home is completely mismatched, but to me, it makes me so happy to see it, that I often wonder why I get "jealous" of people who can go out and furnish an entire room in one weekend!
I guess my problem is that even though I love all my things, sometimes it does feel disjointed somehow. Overall, though, I am very comfortable in my home.
Thanks for a great read!

Thanks for that beautiful & thoughtful post, Magnaverde.
Somehow some day I'll get there but in the interim, while I'm waiting for those perfect pieces to enter my life, my house is a mess. :-)

When a designer said, buy what you love, and it works for them, it seems to me because they somehow have a very specific idea of what they love. There is a common thread a/b the things they like. Everytime I sees a piece that I totally see as potential, my brother would tell me - "not in your house", or "very 80-ish, not for your house". Sometimes I would regret for not listening to my instinct and sometimes I regret that I do listen. :-D

Some people have very distinct & strong sense of their style. Everything my brother picked may have different pedigree or origin, but somehow all the pieces will fit in the big puzzle that is his house. Not me. :-)

Maybe style is irrelevant, what makes a room beautiful is good design. And good design is about scale, composition, relationship between all the elements in the room. I supposed that's why it's so hard to create an eclectic room that works.

"buy what you love" only works, if you already got great style. :-D

I think my favorite styles blend well which are American farmhouse, rustic Texas, Spanish & Transitional.

However, DH loves weird, original art. His favorite artist happens to be a good friend who's favorite subject is scary clowns. That's right, we have lots of scary clowns on our walls. We also have lots of signed prints from DH's favorite rock concert poster artist. I frame them in beautiful, sometimes ornate frames to try to blend them with my decor. I think our art would look exceptional in a modern home but that style is the antithesis of my style.

He gets so much enjoyment from our art, I can't refuse him but I do want to add some more traditional art (I love abstract and impressionistic art) to our home. So I try to think of it as eclectic which, I guess, is the default term for, "I know it doesn't match but this what I have."

Oh man, kelly, do I have a Goodwill scary clown for your DH...I bought it because it made me laugh but I can't bear to put it up! It's still in the pile with my weird paint-by-number John Wilkes Booth still life...

and bellaflora, your point is well taken, IMO. I do think that the next time you see something you like that your brother says NO to, you should get it anyway. What's the worst that could happen? You don't like it, you return it or craigslist it or donate it. But either way, you'll learn *a lot* by bringing a piece you like in the store into your home context.

fly: DH told my kids not to get attached to things because "mom will send it back to CL the minute you love it" LOL :-D

I guess the learning process, the mistake, the agony is what make it fun. If I roll out of bed, snap my finger (or twitch my nose) and a perfect room is created then where's the fun?

There is pleasure in the pain LOL ;-D

kelly: anything but clown. I have this mortal fear of dolls & clowns. When we got married DH had this beautiful collection of porcelain dolls that he collected over the years (who knew!) which I had to give away because they give me nightmares :-)

Found this.

Here is a link that might be useful: magnaverde