From Anglophilia (not Abby Krug)

Okay, here it is! I've edited and re-edited it as it was the length of a book! Believe it or not, this is the SHORT version!!!

For me, it all starts with a fabric. Usually, the fabric is a print, usually chintz, sometimes linen. It’s a fabric that sings to me - that appeals to my very soul. Once I’ve found “that fabric”, then it is really very easy to go from there. Prints have small squares of color on the selvage - these show how many color screens were used. The more squares, the more versatile the fabric. These will be the colors you use in your room, be it on walls or other furniture.

I have a friend who is a designer on Martha’s Vineyard, Her clients are decorating 2nd homes which are used primarily in the summer. She says she usually starts with a really great, exceptional rug - she buys a lot of rugs from Stark. She then uses solids and neutrals that are impervious to children and grandchildren crawling all over them. I have clients who have invested in a huge, room-size oriental rug they want to use the rest of their lives.

I have only once in my life started with wallcolor - I did this in my guest room as it’s quite small and I simply could not spend a fortune on fabric for it. I chose Farrow & Ball’s “Pelt” and then found two different patterns of yellow/white silk plaid taffeta for the dust ruffles and blinds and headboard slipcovers, and used white matelasse spreads. I made a skirt for the dressing table from a chintz print I had always wanted to use but never had quite the place. It works!

I have never started a LR with no furniture at all and my present LR is no exception. All the upholstered furniture was inherited over a period of 50 years. It’s been re-styled, re-upholstered, slipcovered. Old furniture (at least 50-60 yrs old) was far better made than nearly all of what is available today, at any cost. I NEVER get rid of an old piece of upholstered furniture! There will be a place for it someday, somewhere! Look for furniture that is very heavy to lift - that means it has a good solid frame. Look for furniture, that if tight backed, has spring units in the back. If it has horsehair stuffing, do NOT get rid of that - they can sterilize it (a quick soak in Clorex and water) and use it with cotton batting, not fiberfill - holds its shape and doesn’t deteriorate.

Over the years, I changed the LR walls from dragged in a Persian melon color, to the present now-discontinued Nina Campbell wonderful yellow/white striped paper. The Persian melon was too bold a color for the East light in KY. The sofa is still the same, but re-styled and re-covered about 11 years ago. The chairs (my late mother’s) were slipcovered. I previously had different chairs in here - they now are being used in other rooms. The rug was also hers - never thought it would work, but it does!

I’ve had two sets of curtains and a matching slipcover for the chair, in the 32+ years I’ve lived here. Everything new has always worked with the old. Much of the art is inherited, but that over the sofa I bought - large one is a portrait we had painted of my daughter when she was 11 - it was done in LA. The antique dog paintings were bought in London and Springfield MO. The Pembroke table is an early 19th century English piece I bought 11 yrs ago, to replace one that was my parents, bought in 1940. The nest of Chinese tables was bought by my late uncle when he was stationed in the Panama Canal Zone right after WWI - guess they’re now about 100 yrs old so are “officially” antiques. The tiered table was a flea market find - amazing what mineral spirits does for old mahogany. Porcelains have been acquired over the years. Fortuny pillows? Middle one is made from fabric and matching border I bought on ebay for a song. The other ones were made from scrapes that I bought from a client - could never have afforded them any other way. Antique tray coffee table was bought in LA.

I’ve discovered that if one learns what colors one is attracted to, one can often use things in various rooms over time. Pretty things in pretty colors - one can hardly go wrong.

I believe in “investment” decorating. If one invests in expensive material for curtains or an expensive room-size oriental rug, one is committing to decorating around these for decades to come. But different looks can be achieved by slipcovers on other furniture and by changing wall color. Always look at the best, whether or not it is affordable for you at that time. That’s how one trains ones eye. A trained eye will spot that “diamond in the rough” in a junk store or at a flea market. A piece of fine porcelain or a print will give one the colors for everything else. I love touches of aqua/turquoise in fabric and porcelain. Just this week, I’ve had bead board installed on the ceiling of my sunporch which is right off my LR. I’ve painted the ceiling “Haint Blue” - look it up - it has an interesting story - and it reflects the touches of that color in my rug and my porcelain - even a tiny leaf in the fabric of my dining room curtains.

Clip, clip, clip from PInterest and from shelter magazines! Over time, you WILL identify what always appeals to you and you’ll then know what to do, or if using a designer, it will be invaluable to let them know what you love.

A room done all at once is souless; a room that evolves over decades (in the UK in stately homes, over centuries!) is the story of your life.

Good design is not about fashion, it’s about making ones home a refuge from the world. Lord knows, we need that these days! It’s not about copying an HGTV room - so sterile and empty. I can’t remember if it was Bunny Williams or Charlotte Moss who once said “I just design pretty rooms”. That is what I want - a “pretty room” that is comforting and enriches my soul.

Read anything Bunny Williams writes about decorating. The woman knows how to make a wonderful home and her eye is unfailing. Any good designer will tell you to TAKE YOUR TIME! Don’t rush out and buy a room full of furniture all at once. One must live in a home to know what one needs and what will work. And then it takes time to find and buy the right piece.

I’ve learned that if one sees a picture or a piece of porcelain or a scrape of fabric that sings to one, buy it - the right place for it will appear!

Most of all, train the eye!!!! Do this by looking at the very best whether or not you think you’ll ever be able to afford it in 100 years.

One of the best things I ever did for my LR, was to put in larger windows. Before, I had 8 over 8 with a standard window height from the floor. I knew the LR needed longer windows - the brick was actually cut out for such. When I replaced all the 1st floor windows, I had them put i 8 over 12 windows and what a HUGE difference it has made, both outside (gave the house "more importance" and inside "the room felt 2 ft wider and brighter". This was taken right after Christmas a few years ago so it's winter outside, but this time of year, one sees ferns, hosta an astilbe right in a wide bed right in front of the window. It's important to tie ones garden to the inside of ones house.

My least favorite wall is the fireplace wall. Because this house was built in 1948, the fireplace sticks out onto the sunporch, instead of into the room, thus a flat wall. It would look SO much better with a cutback on either side. I really don't like that Victorian chair anymore - wish I could find something with which to replace it. I need the seating or I'd remove it. As I said, it's ALWAYS a work in progress...

Hope this helps you see how one builds a room. This is not a "grand" home, but it's filled with things I love.

That is all well and good..but most of us live our lives, buy what we are drawn to, love and somehow it all meshes and we live in homes/rooms that reflect us and give us joy. Making it a JOB seems far too much work, really.

I only buy things that I love and wait for that right thing to show up. It took me 2 years to find my dining room table and I still love it 16 years later.

It took me forever to find my personal style because at the beginning I was so overwhelmed with all the pretty pictures in magazines. I began to tear out all the rooms that appealed to me over a period of quite a few years and continued to edit the ones I had accumulated in folders, and kept tearing out and editing, until I realized that the true me gravitated toward some version of the English country house style, modified greatly by my budget but also my inclination toward less pattern and clutter than is often typical of the style. I began to realize that I tended toward a color palette that was in the medium range, nothing too dark or too light, and slanted more towards warm colors, which to me means cozy, comfortable and enveloping. A white sofa or white rug and turquoise cushions would never make me feel that way, although I admire good design of any style, even if I would not be able to live with it myself. I began to learn about and collect antique Chinese porcelain and ceramics, and now it would not feel like home without them. When you look around your home and everything makes you feel happy and comfortable you'll know that you've arrived at the right place.

A long time ago I saw some apricot suede wallpaper. I was so taken with the color that I decided that some time I was going to have a room that color (painted, not the suede wallpaper). That became the inspiration for my family room remodel. Before remodeling, the room was always cold. When I remodeled, I beefed up the insulation, but also picked warm colors to get over the psychological hurdle of thinking that the room was still cold. So the colors in the room are in the yellow--pink spectrum, with lots of woods, from yellow oak to walnut to rosewood, and, just because every room needs it, a touch of black. And lots of books.

Yes, lots of books! Books give a room soul. And it's lovely if one can't sleep at 3 am, to just go to a bookcase and pick up a well-loved book.

As I wrote on the other thread, thanks so much, Anglophilia, for sharing part of your home and the wonderfully in-depth tutorial! It's such a lovely, lively, cozy, and comfortable room. I love how everything has a history and a story.

And your post is encouragement and solid help for those of us who want to learn how to achieve something similar in our own homes. Thank you : ) .