IMA Holiday Open Greenhouse

A trip to the Indianapolis Museum of Art Greenhouse as a Christmas tradition? Yep. The Greenhouse is open for business year round whenever the museum is, but two Thursday evenings in December the Greenhouse folks, like my friend Lynne above, roll out a therapeutically warm and life-filled holiday welcome. You can pop into the final Open House of the season next Thursday, December 20 (free, open till 8:00 p.m.). It makes a great date night venue.

I love the subtle details. This year simple candles burning in the snow were at the gates. In the past, it was red fabric lanterns with tea lights inside.

If you think an emphasis on nature limits your color palette to sage and brown, the Greenhouse staff is ready to blow your mind. I’m thinking about buying this metal tree and all of its ornaments for our house so I can make it through the February and March blahs.

If you look closely you can see the guitar player through the window.

I’ll always need a plant and a smiling-person-pick-me-up to brighten my spirits when winter is bearing down on me. Sue, Lynne, and the Greenhouse crowd always hook me up with both.

Oldfields, the IMA’s American Country Place era estate of which the Greenhouse is a part, is open for free that Thursday, too. The grounds are lit so that you can enjoy the gardens at night. Cold as it was outside, winding through the endless luminaria trails was a calming way to end a typically wild December day.

Design Past, Present and Future

It took a 19th century near death experience to get him there, but once Ebenezer Scrooge finally caught his clue he declared that he would keep Christmas past, present and future always before him. In the interior design world I get the impression that most people are a combination of past, present, and future with an emphasis on one more than the others.

I love contemporary design, I really do. Clean, spare lines and an emphasis on materials totally enchant me in public spaces. But for some reason I can only live with a little of it at a time in our home – a danish modern coffee table in our hearth area, a sputnik lamp, which I have yet to hang in our guest bedroom (makes me wonder if I’m subconsciously resisting it even when I love it), and our newish sofa.

The first two of these could hardly be considered contemporary since they were made in the 60s. And the sofa has traditional, even if spare lines.

Sometimes I wonder why I can’t shake a traditional bent. Not that I’m unhappy with our home. Quite the opposite, I love it. This Saturday John and I were sitting in the kitchen drinking our morning coffee, Sam (our wood stove) quietly blazing before us.

We were talking about how we’d rather be hanging out in our house than in any hotel we could possibly think of (at least at that particular moment), which is a good thing since we pour our spare change into the house and not into big vacations. It is full of stuff that means something to us – family treasures or finds. Auction scores, those trophies from furniture safari’s with John’s mom.

But I like to think of myself as progressive–socially, spiritually, politically. Even when I work in art museums, though I love the earlier pieces, I prefer to spend the bulk of my time with art less than a century old. Why then, when we built our new house five years ago, did we look at southern, country antecedents? Am I a closet conservative?

I suppose part of the answer can be found in how I was raised, not just the regional influence (the Arkansas Ozarks), but the people who did the job. We never had a ton of money so we learned to value the things, fine or not, that we saw at our family gatherings. Plus the 70s had that whole “back to our country’s roots”, folk thing going, which my Aunt Judy turned into a subtle, but elegant homey art form that totally worked.

Then there was my friend Felley’s mom, also named Judy. I know it is a chronological impossibility, but I’m convinced that Margaret Mitchell based Melanie Wilkes on my friend’s mother, who even looks for all the world like Olivia de Havilland, I swear. In addition to her sweetness, charm and patience (I always showed up at her house after school ready for a snack and was never, to my recollection, rebuffed or disappointed), she also had an incredibly refined, but remarkably approachable sense of style.

She was never self-conscious enough to speak in such terms,  but I learned from Miss Judy to think of interior design as one of the three essential tools of hospitality–the other two being good food and genuine thoughtfulness, two things my mom could have written the book on.

For Miss Judy, every furniture purchase or placement choice seemed to be with a visitor’s comfort and timeless style in mind. Those two things became fused together in my psyche because of her, I think. One of my sweetest memories is of sitting on her fabulous, dark blue chintz Chinois floral patterned sofa with her as she talked me through my smorgasbord of adolescent problems.

Then there is my own mom. She also has great design sense, but the most valuable lessons I learned from her were to keep it fun and to never be afraid of color, especially red. And when you get stuck, call a designer (luckily she has a friend and next door neighbor who is one). And never apply your lipstick with the aid of a compact mirror when you’re in public. Oh wait, that was what my sister learned. Sorry.  

So maybe it’s because I’m so attached to these people, ideas and memories that I keep my feet rooted in a traditional style. From a design point of view the south is frequently criticized for being retardataire. I suspect my own observations may point to why that is, if it is. I guess for me the past is a vital part of the present and the future. Maybe there’s nothing I can do about that, and maybe I should stop feeling the need to apologize for it.           

More on Neutrals with Color

More from September’s Elle Decor. Here is a better shot of Marjorie Gubelmann’s living room. I love the scale and finish of the hanging lantern.

And here is her dining room with its spectacular hand-painted Gracie wallpaper, proving neutral rooms are happy to live near big color walls. I find it hard to believe that I’ve never had a room this color green. I’ve always loved it.

Side note: In Bob Altman’s glamorously stuffy Gosford Park,

a great source of design inspiration if you need it, the billiard room (the room pictured above is actually the drawing room in the film. I couldn’t find a still of the BR but you get the glamour point) is glazed the same color green as the wallpaper above. I think the billiard room is under-painted with yellow. Whatever the technique, the effect gives the space a sturdy glow. In Gubelmann’s dining room, the silver of the Venetian mirrors, the shimmering chandelier, and the small scale of the black bamboo chairs keep the room light and airy. I love it.

Patterns, Color and Winterthur Revisited

I’m intrigued by how good designers mix patterns. Henry F. DuPont’s, Winterthur, is a great place to see a seemingly infinite number of ways to do it.

I took John there for his birthday a few years back because I knew he would enjoy the craftsmanship of some of the finest examples of wood furniture in the U.S. As DuPont turned his estate into a survey of high quality non-native American furniture (approximately Empire and before), he also created a giant canvas on which to layer his talent for putting rooms together (and gardens, but that’s another post).

Julie and I have been exchanging comments lately about color in neutral rooms. While the elements of DuPont’s dining room are a little more reserved than Julie’s more worldly style, the basic idea of using color with a neutral background is here—the fabrics carry the color.

The architectural elements are allowed to shine on their own with a neutral coat of paint (more of an oyster than the pinkish color you see here), and maybe a few highlights (see the trim on the doors). The rich wood of the furniture also gets to play a major role.

I like that the drapery fabric and the chair covers are the same medium sized pattern. Sometimes I think I’m afraid to use a fabric in other parts of the same room. I don’t know why (maybe it’s an attempt to avoid the catalog look). But a few repeated fabrics, even a vibrant stripe like this one, can give a room unity of design, calming the space. If I remember correctly the stripe and the large pattern of the rug are the only two fabric patterns in the room and the differences in scale work well together.

The stair hall (not a great picture, sorry) is an even more refined space, with light and airy Federalist pieces, which play nicely with the floating staircase – delicate, but sturdy. Anyway, the green of the settee fabric, which in another application might be considered bank-ish or too heavy handed looks downright understated in this setting.

There’s nothing understated about the Chinese parlor. I love it, with all of its game and tea tables everywhere (mostly, if not all, American Rococo, aka Chippendale), and that great (in every sense of the word) wallpaper that makes you feel like a character in a giant storybook. The whole room is a big, elegant play room for grown-ups, but really, wouldn’t kids be happy here, too?

I’ve never worked with pattern on the scale of this wallpaper, but I like it, especially that DuPont made it work with two large rugs and the large pattern in the two different green damasks. The sturdy forms of the furniture ground things. And now that I look at it so do the drapery and sofa fabrics, which even though they are a damask pattern read as a solid when seen next to the wallpaper.

If you are a furniture/design or even a garden buff, Winterthur is well worth a trip for inspiration.

Paint and Lighting is Up, Cleaning Tid Bits

Well, all the painting is done except for the detailing. After climbing over furniture to find a spot to sleep Tuesday and Wednesday, we actually slept in our room again last night. The redo isn’t done yet, but here is the wingback we had reupholstered (labor at T & H Upholstery in Indy – $260.00). I apologize for the crassness of posting prices, but I find the lack of readily available information about this kind of stuff kind of frustrating, so I’m putting it out there.

I think the fabric (Calico Corners – 9 yards – $200.00 [discounted price]) Dave helped me pick looks pretty good with the paint color. You can see both here.

The redo has been a good op to clean things that I never would have otherwise (My tendency to ignore baseboards is one of the reasons this blog is called “Good Home” and not “Great Home”). When our next door neighbor Mindy heard we were going to hire professionals to clean our rugs she insisted that we let her bring her rug cleaner over and have a go at it.

So Wed. night while John and I painted one half of the room, she cleaned the carpet in the other. THEN she came back the next day to do the other half! She refuses to let us pay her. We’ll have to figure out another way to thank her because the carpet looks really good. Mindy rocks!

To clean the screens on our windows we decided to put them in the shower and just hose them off with a little attachable sprayer that I got John from Restoration Hardware one year for Christmas (it was actually on his wish list). I’m thinking I may clean all of our screens this way in the future.

Here is one of the chandeliers.

I think they are hanging a little low, which we can easily fix (going the other direction is a little harder). I’m going to see if I can talk John’s mom into sewing sleeves for the chains—either in champagne or wheat colored linen.

My favorite thing so far is the paint color. It’s the only one besides the yellow in our living room that I’ve ever liked the minute it went on the wall. I usually have to get used to new colors even when I like them a lot. This blue is hard to photograph though.

Some potentially bad news. I know I promised before pics, but they may be lost. When my computer hard drive went a couple weeks back they may have been erased. I’ll know next week, I think. Keep your fingers crossed.

Bedroom Status Report 2

Looks like I have a deadline for finishing the bedroom. June 6. Our friend Scott is coming to town for a conference and he’ll need the guest suite, so it will need to be free of the furniture from our bedroom placed there temporarily while we work.

For the sake of scheduling ease (our lives are too complicated to work around someone else at the moment), we’ve decided to do the painting ourselves. Know that I will say at least fifty times as we are painting, “we totally should have hired someone.” John will ignore me, as he should in such cases.

BTW, I like Benjamin Moore paints (also Sherwin Williams, Porter and even Behr-I can’t afford Farrow and Ball), but something it took me awhile to realize is that not all paint stores are alike. Their mixing skills vary. So either get all of the paint you need on one trip or find a good paint store because if you run out, you may well end up bringing back a slightly different color or finish the second time.  That happened to me once, and it annoys me everytime I see the result in our kitchen.

We’ll be using:

Palladian Blue (HC-144 – Eggshell)
from Rollie Williams Paint Spot
5292 E 65th St
Indianapolis, IN 46220
(317) 842-6772

Rollie’s is a Benjamin Moore dealer here in town that I’ve used before with good luck.

Dave, who is in the residential leasing biz, says a cleaning service could do wonders for our carpet and that we really don’t have to replace it. So that should save some trouble and a little money. If I can get him to provide the company’s name I’ll call them and post their info here as a resource for Indy folks.

John is on vacation next week, so we’ll hit the ground running with painting next Tuesday when we get back from Batesville.

I still need to:

Call and order paint
Measure for, then order matchstick blinds and window hardware
Pick up the reupholstered wingback
Take two other chairs to be reupholstered

Keep your fingers crossed and pray for John. As much as I try to be good, I get antsy in the middle of weeks long projects. And I can get kind of sullen towards the end when it seems like the details will never come together.

A Store I Love: Country Friends

If you read this blog much, you’ll realize that while I’m crazy about all kinds of design, our own home tends towards the “not new” (I stopped using the word “traditional” during an episode of the Sopranos when Carmella used the term to describe the white leather and chrome-gilded mobster haven she and Tony called home.)

(Outdoor table and four chairs I have my eye on. $199.00.)

I don’t know why I like what I do. I could try to figure out why old furniture, flowers, lots of color, gardens, cushy chairs, woodstoves, holidays, etc., appeal to me, but I don’t really care. I’m a big fan of metacognition, but over thinking design is one of the easiest ways I know to kill a good look.Fortunately though, there is a store made for people like me: Country Friends. Saying the name embarrasses me, but I’d be lying if I said it isn’t the first place in Indianapolis that I go when I need a perfect “something”—for a gift, to fill a floral container, for the front door, to help set the table.

(A bronze birdbath we bought for John’s dad. I liked the forked base that makes it easy to relocate.)

Dave, another Friends-o-phile, and I typically make four official pilgrimages a year—Easter time (for spring and summer), early fall (Halloween and Thanksgiving), before Christmas and after Christmas. And then there are a few trips for random gifts or decorative dilemmas.Many people I know won’t go there. John refuses to darken the door. The place is PACKED with stuff, a look and shopping experience that a lot of people don’t enjoy. And there’s no shortage of kitsch, which doesn’t bother me. For whatever reason, I have a healthy respect for kitschy things as long as they’re sincere.

(Michael and Sharon)

Plus the owner Michael, who started the business 22 years ago in Muncie, is a little manic and loud, but I love him. He buys fun stuff constantly and a lot of it, so if you are willing to spend some time you can usually find what you need. The staff is super friendly. They asked about my mom three months after she came to visit one time. I like that in a store.

Bringin’ Peachy Back

If you can’t remember being dragged to a bazillion peach colored weddings in the 80s, chances are the notion of using a little peach in the home here and there isn’t that offensive to you.

The problem with the use of peach, or teal, or even mauve in the 80s wasn’t the colors. Colors, all colors, are timeless. They’ve all been used before. They’ll all be used again to great effect. The problem was that they were everywhere. And ubiquity is an invitation to revolt. Peach was bound to fall out of favor.

But there’s no need for it to stay there. I pulled the image above, a Serebriakoff watercolor of a state room at Ditchley Park to show its use prior to being spewed all over late 20th century pseudo-Victorian, panty-festooned bed and breakfast decor.

Why Bother?

Peach and its cousins are sunny and very natural–think morning sun.

It’s handy in colder, grayer climates–peach can warm a room without overwhelming it.

It’s a more neutral color than you might think.

Tips

It looks handsome with cream trim and woodwork.

Peach actually plays well with others and will take on the energy of the colors around it. While it’s best to mix strong hues with it sparingly, don’t shy away from them. Nancy Lancaster entertained in the room above. The tea tables she brought in for them were painted a lacquered red! Sounds completely elegant to me.

I can’t think of a room where I wouldn’t try using it, though I have not found a good version for our bedroom yet.

Picking the right shade is tricky. If it gets too muddy, as Mark Hampton said, it will look like pancake makepup on your walls. Test a few quarts to find a shade good for you.

Any other tips for using it? Let me know if you are or are on your way to being brave to give it a try. I’m no expert on peach, but I doubt it will ever be as big as it was in the 80s (thank God!–nothing should be that everywhere).

Yellow Parlor

Nancy Lancaster’s legendary yellow parlor in London.

I love:

This yellow.
The silver accents.
The mirror panels around the door.
Hand painted pillows.
Desk behind the sofa.
Blue chairs peeking from behind the skirted table.
The dirty water in the flower vase.

(Photo from Martin Wood–Nancy Lancaster: English Country House Style)

Hotel Chelsea- A Home In Bohemia

I refuse to stay at hotel chains in NY when there are an infinite number of more interesting places to be that are really no more expensive.  On my last trip I decided I needed creative inspiration so I booked a room at Hotel Chelsea, historic host to folks like Jasper Johns, Joan Didion, Dee Dee Ramone, and Janis Joplin (the list is infinite).    

Online reviews and stories from friends who have suspiciously vague recollections of parties there had me a little worried—no coffee makers in the room because they can be used to cook meth (who knew?).  But the hotel website won me over.  I especially like the resident blog, which is like eavesdropping on conversations in the hall.   

You’re never denied the reality of living in an old building at the Chelsea, but considering the borg-like ethics of Manhattan developers, I was grateful for the lived in smell and the still kicking creaks.  Besides, only the halls smell like everybody’s homes rolled into one (people do still live there after all).  The hotel rooms smelled like hotel rooms.   

Rosie got several good looks at the halls.  She won’t ride an elevator in NY that she can’t see out of, so she walked up to my room on the 9^th floor several times (I would make fun of her, but all of her neuroses keep her looking 25 even though she‘s 40).  Good news is that there is art lining the filigreed stairwell all the way up and in the lobby, too.   She never got bored.

 

Isn’t this a fun room?  Believe me, for an old NY hotel, it’s huge.  I had a dressing room, walk-in closet, a kitchenette and a really nice bathroom.  I fell in love with these black patton woven dining chairs.

Oh, and a nice bouquet of impossibly colored and dead (real, but dead) flowers.   In fact, one flower was actually just a stem.  I would say it was a sign of neglect, but my room was always impeccably cleaned.  And the flowers kind of worked with my minimalist/traditional fireplace. 

 

My friends Kris and Robin who were attending the same conference came down for breakfast one morning.  We popped over to Big Booty Bakery across the street at the recommendation of one of the hotel’s residents.  Big Booty doesn’t open until 9:00 a.m., but they warm the milk for your coffee, which I think more than makes up for that shortcoming.  Plus their baked goods are baked greats—try the Nutella Booty Bun.   

HC doesn’t need concierge services.  The gentle residents, who all seem to own smallish dogs, are constantly draped around the desk with the most useful advice (Good bagels?  Melvyn’s, around the corner. Where did you get that breakfast sandwich?  Venus on 9th.) I maintain that Manhattanites are the Southerners of the north.  New Yorkers would surely hate the comparison, but they are so friendly and helpful.  There are some differences.  If you annoy a New Yorker they are more likely to stab you in the front than in the back. That and they are less likely to pay retail.  

When I arrived on Thursday morning, staff happily offered to let me check in early.  They didn’t have a key for me (“Our engineer is making your key. You’ll go have lunch.   It’ll be waiting when you get back.”).  I may be a rube, but I’ve learned to do what New Yorkers tell me. They know the lay of the land and that they and you don’t have a lot of time to waste, so their recommendations are usually the most pragmatic and logical in the end.  Oh, and they use metal keys, handcrafted evidently and impossible to lose, a winning combination.  

 I’m sure the Chelsea has been tidied up some for timid Southern/Midwestern boys like me, but I can gladly say it hasn’t lost all of its happy hospitable edge.  Hopefully I can call it my Bohemian home away from home again someday.      

Goodbye Winter Buffet

”

Finally time to start thinking about the transition to spring. This wasn’t my favorite winter buffet design. I don’t think it ever really came together. But it did get me through the season and looking at it reminded me of some good people and times.

”

-From left to right, the candle was a Christmas present from John.
-The plate stand was from a trip to Target with Dave.
-The Nautica earthenware was an outlet find of John’s (10 place settings and all of the serving pieces for $110.00) on one of our old trips to Branson.
-Mercury ball and the “C” were birthday presents from Dave. The “C” (a Dave original) is for Claire and is wood painted to look like b and w damask. Little cardinal was a Dave Christmas present.
-Sweet red box was part of a Christmas present from Lori.
-The lamp was “at the auction” with John’s mom.
-The runner was on the bargain table at Williams Sonoma as was the mistletoe garland (from Country Friends).

Sometimes good memories can overcome so-so design.

Just Enough

I bought Martin Wood’s Nancy Lancaster – English Country House Style with a Barnes and Noble gift certificate Jim and Linda, John’s mom, gave me for my birthday. It has a lot of painted or printed illustrations (I often like these better than photos of interiors–I think the eye creating them sees the space better.).

This is an illustration of a closet at Ditchley Park that Lancaster turned into a writing room. The view from the window was of a lake and part of her garden. Cream and green everything, down to the tiny vases filled with flowers on the riser at the window, creates an uninterrupted connection with the out of doors for the lucky writer at the table.

The flowers and the wacky chair keep things from getting too serious.