More thrifty decoration

July 20, 2008

I rise to the challenge of coming up with homespun, simple ,and cheap ideas. It’s needs must, but somehow more rewarding than pointing like a Carl Sarkozy/Bruni and saying I’ll have that, that, and….. that, regardless of price. Maybe if the boot was on the other foot, and I was able to waft around the Conran shop picking out anything I fancied I might think differently. But for now, I’m happy to go the inventive route to keep my home looking and feeling good.

The really important part of being thrifty and creative, and one important rule that I impress upon clients, is to make the most of what you’ve got, rather than always feeling that NEW, NEW, NEW, is the way to decorate. Take my rather worn and shabby chesterfield, that looks far from chic . I have debated it’s removal many times but it too comfortable , and I figure that it’s worth buying eight metres of good linen for a loose cover and facelift. Similarly, you can do wondrous things with muslin, like making an underskirt for a dressing table, which not only hides clutter but makes an ordinary piece of furniture look more quirky and individual.

Simple detail is another way of showing your creative spin around the home, and it can make an enormous difference for little time and effort. See how this scalloped edging in contrasting plain linen on a basic check blind looks pretty and homely.

The film crew vacates this weekend (I hope the cat’s not become precious, Go Cat won’t be good enough, since her filming debut) and we’re allowed back home. Being away for a month has given me time to reassess. I’ve decided that because no one really ‘sits’ in the sitting part of our knock-through kitchen and living space, I will remove the armchairs and bring in the large kitchen table. We will then have a much larger and more relaxed eating area, rather than being too close to the cooking action and piles of washing up. In turn the big armchairs will go up to the 19 year old’s lair at the top of the house. The kitchen itself, will be freed up for the business of cooking without interruption.
A good opportunity then to throw together some tasty goats cheese and red onion tarts. I have developed rather a pasion for them since I was put down for making half a dozen for our annual street get together. It was good to enjoy some neighbourly bonding and eat great food, partying on the grass around a long table with flickering candles, until the early hours. Suburbia can, indeed, be blissful.