Things That Inspire

Ode to hydrangea

2012-05-22T07:57:00.000-04:00

Perhaps it is because of the mild winter we received, or the recent rain that has fallen, but the hydrangea in Atlanta are particularly beautiful this year. They have slowly but surely become one of my favorite flowers over the past few years, so when we designed the landscape of my yard last year, my request was to incorporate hydrangea bushes wherever possible.

In the area close to the house, my landscape architect specified white annabelle hydrangeas, as he wanted a predominantly white and green look to the yard. The delicate lacy bloom of the annabelle hydrangea is a beautiful addition to the yard. I love the softening effect of the hydrangeas, as my landscape has so many clean lines and geometric shapes. Most of the annabelle that were planted in the fall made it through the winter, although a few of the plants had to be replaced in the spring (and the replacements look as if they are struggling a bit). The ones that are thriving are doing quite well, and in a few years I imagine that we will have thick covering of these beautiful plants.

Where our lot begins to slope, mophead hydrangeas were planted. Most of them are white, but interestingly a few of them are coming in with a distinct pinkish hue. When doing a bit of research on hydrangeas, I learned that for the pink and blue variety of hydrangea, the color of the flower is determined by the ph balance of the soil. According to http://www.hydrangeashydrangeas.com, it is possible to change the color of pink and blue hydrangea plants by changing the acidity of the soil – although the website notes that it is easier to change from pink to blue than blue to pink. Maybe in a few years when these are more established, I will see if we can change the ph to make these blue – I much prefer blue hydrangeas to pink.

A few weeks ago, I had a fundraiser at the new house, and one of my co-hosts brought over white hydrangea blooms from her garden. I am normally the worst flower arranger you can imagine – I tend to trim the bottom of a bouquet, and plop in a vase hoping for the best. However, I had recently read an excellent flower arranging guide from Goop – and I was able to create lovely and simple arrangements of hydrangea in the cube shape vases that I purchased from Home Goods. I recreated the arrangements for another gathering I had at the house last week with freshly cut blue hydrangea from a friend's garden. Here is one of the arrangements in my side entrance – it is a bit past its prime, but still looking good. I know it looks simple, but creating any kind of flower arrangement is a small victory for me!

Maybe next time I will try a dramatic arrangement like this one, from a room designed by John Saladino for a Veranda feature. I remember seeing vases like these at the Mart, although I don't remember who makes them!

As much as I like blue hydrangea in vases, my favorite place to admire them is in their natural state. Although this is not quite natural state, it is one of my favorite images of hydrangeas – an allee of hydrangeas, planted in giant pots.

A little more realistic are the images I have captured on my iphone when walking my dog around Atlanta this month. This picturesque fence was adorned with all different shades of hydrangea, both pink and blue.

A lush and loose arrangement of blue hydrangea frame this lucky homeowner’s driveway.

An unstructured profusion of blue hydrangea take up the entire side yard of this corner lot.

A small peek of the blue hyndrangeas on this property can be seen through the gates. I featured this house on my blog a few years ago, when it was on the market.

Here is the back yard from a picture taken a few years ago; the white and blue hydrangea must be incredibly beautiful right now. Landscape design by John Howard. To see the blog post, click here.

A few more pictures found around the web just to round things out…this pretty white hydrangea allee is from designer Loi Thai's pinterest board of white gardens.

This one is from Loi’s pinterest board too…I could spend hours looking at his curated collection of images!

This is how I am hoping my white hydrangeas look some day. Source.

A stunning picture found on the web, showing a nice range of colors of mophead hydrangea (source).

Designer Suzanne Kasler’s back yard, from a recent article in Architectural Digest. Note the beautiful blue hydrangeas flourishing behind the clipped Korean boxwood.

Recently, Veranda contributing editor and author Danielle Rollins snapped a picture of the hydrangeas in her yard and posted on her facebook page. For those with great memories for magazine spreads, this view might look a bit familiar…

Danielle’s house was featured in Town & Country in 2010, and was decorated by legendary designer Miles Redd. Danielle’s book Soiree: Entertaining with Style is available for pre-order on Amazon, and will be released in the fall. I see that there is a turquoise garden bench in the recent picture, which was not in the magazine spread. I think it adds the perfect touch to the space, but then again I am partial to garden benches (as this post confirms)!

I could go on and on, but I think you get the idea! Do you have hydrangeas in your area? I don’t remember them from my teenage years in Connecticut, but then again I did not really notice these kind of things back then. If you have any inspirational images of hydrangeas from your neck of the woods, I would love to see them.

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A one of a kind Atlanta antique sale

2012-04-18T21:34:00.002-04:00

Almost three years ago (it is truly incredible how time seems to pass so quickly these days!), I read a blog post on Cote de Texas about an special antique sale by New Orleans antique dealer Mignon Topping. I was ready to buy a ticket and head to Houston after seeing the beautiful antiques so artfully displayed in a house that was on the market.

A beautiful image from the post on Mignot’s antique show in Houston, via Cote de Texas.

When a friend of mine called and told me that Mignot was doing a show in Atlanta, and asked if I was interested in a sneak preview, I jumped at the chance. Interestingly enough, the show is at Mignon’s house, which is located in the heart of Buckhead, on Argonne Drive at the corner of Argonne and Arden. I pass this house frequently on my dog walks, and was just as interested in seeing the inside of the house as the antiques!

Mignon gave me a tour of her homes and her wares, and it was not surprising to learn that she grew up in New Orleans. The influence of both France and New Orleans can clearly be seen in the beautiful furniture and fabrics that fill her lovely home.

I wish I had taken a better picture of this pretty room - but did not think to turn off the lights for a more natural light balance. Please excuse the poor photography!

Mignon’s Godmother is the famed New Orleans designer Gerrie Bremermann, and her mother was a well known antique dealer in New Orleans. I told Mignon that there is something about New Orleans décor that really captures my heart and imagination, and the feel of this is certainly present in Mignon’s house and the beautiful pieces that she has collected over time, most of which are for sale over the next few days.

Treasures abound throughout the house.

I love this hand made Italian bowl, which is one of a pair.

Here are the two bowls displayed on an antique sideboard, also for sale.

Mignon has a passion for small antique chairs, which serve almost like accessories in every room in her house.

All of the rugs are for sale too. I particularly like the rug in the dining room and the living room, and have my eye on the mellow antique chest seen in this picture. The lucite clock is one of Mignon’s favorite pieces; she loves to mix the contemporary and the antique. The antique Italian console seen on the right is another favorite.

A better view of the console, with another one of Mignon’s signature petite fauteuils.

The other side of the room features an exquisite antique French commode, and an incredible painting that is part of Mignon’s extensive art collection. The mix of the antique and the contemporary is one of Mignon’s signature looks.

The house is full to the brim of antiques and objects that are for sale – the entire garage has been turned into a showroom, and there is even a tent in the driveway to contain the overflow of furniture and accessories.

A quick snapshot of the tent as the items were being set up!

A view into the kitchen, with a mix of the antique and the new.

My eye is always drawn to charming mirrors, such as this one placed on a small wall between the kitchen and the powder room.

A unique mirrored barometer is well placed on a wall in the entry hall.

A beautiful gilded wood chandelier hangs in the master bedroom, but will certainly find a new home quite soon.

Another charming mirror and commode in the master bedroom.

This elegant room belongs to Mignon’s teenage daughter, and many of the furniture items in the room are for sale.

Another chandelier, paired with an antique chest and a contemporary piece of art. Most of the pieces from Mignon’s huge collection of contemporary art are for sale, and it is wonderful to see them in a home setting, paired so comfortably with antiques.

The French Collectibles sale in Atlanta takes place this Thursday – Sunday, April 19-22, at 575 Argonne Road, Atlanta, GA 30305. Feel free to drop in anytime between 11 am and 6 pm daily, or to schedule an appointment with Mignon please contact her at toppingm@bellsouth.net, or 404.271.6362.

Garden benches

2012-03-26T08:45:00.000-04:00

In our backyard, we have a spot that is ideal for a garden bench, but with all of the other higher priority items involved in finishing the house and getting it furnished, the garden bench took low priority. However, we ended up having to replant some trees, and it became apparent that we needed to go ahead and find a bench so that the trees could be placed in their final position based on the size and scale of the bench.

I have been collecting some images of benches over the years, as I love the charming element that a classic bench adds to a garden. Many of the benches that I have seen and admired have been in the beautiful parks that can be found all over London. This image shows a bench in Kew gardens (source).

As I was looking for inspiration photos, Cote de Texas’s most recent post had a beautiful picture of a curved garden bench. I really like this style, but I need at least a 6 foot bench, and this style only comes in 4’ and 5’.

I have long admired the custom benches in this garden designed by John Howard. These benches were custom designed for the space.

A custom colored bench is a feature in this back yard from a house that was on a tour a few years ago.

A simple and classic garden bench, flanked by magnificent trees, makes a wonderful visual feature in this garden. Image from Southern Accents.

This is one of my favorite style benches, and is not too hard to find in the 4’ size (as seen here). However, it is much more difficult to find in the larger 6’ size (and can be quite expensive). Image from old real estate listing.

Here is the larger version – there is something about the straight lines of the bench and the curves of the design that really appeals to me. Source unknown.

Richardson Allen makes a 6’ version of this bench. It comes in natural teak, or any custom color painted in marine grade boat paint (so it is very hardy and won’t rot). I do love this bench – this particular version is over my budget, though! Also, as the bench is custom made for the customer, I could not wait for the standard lead time as we needed to move a tree that was incorrectly placed, and we need to do it while the tree is still dormant.

The Lutyens style bench is a classic (this one is made by Kingsley-Bate), and I kept visiting it in a local teak store as I thought it would look beautiful as a featured landscape design element in my backyard.

According to what I could find on the internet, what we know as the Lutyens bench was designed by famed English architect Sir Edwin Lutyens (1869-1944) for the garden at Little Thakeham, and is officially called the Thakeham seat. When researching the origins of the bench, I stumbled across a company called Lutyens Furniture and Lighting, which was started by Lutyens granddaughter and sells furniture based on Lutyens’ designs. According to the Lutyens Furniture site, not only was Sir Edwin Lutyens a prolific architect, but he also had a passion for and expertise in furniture design. Image source.

After much thought and consideration, I purchased a Lutyens bench for the spot (seen above, in my back yard), and I am very happy with the decision. The Lutyens bench has such a distinctive and classic style, and the size (6’ 5”) works very well for the space. The bench is teak, so it will weather with exposure to the elements, and ultimately achieve a beautiful silvery gray color. Already the color of the teak is starting to mellow.

The bench can be seen from most of the rooms on the main floor, and it such a pleasure to catch a glimpse of it! Landscape design by Alec Michaelides of Land Plus – now that spring is here, and the back yard is starting to bloom, I am simply awed by the beauty of the landscaping – Alec created a truly beautiful design for us. I am such a big advocate of carefully considering the landscape when designing a house. It is an essential design element, and makes our house feel as if it has been here for years.

When I was contemplating the garden bench decision, I pulled out a lovely book that I received for Christmas: Gertude Jekyll and the Country House Garden. Ms. Jekyll was known for her collaboration with Edwin Lutyens, and the book highlights several beautiful gardens that were a result of this collaboration (as well as many more). In this book, I saw pictures of some of the original benches that Lutyens designed for the gardens that they worked on. (Click here to purchase on Amazon)

One of the original Lutyens designed benches, in a garden designed by Gertrude Jekyll.

A Lutyens bench found in an image on the internet (source unknown), at a house in France.

The author of this book will be in Atlanta this week – on Wednesday evening – to give a lecture on her book on the gardens of Gertrude Jekyll. It promises to be a wonderful event!

According to the Atlanta History Center website, registration is required by calling 404.814.4046, or emailing scatron@atlantahistorycenter.org.

On the AHC website, it is noted that this lecture is free to the public, but I am not sure if there is an admission fee to the Atlanta History Center. Regardless, reservations are required for this lectures.

The ICAA Southeast is also presenting this lecture. To join ICAA Southeast, please click this link – the Southeast chapter has many great events for architecture and design enthusiasts like us!

Membership gives you early access to ICAA SE events such as the lecture noted above, special member pricing, as well as special members only events. Note in the comment section that you are joining the ICAA-SE chapter.

A Veranda house on the market

2012-03-06T13:26:00.001-05:00

I have been reading quite a bit about gray slowly but surely become the new neutral of choice in interiors, so when I stumbled upon this picture recently, I thought it beautifully reflected this trend. The gray of the sofa, the walls and trim work, the tone on tone curtains with the slightly deeper shade on the leading edge – the room looks timeless, and hardly trendy, and I wondered if this room would have been cloaked in shades of beige and brown had it been designed 10 years ago. Library designed by Peggy Stone, photo credit Peter Vitale, via Veranda.

Given that this first image was featured in Veranda, I looked on the Veranda web site to check it out, but did not find it. It is interesting to me that Veranda does not keep all of their articles on the website – I wonder why? However, it was not hard to find the images in the blogosphere. This image (above) was found on Cote de Texas; Joni noted that the house reminded her of the wonderful houses she used to love from Southern Accents and older Veranda issues. She noted that houses like this just aren’t featured as much in today’s interior design magazines. Photo credit Peter Vitale, via Veranda.

Thanks to Splendid Sass, I found all of the images from the article in one place. Photo credit Peter Vitale, via Veranda.

This image, from Veranda, really captured my attention. The paneling on the walls and in the doors, the thickness of the walls, the beautiful pattern on the wood floor, the antiqued glass in the rounded entry – what beautiful attention to architectural detail. This is a house that was beautifully conceived and designed to be true to the French style, not just in the interior design but the architectural design as well. The circle motif above the door in particular caught my eye, and when I realized that this house was located in Atlanta, I also recalled that I had seen a similar design in a house that is currently on the market in Atlanta. Photo credit Peter Vitale, via Veranda.

Sure enough, this house is one and the same as a house that is listed by Beacham & Company – in the listing detail, the Veranda feature is noted. The house was designed by Duane Stone, for designer Peggy Stone. As the Veranda article notes, this house was a labor of love – a house build by a lifelong Francophile, to feature her collection of a lifetime. Certainly the collection of antiques is impressive, but what I love about the house is that the bones and the setting are also so exquisite – the attention to detail is incredible, and this will stay with the house even when the antiques and objects go with Ms. Stone.

The exterior of the house was not shown in the Veranda article, but it is as French as the interior, with the beautiful soft color scheme of the house and shutters, and the pea gravel motor court that extends to the front of the house, creating both a visual and a textural introduction to the house. Image from the real estate listing.

Here is a picture of the living room/library, as taken by Blayne Beacham for the real estate photos. It’s interesting to see that the room is set up almost identically to the way it was shown in Veranda, with the exception of the screen that is placed in front of the window. So many times a room is styled in a particular way for a magazine, with accessories and furniture that the designer brings in just for the photo shoot. Not the case here! Image from the real estate listing, photo credit Blayne Beacham.

I always find it gratifying to see real estate photos, because it gives me a better understanding of how the house flows. From this perspective of the foyer, it is clear that the dining room is on one side, the living room (which I had incorrectly identified as a library) on the other side. Image from the real estate listing, photo credit Blayne Beacham.

Based on this picture, the stairs are at the back of the house, seen when entering the foyer. Image from the real estate listing, photo credit Blayne Beacham.

A different view of the stairs. Note the beautiful curve of the stair, and the herringbone pattern on the floors. I love the little painting under the sconce – what a charming place for a small piece of art. Image from the real estate listing, photo credit Blayne Beacham.

I don’t think that the kitchen was shown in the Veranda article (I looked high and low, and could not find my April 2011 issue), but it is beautiful and very much in keeping with the style of the house. What I find to be interesting is that the house was designed and built in 2002 – 10 years ago – clearly Ms. Stone drew her inspiration from the style of Europe, versus the trends that were going on in Atlanta at the time. Image from the real estate listing, photo credit Blayne Beacham.

Another view of the kitchen that shows the connection with the adjacent rooms (breakfast room and keeping room). Image from the real estate listing.

The breakfast room. Image from the real estate listing, photo credit Blayne Beacham.

This angle shows how the kitchen opens to the keeping room and the breakfast room. I seem to recall seeing the Louis XV cardboard figure in Veranda, but could not find the image. Image from the real estate listing.

A quick peek at the family room, with its many layers and textures. The collection of blue and white pieces on the commode is the highlight of the room to me. Image from the real estate listing, photo credit Blayne Beacham.

The master bedroom. Image from the real estate listing, photo credit Blayne Beacham.

Beautiful fireplace in the master bedroom. Image from the real estate listing, photo credit Blayne Beacham.

Master bathroom, which was not shown in the Veranda article. Image from the real estate listing, photo credit Blayne Beacham.

Back yard. Image from the real estate listing, photo credit Blayne Beacham.

Formal garden. Image from the real estate listing, photo credit Blayne Beacham.

I would love to see this house after a new owner purchases it – certainly it will have an entirely different look and feel, given that the current homeowners have such an extensive collection of antiques and collected objects. Wouldn’t it be interesting to see the house decorated in a more streamlined style? The beauty of this house is that the bones are so wonderful, and it will suit any number of design styles because so much thought was put into the architecture and flow of the house.

To see the complete listing, please visit Beacham & Company’s website (or click here). To visit photographer Blayne Beacham’s blog, please visit http://www.thisphotographerslife.com/.

Books in a Living Room Vignette

2012-03-04T09:37:00.003-05:00

As I was looking through my pictures, searching for a particular one, I came across this image that never fails to please me (the interior design is by Birmingham based firm Caldwell Flake). There is something so lovely about this vignette – the symmetry is pleasing, but so is the slight variation that can be seen in the arrangement of the tables on either side. The colors and composition of the design, as well as the pattern on the fabric and pillows, really draw me in. In the past I have always preferred solid curtains, but I am finding myself gravitating to pattern more and more these days. I always like solid colors on upholstery, though!

As I am still trying to expand my book collection for the many unfilled shelves in my library, I took a closer look at the books under the side table on the left. I spy American Decorative Arts; The Art of War; The World’s Best Golf; The Battle of the Bulge; Battle at Sea; Living with Dogs; More is More: Tony Duquette (my best guess); Perfect Neutrals (this is also a guess –the first word is perfect, and the font matches the book cover); Mood Indigo: Decorating with Rich, Dark Colors. If books are a reflection on the interests of the homeowners (and are hopefully not just props for a photo shoot!), this small collection reflects a couple who are interested in history, decorative arts, home, golf, and dogs.

For more beautiful and inspiring images from Caldwell Flake, please visit their website here: http://www.caldwellflake.com/