Furniture gone wild

Why pick just one pattern?

This sweet little cabinet was a perfectly lovely Shaker style china hutch that a friend consigned, back when I had a boutique, here at Belle Ami.  The price was nice, but though it had a lot of lookers, it was always the wrong color, the wrong width, or somehow just not quite right, so after a couple of years, I decided to try giving it a paint job.  Its background color suggested the leopard, and the rest of the pattern and embellishment took off from there.

Leopard spots and gilded wood ornament are practically neutrals around this place.

This got a lot more people talking about it, and the piece actually caused some marital discord between a beautiful blonde woman with a heavy accent, and her Ken Doll American husband.  She was absolutely in love with everything about it, and he, in an unmistakeably upper class voice, declared it tasteless.  She quite obviously thought him stupid beyond words, but unlike most American women, made no apology to me for his rudeness.  Not that I mind.  As a decorator, it is my job to interpret such a range of styles for clients, I am never offended if someones taste doesn't match my own (heck, half the time, even my taste doesn't match my own!...?), and as a woman with a bit of experience in the marriage department, I never want anyone to apologize for the actions of their spouse.  Interestingly, the tiff ended with a derisive snort and an eye roll from her, accompanied by a little head-shake-flip-of-the-hair sort of thing, and then a change of topic.  Poof!  All lovey and fine, just like that.

The martini glasses are usually overflowing with candy...

They picked out a pair of painted glasses instead, similarly embellished, but apparently of a size that made them not so vulgar.  Because some of the Russian women from here in town had also expressed a strong interest in the cabinet, I wondered if there might be a cultural trend with the style of it, so while she was paying, I mentioned her accent, and politely asked where she was from.  She invited me to guess, but I know that I'm absolute crap at this.  She looked a bit like my friend PJ, whose mother is Slovenian, but having never heard a Slovenian accent, and fearing the snort and eyeroll thing, which like a typical American woman I would be crushed by, I confessed to not yet being a world traveller. 


I have clients who keep those huge curvy glass apothecary jars on their counters, filled with candy, and I love the happy abundant look of it, but I have neither the room for them, nor the desire to feed that much sugar to the Artgirls, who presumably would know why out of six glasses, only two still have candy... :)

 "I'm from Yugoslavia." she said, in a voice that said this was clearly obvious, and she took her parcel and the arm of her man and left without another word.  I'm still not sure if she was offended, or if this was just a culturally normal way to end a conversation.  I guess when I become a world traveller, I'll find out for myself, and find out also what it is about my style that attracts so many Russian and Central and Eastern European admirers to my more heavily embellished pieces, and surprisingly, to this blog.  I know this gets translated into a few languages (scary, considering I write how I talk, so I gotta wonder about the slang and colloquialisms!), and photos get picked up on Google images from around the globe, so if you are reading this from somewhere outside the US, and know the answers to my musings, please comment below.

If you are in the US, I will happily paint and embellish the furniture you own.  Check the website, theartofthehome.com, for examples of other pieces and styles, and all the info on how to hire me.

If you are doing this on your own and run into questions or difficulties, feel free to email me.  I'm happy to share what I know.  dawnmariedelara@gmail.com