Of Rose Buds and Rotary Phones

Broderie Perse Rosebuds Appliqued

After all that worrying, I finally appliqued my broderie perse rose buds to the center of my Whig Rose block this week, and they weren't as bad as I thought they would be.  Broderie Perse means that I cut the rose buds out of a scrap of my Vervain Monado print drapery fabric (it's 100% cotton, very lightweight, and I did prewash it). 

Monado print from Vervain, Havana colorway

 

I used Jeanne Sullivan's Patch Back product to give the rose buds a little dimension and preturned the fabric edges with glue stick, then used Roxanne's Glue Baste It to secure them in place for stitching. 

As you can see, the rose buds that initially appeared to be identical in the drapery fabric are more obviously NOT identical now that I've stitched them onto the dark brown fabric.  I think that's okay.  What may or may not be okay is that now the center of my Whig Rose block bears an uncanny resemblance to a rotary telephone dial: 

Would it help if I tried to squish additional rose buds between each of these to reduce the rotary dial effect, or should I leave it alone?  It would be a pretty tight fit if I tried to add more rose buds.  Alternatively, I could do some kind of embroidered embellishment between the rose buds.  Who knows -- maybe the rotary phone dial look will grow on me.

Tulip Thingys Up Next

Next up for this block will be the tulip thingys, or whatever they are supposed to be.  Today I think they look like Daffy Duck footprints.  I've already reverse appliqued the centers, and now the challenge will be in needle turning the tight outer curves smoothly as I stitch these onto the block.  Wish me luck!  I'll try to take the sharp curves slowly, just turning enough for one stitch at a time, and hope for the best.


Tulip, or Daffy Duck Foot Print?

Before I get back to more hand stitching, though, I have to dust off Sergei the Serger and thread him up for a cover stitch.  This will require a consult with his instruction manual, since I haven't done it in awhile.  The BBC Shop only sells Dr. Who tee shirts in adult sizes, and I bought Anders an adult size small that needs to be shortened for him lest anyone mistakes it for a nightgown!

I'm linking up with Slow Sunday Stitching at Kathy's Quilts today and Anything Goes Monday at Stitch By Stitch.  Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Design Wall Monday on Wednesday

Behold, Constructive Chaos!

So on March 10th I posted here and told you about a new applique project I'm cooking up.  Recall that this project originated as a small applique sample for practicing new (to me, anyway) needleturn applique methods.  I didn't like any of the cute projects in my book so I dug through back issues of Quilter's Newsletter magazine and found one applique pattern that I mostly liked except for the hearts, which I swapped out for the stylized tulips on a historical reproduction quilt from another issue.  That was nearly two weeks ago.

I photocopied and laminated my templates as per the Piece O'Cake book instructions, and that went fine except that next time I think I'll photocopy them onto a heavier weight paper to make them a smidge sturdier for tracing around.  I then traced my full-size pattern onto midweight upholstery vinyl with an ultra fine point Sharpie permanent marker, also as per the POC instructions.  But at that point, I decided that I really didn't like the bullseye effect of three stacked circles for the center of my big flower.  After playing around with it a bit more, I decided to make the largest and smallest circle, but not the middle one.  I'll put a ring of little berries or seeds or whatever around the center circle instead.  While I was at it, I added some more little berries at the ends of my tulips, because Bernie likes the little berries.  He has finally started painting my bedroom this week, so he deserves some berries!



Applique Pattern, Revised Yet Again

That's what my pattern looks like now.  I'm happy with it.  The block will finish at 16" x 16" so those stacked petals are pretty big.  I'll be stitching the stems first, then the large stacked petals, so I'll be starting out with gentle curves and not-too-severe inside and outside points.  Then I'll reverse applique the tulip centers before stitching down the tulips and leaves.  As for the circles, large and small, I'll probably still use my heat resistant Perfect Circles and More Perfect Circles templates and starch and press them, because I really like how nicely the circles turn out that way.  We'll see.

Fabric Auditions in Progress

Now what has really been bogging me down is the fabric selections.  I decided to piece my block background from print fabrics, and I'm using my kitchen drapery fabric (Monado in Havana colorway from Vervain) as a color and style inspiration.  I like the mood of it.  But I've been tracing templates and cutting little pieces out of all different fabrics, arranging them on my block background, scowling at the result, and then cutting new pieces out of different fabrics.  I thought that some solid fabrics might be better, so I ordered a few shades of Kona solids online... waited for them to arrive in the mail... cut them out... and rejected them!  Then when I finally settled on my favorite combination of fabrics for the large flower petals, I realized that the only chocolate brown in my stash that could work for the bottom petal was one that I bought several years ago in a fat quarter pack.  So I only had enough to do ONE block.  What's that, you say?  You thought I was just making a little sample block to learn a new technique?  No, now that I've invested so much time just with the pattern and the fabric selections, it will have to be more than one block, at least enough for a throw sized quilt that I can drape elegantly over the arm of the sofa in the family room.  My kids will throw it on the floor -- which is why it's called a throw.

New Fabric Left, Stash Fabric Right

This time I called in reinforcements, and Anders and I went to the Bernina quilt shop in Lowell, NC, Sew Much Fun.  We found the closest substitute possible for my brown print. 

But now I'm thinking I might want to do just one block using the original fabric, and use the new fabric for all the other blocks.  Sometimes in a vintage or antique quilt you'll notice that the quiltmaker ran out of a fabric and "made do" by substituting something similar.  Sometimes quiltmakers would deliberately set one block upside down, an intentional mistake symbolizing that no one is perfect.  Anyway, I cut four perfect petals and one little tulip out of my brown daffodil print fabric so far, and I'd rather not throw them in the scrap bin if I can make them work in my quilt.  So, we'll see.

I still have only the vaguest idea which fabrics I'm going to use for the circles and seed/berries in the center of my flower.  After I recut the rest of my leaves from the darker green print fabric, the flower centers will be the last item on the agenda. 

I'm linking up to Judy's Design Wall Monday post because the linky is still open, and I can.  I'm also linking up to Esther's Works In Progress Wednesday, since it IS Wednesday, after all. 



So, Do You EQ? And More Importantly, Should I?

Photo Courtesy Electric Quilt, Quilt Design by Deb Crine

I have been intrigued by the possibilities of Electric Quilt (EQ)software for several years, but have not purchased it yet. In my interior design business, I went through several purchases of design rendering software that worked great if you limited the furniture shapes and drapery styles in your projects to the vector line drawings that came preloaded into the design software, but whenever I wanted to create something totally different and unique for a client (which turned out to be most of the time), the software ended up being a nightmare and a limitation instead of the great time saver I thought it would be. My husband calls those my "shelfware" purchases, software I invested in that I end up not using, and it's just sitting on the shelf getting dusty and making me feel guilty.  I do have Bernina's DesignerPlus embroidery design software (v6)  that I use often and I did eventually find an interior design software that I was able to use successfully most of the time.  I understand that every software package has a learning curve and I am willing to put in the time to learn how to use a new software program, as long as the investment of time and money will pay off with the results I'm looking for.  My frustration with design software in the past has always been hitting a roadblock when I want to design something "outside the box" of what the software designers anticipated users would try to do.




Layout I Wanted To Use

So, EQ: I'm interested for two reasons, but not sure if EQ can help me with either. First, I like to use as many different fabrics in my quilts as I can and with my recent scrappy Drunkard's Path quilt for Lars's bedroom, I was not able to use the layout I wanted because I ended up not having enough value contrast for the pattern to show up. 

 

See how the "path" pattern didn't show up with my blocks?

I do like how this quilt turned out in the end, but I had originally planned to make a Drunkard's Path quilt and I'm pretty sure that it's a Mill Wheel or something else when you lay the blocks this way. 


Finished "Drunken Dragons" Quilt with Alternate Block Layout

It annoys me to have started out making something from scratch, and then to STILL not have it end up the way I wanted it to be. 

 

I know that I could have previewed fabric selections ahead of time on the computer using the Drunkard's Path block that is surely already included in the EQ software

s block library, and I understand that there are even "stash" CDs available with major manufacturer's current fabric offerings so I could have played with color and value alone, or actually filled each patch with a fabric pattern the way I fill drapery panels with fabric in my interior design software. But there's no "Rebecca's Stash" CD with all of MY fabrics, and whereas I might use three or four fabrics in a window treatment design, there could be HUNDREDS of fabrics in a single quilt.

I know from the EQ web site that you can scan in, upload, and save your own fabrics in EQ7.  The web site also says that the software will "automatically scale" your fabric so the design you create in EQ is what you get when you make it up in your actual fabric.  It seems as though you can also rotate patterned fabric in EQ to accurately preview "fussy cutting" options for large prints in EQ7, but I don't know how well those functions really work.  Also, I often use fabric scraps for which I no longer have big yardage pieces to scan, and if I had hundreds of tiny scraps to audition it would take forever to scan them all in.  I wonder whether there is an easier way to play around with color and value for scrappy quilt designs in EQ7?

Vervain Monado fabric, Havana colorway

The other thing I was hoping that I could do with EQ7 is to create some really weird curved blocks. I love these traditional, huge scale drapery prints that have pattern repeats that are basically on-point quilt block shapes, except that the top and bottom are pointy and the sides are curved, like tessellated onions that fit together, like the Monado fabric from Vervain shown at left, which is actually my kitchen drapery fabric.  Wouldn't it be cool to do Baltimore style applique on blocks that fit together that way, maybe even with serpentine sashing from modified hexagon shapes?  I have never seen a quilt like that before -- would EQ7 allow me to easily create a templates for a block and borders like that so that everything (hopefully!) would fit together and lay flat at the end? Or when they say you can "draw any block" with EQ7, is that limited to square or rectangular blocks with straight lines?

 

Fontenay Vase Fabric from F. Schumacher, Porcelain Blue

The F. Schumacher linen print shown above is one of Bernie's favorites.  I suppose I could just do boring (but expensive!) drapery panels from this fabric, but the more I look at this print, the more I'm seeing applique possibilities with lots of embroidery embellishment.  Those darling little green grapes or berries or whatever they are: stuffed!  The little dots on the edges of the taupey beige border around the urn: French knots!  And instead of making every block the same on my quilt, I could do a different historical Baltimore Album urn with flowers on each block. 

 

So...  Do you have EQ?  If so, do you use it?  Can it do what I want it to do?  Any advice or suggestions greatly appreciated. 

Laundry Room Window Treatment Sewn from Scraps

It's Done!  Quit Nagging Me!

My kitchen drapery panels were installed back in 2008, and I've been holding onto a scrap of leftover drapery fabric ever since.  I knew I could do something with it for the small window in my laundry room, which is adjacent to the kitchen and has the same cabinetry and granite, but I've been very busy for the past four years and have not had time to do anything with it.  Um, that's my story, and I'm sticking to it!  My husband started nagging me about it a few months ago, and I retorted that he needed to repaint the laundry room before I could even think about making a window treatment.  When he hauled out the paint rollers and called my bluff I had no more excuses.

The fabric is Monado in Havana colorway from Vervain.  I found a reddish fabric for the contrast pleats in a pile in my studio, left over from a client's project so long ago that I don't remember where it came from.  (Note: I really should have contrast lined those pleats instead of using white drapery lining for those pieces, because I don't like that I can see white lining peeking out there from the front).  The trim at the bottom of the valance was another leftover piece from a long-ago project, a Robert Allen braid that is now discontinued, and it was top applied (NOT machine stitched).  The valance is interlined and board mounted, with a narrow contrast piping at the board line.

On the Cutting Table, Ready to be Mounted!

The colors are truest in the photo above, taken just prior to mounting the valance.  I really love this fabric, especially because of the little red-headed birdies.  We have birds that look just like the fabric frequenting our bird feeders in the back yard. 

So here's my newly improved laundry room!  It's really tiny, more like a laundry closet, but the door is always open because I like having the natural light from the window.  The dogs' water dish is in there, too, another reason the door has to stay open.  I think the new window treatment dresses it up a little bit.

I must confess that I loathe sewing window treatments anymore.  I still have some remaining naked windows around the house that I promised to sew for, including the F. Schumacher drapery panels for my office, but I would SO much rather start cutting out my next quilt instead!!

Once Upon a Dining Room: A New Ceiling Reinvigorates an Ever-Changing Space

Finally, my dining room ceiling is finished!  In person, it looks like a midnight sky; pictures (my pictures, anyway) don't do it justice at all.  The ornamental scrollwork design around the chandelier is barely visible in this picture.  It's subtle in real life, but you can see it much better.  It's kind of like a shadow or an echo of the scroll work on the chandelier, and it's embellished with decorative upholstery nails.  The crown molding has a metallic foil finish selected to complement the gold drapery hardware and accents on the light fixtures.

Tantalizing Tassel Fringe: It's All About Levels

Photo courtesy of Samuel & Sons

Occasionally, someone will tell me, with great conviction, that they "don't like drapery trim."  What they usually mean, though, is that they don't like the drapery trim they've seen at their friends' or neighbors' homes, or at the local Calico Curtains store.  Custom soft furnishings are all about attention to detail, and the best passementerie (fancy French word for trimmings) is like the elegant icing on an otherwise ordinary cake.  Decorative trimmings are available in a dizzying array of styles and price points, and I incorporate some kind of passementerie into almost every drapery panel, Roman shade, or pillow that I design.  However, fine trims are luxury items, and you do get what you pay for.

In this post, I'm going to show you some of the different tassel fringes available at different price points.  Although tassel fringes come in a wide range of styles and colors, I'm going to focus on traditional tassel fringe in a gold/camel color for the purpose of comparison. 

Machine-Tied Fascination Tassel Fringe from Milton Decorator Fabrics

This is a very common type of tassel fringe that you can find at your local JoAnn Fabrics as well as many online retailers.  This particular trim sells for $25/yd at Milton Decorator Fabrics.  This trim is made of synthetic fibers, probably rayon and/or poly, and the tassels are machine-tied rather than hand-tied (if you look closely at the top of the tassels, you can see the machine stitching holding the tassel together instead of a smooth coil of hand-wrapped thread).  If you need 13 yards of trim for your drapery project (enough to trim the lead edges of four 110" long drapery panels), a trim like this will run you $325.  From across the room, no one will see those machine stitches, anyway.

Hand-Tied Fascination Fringe from Milton Decorator Fabrics

...However, decorative trimmings are all about attention to detail.  Decorative trimmings invite the viewer to look more closely, and this hand-tied tassel fringe from the same collection is much more elegant and luxurious.  Also available from Milton Decorator Fabrics, this hand-tied Fascination Fringe sells for $48/yd.  If you need 13 yards of trim for that same hypothetical drapery project, your cost for the trim just bumped up to $624.  However, this is what I consider an entry-level trim collection, like the Honda of passementerie.  When you look through magazines like Architectural Digest or Southern Accents, the trims you're seeing are invariably sourced through trade-only suppliers, and most of them are considerably more expensive.

Robert Allen Scallop Trim in 14 Karat

The tassel fringe at left is available through interior designers from Robert Allen.  It's a rayon hand-tied tassel fringe with an interesting header, and it retails for $99/yd.  Going back to our imaginary drapery project, 13 yards of this trim is going to cost $1,287. 

Robert Allen Velvet Trim in 14 Karat

This Velvet Trim is from the same Robert Allen collection, still made of synthetic fibers, but it has a more elaborate header with a velvet ribbon woven through ladder stitches, and it incorporates a draped rope cord between the tassels as well.  This trim retails for $129 per yard, which translates into $1,677 if we need 13 yards to trim the edges of those four drapery panels.   

Vervain Eliot silk tassel fringe in Camel

 The trim pictured above is exclusive to the design trade from Vervain.  It's a hand-tied tassel fringe, but it's 100% silk rather than rayon.  It's lustrous, soft, and the color is rich and luminous.  No other fiber accepts dye the same way silk does, so I like to use 100% silk trims with 100% silk fabrics whenever possible for the best color match.  Of course, there's a reason not all trims are made of silk.  This tassel fringe retails for $132 per yard, so it would cost $1,716 to trim the lead edges of our four drapery panels.  That's the cost of the trim alone, in addition to the cost of the drapery panels themselves and the labor for hand-stitching the trim in place.

Photo Courtesy of Stroheim

Supposing price is not an issue, and you love silk trim, but you're looking for something more playful and unique?  Look at the impact this silk Pom Pom tassel fringe from Stroheim makes along the bottom edge of a simple balloon shade.    I love how the thread connecting the little pom pom balls is barely visible from a distance, so the little balls seem to be suspended in midair along the edge of the shade.  Here's a closeup shot of that same Stroheim pom pom fringe in a gold colorway:

Silk Pom Pom Tassel fringe from Stroheim

Stroheim trim is also sold to the Trade.  This is an especially beautiful collection from Stroheim, and the coordinating tassel tiebacks and braids are exquisite.  I love the mottled color variation in this collection -- the large drapery tiebacks almost appear tie-dyed, which gives it a Bohemian flair.  This pom pom fringe retails for $232 per yard, so the 13 yards we'd need for our four drapery panels would cost $3,016. 

Now for my favorite tassel fringe of all (favorite today, anyway): the Normandy Ornamental silk tassel fringe from Samuel & Sons, which was shown on a detail shot of a drapery panel in the photo at the very top of this post:

Normandy Ornamental molded tassel fringe in Nuance d'Or

Not only is this a silk trim, but look at the exquisite detailing!  At $290 per yard, this is the most expensive trim I'm showing you today (although it's not the most expensive trim available, not by a long shot).  Trimming those four hypothetical drapery panels with this breathtaking trim would cost $3,770 -- just for the tassel fringe.  As you can see in the photo below, that window treatment also has a coordinating wide braid trim layered next to the tassel fringe, double tassel tiebacks, a decorative hardware holdback, and what appears to be an expensive embroidered silk drapery fabric.

Photo courtesy of Samuel & Sons

Obviously, this look is not going to be practical or affordable for everyone.  If you live in an historic home, or you long for an Old World European flair, there are ways of bringing a little of this in without having to empty your kids' college accounts to pay for the draperies.

• Look for a similar trim at a less expensive price point.  From across the room, the $100/yd trim may look almost as good as the $300/yd trim.
• Consider a less expensive drapery fabric to offset the price of the trim.  Gorgeous high-end passementerie can turn a simple solid silk taffeta into an extraordinary drapery treatment, and not only are the solid fabrics less expensive than prints or embroidered patterned fabrics, but you will probably need less yardage since you won't have the waste required for matching the pattern repeat.  This is especially true for swag valances and other top treatments where the same motif needs to be centered on each piece that is cut from your fabric.
• 
  
  
  Remember that sometimes, less is more.  With our example of 110" long single width drapery panels, we can use half as much trim if we apply it horizontally instead of vertically.  An attached panel valance, as shown above, is a great way to showcase a beautiful trim in a horizontal application. 
• Embellish readymade drapery panels with designer trimmings.  Even if you're working on a tight budget and hiring a designer is out of the question, adding tassel fringe to the edges of readymade drapery panels is an easy DIY project to mimic a custom look. Start with solid silk drapery panels from someplace like Restoration Hardware.  Make sure the drapery panels are lined, preferably also interlined with flannel, or they will hang at your window like limp sheets!  Also, no matter what your sewing machine dealer tells you, machine stitching trim to drapery projects will create a horrible puckering mess. The professional drapery workroom that fabricates my designs always stitches trims like these by hand, but if you absolutely can't do it that way, you'd be better off with a hot glue gun than trying to top apply a tassel fringe by machine. Trust me!
• Pillows to the rescue!  If you fall in love with an amazing trim that is too costly for your draperies, consider using it for a throw pillow or two, where you'll only need a few yards. 

Three Days Until Christmas? Let's Rip Out All the Countertops and Start a Kitchen Remodel!

It all started so innocently.  I had ordered wallpaper for the boys' Jack-and-Jill bathroom, but before the paper was installed I wanted to remove the cultured marble vanities and replace them with granite remnants.  My granite fabricator sells leftover pieces from other jobs at a fraction of the regular price, and since the vanities are small I wasn't going to need much, anyway.  Once I was at the granite place, though, looking at all the gorgeous slabs of stone, I started thinking about my kitchen countertops again.  How can I have nicer granite in the boys' bathrooms than I have in my kitchen, after all?

My kitchen has granite countertops that I lovingly refer to as Baltic Barf -- you may be more familiar with the term Baltic Brown.  I have seen some Baltic Brown granite that actually does have brown in it, but alas, mine is decidedly mauve, and not in a good way.  As if the black-and-pink splotched counters weren't bad enough, the builder chose the nastiest, cheapest commercial bathroom type tile on the planet for a backsplash and used huge grout lines.  Yuck, yuck, yuck! 


Our Kitchen Before it was Ours: Home Inspection Day



We've done a lot in the kitchen since we bought the house already: Replaced all the light fixtures, painted, painted again, installed crown molding, custom draperies and shades (naturally), upgraded all of the appliances, recently replaced all the light fixtures again (one of the dangers of the design biz), and upgraded the gas fireplace logs in the sitting room area off the kitchen. 

Breakfast Room soon after we moved in, Lars at the table

Breakfast Room with Custom Draperies, Temporary Chandelier

Don't draperies make a HUGE difference?!  This Home Depot chandelier was recently replaced with a nicer, larger one with fabric shades from Nulco that has more of a French flair to it:

French Country Chandelier from Nulco Lighting

And yes, I know the pattern on my dining chair fabric fights with the drapery fabric, but these chairs were a bargain buy at a clearance outlet.  They will eventually be slipcovered, reupholstered, or replaced, once my kids learn to wipe their hands on their napkins instead of on my chairs.  The drapery fabric is from Vervain and I absolutely love it:

Monado from Vervain, Havana Colorway

But still, what continues to bug me most about the kitchen is the pink and black countertop and the wretched backsplash tile.

Previous Owners' Mauve Sofa Complements the Baltic Barf

I had fleeting hopes that I would find some perfect replacement backsplash tile that would make the existing Baltic Barf counter look more terra cotta than pink, but that turned out to be a lost cause.  Although I'm sure Baltic Brown looks great in the right kitchen, mine ain't the right one -- I never in a million years would have selected that stone for my home.  It's just not me. 

So, what kind of stone does say Rebecca, you might ask?  Allow me to introduce you to CD Volcano, three slabs of which are scheduled to be installed in my kitchen next month:

Isn't that breathtaking?  The drawer box that the man is holding in the foreground gives you an idea of the scale.  This stuff is even more dramatic in person. 

Can you believe that's natural stone that just came out of the earth that way?  The owner of the granite import company flew to Brazil to selected CD Volcano himself and bought up the whole lot of it on sight.  If granite could be custom ordered, and I could select all the colors I wanted, I still couldn't come up with a slice of earth more perfect for my kitchen than this one.  Gush, gush, gush!

Since there's a lot going on in the granite, the backsplash is going to be a simple 3" x 5" polished creamy marble in a brick pattern, with a herringbone section inlaid above the stove.  The new faucet is from the Brizo Tresa collection:

http://www.brizo.com/

 So this year, when all the gifts are unwrapped and the debris has all been carted out to the curb and the kids head back to school, I'll have countertop demolition to look forward to!  There will be no post-Christmas blues in my house this year!

Design Tragedy on the Golf Course: Before, After... and After Disaster

This is what my client's husband's home office looked like when I first laid eyes on it in the summer of 2008.  It's located in the walkout basement level of a magnificent custom home in an exclusive country club community.  My clients chose this home because of its breathtaking views of both the golf course and lake, the floorplan and layout of the home, and the impeccable quality of construction and materials used throughout the home.  However, they hated the previous owner's taste in window treatments, such as this vinyl vertical blind wrapped in beige polyester chiffon that reminded my client of "wadded up pantyhose."  Most of the light fixtures and ceiling fans in the home seemed to have been someone's temporary solution rather than a deliberate choice, such as the builder grade white ceiling fans in this room.  Recent retirees, my clients were combining the contents of two previous homes, one in the United States and another in Singapore, and brought with them a unique collection of Asian antique furnishings and art as well as more traditional furnishings, like the solid mahogany desk in this photo.  My assignment was to help the clients make everything work together with new light fixtures, new wall and ceiling treatments, and to design one-of-a-kind window treatments and custom throw pillows for every room in the home. This client was a geologist, so instead of the usual "decorative accessories," this home, and in particular this man's office, was accessorized with museum-quality displays of sculptural fossils, geodes, and enormous gemstone specimens -- to say nothing of a lifetime of mementos and souvenirs collected throughout his career, family photos, and personal papers.

This is what my client's office looked like when I'd finished.  It was the first room I worked on in their home, the very beginning of a project that I worked on continually for at least a year and a half.  The solid granite coffee table in the foreground was hand-picked by my client because he loved the stone.  The armoire on the right is a hand-carved, solid teak Asian antique.  My cornice is upholstered in a menswear inspired silk woven fabric from Beacon Hill, and the multilayered rectangular upholstered pieces on the face of the cornice combine the drapery fabric with a solid black silk/linen, an "X" of Kravet feather braid trim, and a wrought iron pyramid medallion at the center.  The tall, dark cabinet behind the chair is another priceless Asian antique. 

...And THIS is what that same office looks like today, after an electrical fire that started in this room a couple of weeks ago.  The whole wall of window treatments, as well as the windows themselves, are completely gone, as are the silk oriental carpets, all of my beautiful pillows, the hand-carved figurines...  It was so hot in this room that the granite coffee table exploded, but miraculously, the solid mahogany desk protected the important papers filed in its drawers.  Although the doors were closed and the blaze was contained in this room, temperatures exceeded 700 degrees Fahrenheit and the air conditioning was running full blast, blowing smoke and soot through all three stories of the home.

This photo shows an area just outside the office -- taken before the fire, obviously -- at the base of an open circular staircase that functioned like an enormous chimney in the disaster.  I designed the quilted silk cushion and custom throw pillows for this teak bench to complement the handmade silk carpet you see here as well as some antique Indian textiles that were displayed on the wall above (not visible in this photo).  The fabrics are a silk woven from S. Harris, a wool/silk Schumacher, and an embroidered linen Saree Stripe from Schumacher that was also used to cover seats on some teak chairs that aren't in this photo.  All of the pillow and cushion trim is 100% silk from Vervain.

It was so hot that ceiling can lights melted and dripped liquid plastic all over the silk cushions -- that stuff you see in the picture that looks like a giant bird poop is a melted can light. 

This is how the basement game room looked when I first saw it, in the summer of 2008. 

Here's that same room again, in January of this year.  This was one of my favorite spaces in the whole home. The only thing I wanted to change was the stark white ceiling -- and I was working on that before the fire.

This is a closeup of the stunning Lee Jofa upholstery-weight graphic woven fabric we used for the cornices and the silk velvet drapery panels with beaded metallic trim from Kravet Couture.  This is the room with the largest television and best setup for movies, with a secondary kitchen area, a wine cellar, powder bath, and full-sized dining table that you can't see in my pictures.  It was a fabulous space for entertaining, and contained some of the client's most contemporary furnishings.  This was a space casual enough for three generations to relax and play in together, yet formal enough to serve as the backdrop for a catered New Year's Eve party.  Sniff, sniff...

So here you see the lovely game room as it looks today.  It's not that the camera was out of focus, by the way -- there was an incredible amount of lingering smoke and soot in the air when I went through the house with my client and her insurance adjuster to assist with documentation of the loss.  The ceiling isn't white anymore; it's streaked with oily soot, as are the walls and everything else throughout the entire three-story home.  The dark spots you see on the ceiling are burn marks made by the drywall nails due to the extreme heat of the fire.

You can really appreciate how much soot is on everything in this photo.  The two lighter rectangular areas on the wall were covered by artwork.  All the carpeting in this room has been ripped out, the windows across the back wall and all of the drywall, every light fixture, the draperies, and every stick of furniture will need to be replaced.  The whole kitchen area on the other side of the room needs to be ripped out and completely rebuilt as well.  Almost everything on this floor is a complete loss, and it looks like 50-75% of the contents on the main floor will be lost as well, including the kitchen cabinetry and all of my drapery treatments.  Notice how I say "my" draperies -- of course they belong to the client, but it's just devastating to see so much hard work literally gone up in smoke.

So, that's why my blog has fallen silent over the past few weeks while I've been meeting with my client and her insurance adjusters and working on replacement quotes for everything that was destroyed.  My client loved everything I did for her and wants almost everything exactly the way it was before, which is such a wonderful compliment, but some several key fabrics and a couple of trims have been discontinued with no stock available, and I'm going to have to find substitutes for those.

The silver lining to this story is that no one was hurt in the fire and the clients had updated their insurance coverage and documented the contents of their home just the previous year under the advice of their financial planner, so they will be adequately compensated for their material losses.  The moral of this blog post is to take the Boy Scouts' advice and BE PREPARED!  If you haven't done so recently, give your homeowner's insurance agent a call and check to see how much coverage you have for the contents of your home.  Most policies base the contents coverage on a set percentage of the value of your home.  If you have a great deal of expensive electronics, artwork, antiques, or anything else that might push you above that number, you can purchase additional coverage to make sure you can put your home back the way it was in the event of a fire or other catastrophic event.  It's also a good idea to go through your home with a video camera or take still photographs documenting the contents of your home room-by-room and store that information in a safe deposit box or with a relative so you can prove what was in your home if you ever suffer a loss like this one.