My Slow Progress: Scrappy Tilda Celebration, Scandi Deco, New Sewing Room + Kitchen Update

Hello from sunny Naples, Florida, my lovelies!  Happy Spring and Happy Easter to all who are celebrating!  Son the Younger went off to spend the weekend with a friend in North Carolina, but Son the Elder, Bernie and I will be having Easter dinner with Bernie's dad and sister.  Alas, no little ones hunting eggs or keeping their eyes peeled to spot an Easter bunny.  Those years sure went by fast!

I haven't written a blog post in a LONG time, so fair warning -- I have lots to say.  ;-)

My Tilda Scrappy Celebration

On to the eye candy, because I know that's what you're here for.  My most recent accomplishment was cutting out all of the pieces for six of these double nine patch blocks, for my Scrappy Celebration quilt project.  The small scale green floral is Tilda Farm Flowers in Green (available here on Etsy).  This fabric is also included in the Tilda's Jubilee Mega Blenders Bundle if, like me, you are crushing on Tilda prints lately and want to add a whole coordinated assortment of these sweet Norwegian prints to your current projects (or to your stash -- no judgement!).  And now, for that icky but necessary disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links.  If you make a purchase after clicking on one of my links, I might be compensated at no additional cost to you.  I feel so dirty now.  Moving on...  

The rose pink solid in the center of my little 9-patch blocks is from a Tilda Solids fat eighths bundle (not sure which shade), the little white squares were cut from my bolt of Moda Bella Solids Off White, and that low volume print with diagonal blue stripes and tiny red dots was pulled from my stash of Who Knows What Purchased Who Knows When.  I'm looking forward to piecing these blocks!

Yummy Tilda Fabrics Cut and Laid Out, Ready to Sew

I'm sure that, if I was following Lissa Alexander's pattern for my Scrappy Celebration-inspired quilt, the instructions probably involve time-saving strip piecing techniques.  However, when I began this project my rotary cutters and rulers were still packed in boxes somewhere, and they are still packed in boxes somewhere since we need to make modifications (amputations!) to my ginormous worktable before it will fit in the much smaller sewing room of our new house in Florida.  So instead of cutting strips for my nine patch blocks, I cut out all of my squares individually with my AccuQuilt GO! fabric cutting dies.  

No Painted Brick Houses for Rebecca

Yesterday my husband innocently queried, "What color should I paint our shutters?"  Ah, thinks me, what color, indeed?  So I went outside, across the cul-de-sac, and gazed thoughtfully at the family abode for awhile.  I had been asked for input.  My creative vision had been called to action!  Yes, loves -- Bernie started it.  For it's no fun at all to choose a paint color for shutters when one is constricted by a sea of reddish-orange brick: the only attractive(?) options are going to be black, blackish-brown, or a very dark green.  But who says the bricks have to STAY reddish-orange?  And, if we (and by that I mean HE) were to paint them, what impact would that have on our curb appeal, hmmm?


What My Brick Might Look Like Painted

The Boring Red Brick Persists...

But alas -- my husband does not WANT to paint our house.  He choked out something like, "Do you know how much that would cost in paint alone?  Do you have any idea how LONG that would take?  I was only going to paint the SHUTTERS!!"

 

And so, friends, another design dream dies and fades away, and I find myself looking aghast at the time and wondering where my afternoon went.  Hopefully your day was more productive than mine was!

 

Updated July 18th, 2013: I no longer want to paint my house.  I don't like how the painted brick looks with my peaked roofline.  So the hours spent on that rendering weren't wasted, after all -- I saved myself the expense and heartache of having the house painted and THEN realizing I didn't like it after all. 

Tips and Tricks: Custom Drapery Sewing Like the Pros

Faux London Shade Valance, Interlined, with In-Seam Bead Trim

These days, I send most of my clients' drapery projects to my wholesale drapery workroom for fabrication, but when I was first starting my business I sewed all of them myself and I still do small window treatments and accessories like throw pillows for clients occasionally.  My workroom experience makes me a more successful designer, because I have a much better understanding of how things are made and how different fabrics and trims behave than designers who don't sew. You will never see me bringing an upholstery chenille to my workroom, asking them to make it into a swag valance!  Since I had just gotten my new sewing machine right before this order was approved, I decided it would be a great first project on my new Bernina 750 QE.  Remember how I was neurotically matching this large-scale botanical bird print fabric a few weeks ago with the help of my machine's dual feed feature?  Now that the drapery valances are finished, out of my studio, and installed in the client's home, I thought I'd share a few tips and tricks for achieving professional results sewing window treatments at home on a domestic sewing machine. 

Rule #1: Beware Drapery Panels!  I know what you're thinking.  Drapery panels are easy -- they're just rectangles with hems on three sides and pleats at the top!  The problem is that they are HUGE rectangles that have to be cut perfectly straight and perfectly square.  If you cut them crooked, they are going to hang crooked.  For a 102" finished length drapery panel, you will be cutting your fabric into 118" lengths.  Single width panels tend to look very skimpy at the window, even if they are just stationary side panels and not operable, so you will need to seam at least one and one half widths of your 54" wide drapery fabric together for each panel.  Now your rectangles measure approximately 80" x 118" (for 1 1/2 width panels) or 107" x 118" (for double width panels).  A professional drapery workroom has huge padded work tables to accommodate projects of this size without anyone having to crawl around the floor, "tabling" the drapery panels to measure for an exact finished length.  Considering that drapery panels are among the most economically priced custom window treatments to have professionally made, I strongly suggest you leave the panels to the pros.  Believe it or not, the more complicated looking valances or "top treatments" are much more manageable to make at home because you will be dealing with much smaller pattern pieces.  My longest cut lengths for these shade valances were 48", so I was able to roll my fabric out on two side-by-side 3' long utility tables, which were clamped together from the bottom to prevent them from moving apart as I was working.

Cutting 54" Wide Drapery Fabric on TWO 72" long Tables

Rule #2: Stay Away from "Big Four" Pattern Company Patterns!  Trust me, that gorgeous swag valance you saw in Veranda was NOT made with a McCall's Home Dec pattern!  I recommend M'Fay Patterns because they include excellent instructions and detailed yardage guidelines.  Pate-Meadows Designs has some pretty window treatment patterns as well, but they tend to be more complicated and, unless you're planning to make your pattern exactly as shown in the picture, it can be much more difficult to calculate how much of each fabric and trim you will need to complete your project with these patterns.  I didn't use a pattern for my valances, because I've made treatments like this many times before, but M'Fay London Shade pattern #9316 would be very similar.

I know people love to see "before and after" pictures, so here you go!  My clients had recently purchased this home when I met with them, and they wanted to get rid of the previous homeowner's window treatments and paint colors in this kitchen:



Client's Kitchen Before: Dark, Heavy and Dated.  And no, that isn't my Starbucks on the counter...

Here's my design proposal for the client (below).  The old treatment, which spanned from window to window across the top of the French doors, felt heavy and oppressive to me, and emphasized the width of the room while visually lowering the ceiling.  I proposed treating the windows individually with mock shade valances mounted above the windows, just below the crown molding, to open up the space and add a splash of color without that visual weight, and to display decorative plates in the space above the French doors.  

My Design Rendering Showing the New Mock London Shade Valances

Eleria in Graphite, from Robert Allen

This young couple wanted an updated, more tailored look that was elegant without feeling fussy, in a color palette of warm cream, pale blue, with darker wood tones and fixtures. The wife really loved birds and already owned quite a few accessories with botanical or bird themes, so the Eleria linen print fabric from Robert Allen was perfect for her.  The wall color is Sherwin Williams Macadamia, SW 6142.  I've used that color several times before; it's a great neutral that works with a lot of fabrics and doesn't go too gray or too yellow on the wall.

These are called "mock" or "faux" London Shade valances because they are inoperable -- they do not go up and down, and they do not even have enough length to go up and down.  The fabrication of fabric shades is very similar to that of drapery panels, with your decorative face fabric, cotton flannel interlining ( to prevent too much light coming through and washing out your fabric), and a cotton sateen drapery lining sandwiched together and blind-hemmed at the sides. 


Blind-Hemming the Shade Panel Sides

For blind-hemming interlined drapery or shade panels on my Bernina 750 QE, I used Blind Hem Stitch #9 with my #5D Dual Feed Blind Hem foot, just like I would use to hem a pair of slacks.  Since I'm dealing with three layers of fabric and a lot more bulk for a drapery panel, I reduce my presser foot pressure, increase the stitch length to 3.0, and adjust the stitch width to around 4.0-4.3.  It's important to test the stitch width on a scrap sandwich of your actual drapery fabric, lining, and interlining, folded back just like the hem on your actual project, to determine the correct stitch width.  If your stitch is too narrow, you will just catch the lining and your interlining and face fabric will not be secured.  If your stitch is too wide, you will see a big ugly stitch on the right side of your hem.  It's crucial that your thread is perfectly matched to the predominant color of your main drapery fabric for the blind hem.  If you don't want to do a blind hem by machine, your other option would be to hand stitch the hems.  NO top stitching!  If your fabric is any kind of a velvet, hand stitching all of the hems is mandatory.

Kravet Strie Ball Trim in Platinum

Because some of the lining is going to show at the bottom of this type of shade, I cut a 9" deep facing for each shade from my main drapery fabric.  I used a Kravet wrapped bead trim for these shades, which I inserted in the seam at the bottom of each panel so only the bead balls would show, not the header -- I think that looks cleaner and more current.  It gives the illusion that each little thread-wrapped ball was attached individually to the shade.  So the bead trim was basted across the bottom of the shade on the right side, with the trim header entirely inside the seam allowance and a LONG basting stitch to reduce the likelihood of puckering (I think the dual feed helped with this as well), and then the facing strip was sewn to the bottom of the shade, RST.  Then the facing was wrapped around to the lining side of the shade, raw edges pressed under about 1", and STITCHED BY HAND to the lining, just like invisible applique, to hold it in place.  I did not want to take the chance that machine blind hem stitches might go through to the interlining or face fabric, even if I attempted to set my stitch width so that only the lining was caught in the hem, because if the three layers stretch or contract with changes in humidity I would get dimples on the front of the window treatment anywhere that a stitch happened to go through all three layers.  If you absolutely cannot bring yourself to stitch this by hand, I suppose you could use that Steam-A-Seam stuff to fuse it instead if you're sewing something for your own home and you're deathly allergic to hand sewing.  I was doing this for a client, so I stitched this by hand with tiny, invisible stitches, thinking ahead to the applique projects I'm planning for later this year!

At this point, the sides and bottom of the shade valances were finished, but I still had raw fabric edges at the top.  I stitched 1 1/2" down from the top for my board line (used to precisely position the treatment when it came time to staple it to a fabric-wrapped dust board), and then I serged the raw edge for a clean finish with no frayed edges.

What next? More hand sewing!  Little white plastic Roman Shade rings were hand stitched to the back of the shade at the sides and in the center of the pleated areas, at 6" intervals, using an off-white jeans thread (for strength) that matched my linen fabric perfectly, going all the way through all three layers.  It took about an hour to an hour and a half to measure, mark placement, and hand stitch the rings for each shade.  It would have taken MUCH longer if this was an operable shade, because then it would have had about three times as many rings going down the length of each shade.

Some people like to stitch their pleats at the top of these shades prior to board mounting, but I like to make the pleats as I'm mounting the valances so I can make any necessary adjustments to get the fabric taut, but not pulling, in the flat sections.  I mark the top of the shade at the center point, and I make little marks at the center of each pleat.  I make corresponding pencil marks on the top of my fabric-wrapped board at the center of the board and at the center of each pleat, and then I staple the center and ends of the valance to my board.  Next, I create each pleat and staple it in place, and then distribute additional staples as needed along the top of the boards.  Additional fabric wraps over the top of the stapled valance edge so that the top of the valance looks neat and tidy, which is especially important in those situations where the tops of the dust board will be visible from above, as in two-story vaulted ceiling great rooms, etc.

Once the board mounting process was completed, I gathered those rows of rings together and secured them with a larger clip ring to form the soft gathers at the bottom of the shade.  Done -- finally! 

Finished and Installed!

I love how these valances turned out, and more importantly, my client was thrilled with them.  Pardon the mess in the photo, by the way -- ordinarily I would have cleared off the table before taking pictures, but it was an early morning installation and we were rushing so my client could get her children to preschool on time. 

This project reminded me of one of the most important reasons that I continue to occasionally sew some of my clients' window treatments: Every time I do, it takes me at least three times as long as I expected it to, and I realize once again just how much time, labor, and skill goes into every successful drapery treatment.  My drapery workroom is a tremendously valuable resource, and knowing that they can skillfully execute any design I dream up is crucial to the success of my design business, as well as to my own sanity.  Because, when I'm sewing window treatments for clients, I don't get to do ANY of my own projects, and I completely lose my favorite hobby for the entire time that a client's project is in progress.  Sharon and Debra, if you're reading this -- the next one is coming your way!

This week, I need to finish that Dresden Plate quilt for my neice's 5th birthday on MARCH 10th.  Enjoy the rest of your weekend, everyone!

New Paintings from Santa Fe Artist Michael Kessler



I love the new paintings contemporary artist Michael Kessler has been working on, including this one that was recently installed in a gallery in Hawaii. Kessler's work is a fine example of the complexity and emotional richness that can be achieved through abstract art. The greens he's working with have captivated me -- there's something familiar about this color, like a faraway memory I just can't put my finger on. This painting in particular reminds me of fractured memories in the subconscious, dream sequences that you're trying to put back in order. I wish I could see this in person!

To see more of Kessler's latest works, check out his blog here. The exhibit in Hawaii opens on December 18th.

In Progress: Master Bath Facelift for My Most Demanding Client -- Me!

It can be dangerous when interior designers go house-hunting.  When most people tour homes on the market, they notice everything they don't like about the property and discount their offer accordingly.  Designers tend to see all of the possibilities of what the property could be, with a few minor changes...  Those are the Famous Last Words.  Fortunately, when we bought our current home three years ago, it had been sitting on the market for awhile because other buyers weren't able to overlook a handful of goofy flaws, so we didn't overpay for the property even though I was seeing it through my rose-colored glasses of design optimism.  We immediately began ripping things out and replacing them, and those "few minor changes" were inevitably followed by a few more minor changes...
This is what our master bathroom looked like when we moved in:

Yuck!  At first I couldn't figure out why there was a blank space between the his and hers vanities on this wall, and I know this was one of the reasons why the home wasn't selling.  Prospective buyers were looking at this and thinking, "What do I do with that?  When I located the original plans for the house, I discovered that the entrance to the master bathroom was supposed to be between the vanities.  When the original homeowners asked the builder to move the door to the adjacent wall (so you enter the master bath directly from the bedroom rather than from the hallway), no one thought to reconfigure the cabinetry.  Mystery solved!

What's more, the doorway was moved right next to the vanity seat, so that if anyone is seated at the vanity when her husband comes sailing into the bathroom, she gets smacked in the back of the head by the door.  Ouch!  You can get a much better feel for the size of this room from the second photo, too.  I loved the soaring vaulted ceiling and the spaciousness of this bath, but the scale of the cabinetry was way too small for the space, like it had been reclaimed from a couple of secondary bathrooms somewhere.  The effect was kind of depressing.  I also hated the fluorescent vanity light fixtures (which created all the ambiance of a mental institution at night), the "cultured marble" plasticky countertops, the cabinet knobs...  But oh, the possibilities!  Cabinets, light fixtures, and hardware can all be changed, but the bones of the space were perfect.

Here's one more "before" photo before I move on.  Eventually, I'd like to replace the floor tile with something on a diagonal set, run the same tile in a smaller size up the shower walls, and replace the aluminum framed shower enclosure with frameless glass doors, but that's going to have to wait for Phase Two of this project.

We finally got around to starting the master bathroom project just before the holidays last year. Bernie didn't know we were starting the master bath.  He thought we were going to redo the master closet, and I kind of snuck the bathroom in with the closet, much like pork barreling in Congress. Here's how the master closet started out:

It's way too small for a master closet in a house this size -- but the only way to enlarge it would be to take away from the master bath or from my sewing studio, and I'm not willing to sacrifice the space in either of those rooms. However, the existing wire shelving was hardly maximizing the available space. Since the master bath is spacious and the closet is disproportionately small, I decided to do built-in cabinetry storage in the closet, centered on the door to the bathroom, that would match the bathroom cabinetry. The idea was to give the impression that the master bath and closet are one spacious whole. I also know that, someday when we put this house on the market, prospective buyers will be comparing our home to others in the neighborhood with larger closets, and I know that many of our neighbors have done California Closet type systems.  Stepping it up a notch with true custom cabinetry in the closet turns one of the home's flaws into a selling feature, because other homes at our price point will not have anything like it.

Here's the completed closet.  I wasn't using a wide angle lens so I couldn't get much in each shot; the first photo shows the built in cabinet and my slanted shoe shelving; there are hanging clothes units on the far right and far left as well, and the second photo shows the view of the closet from the bathroom.  Much tidier!  I couldn't resist the semi flush mount fixture with dangling chandelier prisms.  The empty space beneath the drawers is for a fabric-lined basket that will be used for drycleaning.

I would be a very cranky lady if I got smacked upside the head by my bathroom door every morning, so Bernie came to my rescue by building a new vanity area in the no-man's-land between the original cabinets.  The vanity lights in this photo were a temporary solution to save me from fluorescent hell; they were castoffs from a client's project that we later donated to Habitat for Humanity.

You can see that we raised the original vanity on the far right to the same height as the sink countertop.  This photo was taken before the new drawer fronts and doors came in.  My original plan was to match the new cabinetry sections to the existing cabinetry, both to save money as well as to remain consistent with the door and drawer fronts used throughout the rest of the home.  I was able to locate the source the builder used for the door and drawer fronts and ordered the exact same style, but unfortunately the supplier had changed router bits or something because the new drawer fronts were just different enough from the old ones that I couldn't use them side-by-side.  So the old cabinet doors stayed, but all the drawer fronts ended up getting replaced. 

I designed a much taller triple mirror spanning the entire wall, framed with trimwork and topped with heavy crown molding for a custom built-in look.  (The mirrors you're seeing in these photos are still temporary; we'll have custom beveled mirrors made to fit once everything has been painted).  I switched the overhead vanity lights out for a pair of dramatic, oversized sconces for several reasons: the overhead vanity lights drew attention to the fact that the sink on the right wasn't centered on its cabinet, overhead lights cast unflattering shadows when you're trying to apply makeup, and I wanted to emphasize the new large vanity as the focal point on this wall elevation.  Three new can lights were added in the ceiling to supplement the light provided by the sconces.

The cultured marble countertops (which were neither cultured nor marble) were replaced with dark brown Emperador marble, and I fell in love with these pricey bridge faucets from Brizo in Venetian Bronze finish.  Again, the larger scale and drama of these faucets was well suited to the space and complemented the over-the-top sconces nicely.  I also liked that, since Brizo is the high-end subsidiary of Delta and both lines share the same finishes, I was able to purchase less expensive towel rods from Delta that match the faucets perfectly.  You can see the new iron and crystal chandelier I added above the tub reflected in the mirror here, as well:

I love, love, LOVE my faucets and my cabinet knobs, and I was really pleased with the marble countertops as well.  However, I'm sorry to say, my bathroom has looked like this, half-finished with naked drawer fronts and mismatched mirrors, for several months now while I've been busy with clients' projects, High Point furniture market, and the IWCE Vision '10 trade show in Atlanta last week. 

I finally got around to scheduling my painter to come in yesterday to paint the walls, ceilings, trimwork, and all the cabinetry in the closet and bathroom.  I should point out that this is the first time Bernie has ever had professional painters working in our home -- usually he's the painter, but he didn't want anything to do with painting the cabinetry and he doesn't have time to do it, anyway.  But I have fabulous painters that I've used over and over again on client's projects, so I know they will do a great job for me.  Here's what my master bathroom looked like yesterday evening, after a full twelve-hour day of three professionals sanding and priming away like madmen:

Yikes!  Can you see why Bernie didn't want to tackle this paint job himself?  That's my newly-toothless first grader showing off his missing front tooth in the foreground, by the way, and that's just primer that you see on the cabinets and drawers.  As you can see, this is a lot more work than your standard run-of-the-mill interior paint job.  Things to keep in mind in case you're eyeing some outdated cabinetry in your own home: You can only paint your cabinets if they are real wood.  The white thermafoil cabinet doors that builders have been using over the past 10-20 years or so cannot be painted; the paint won't adhere to the plastic coating.  Also, if you're repainting existing cabinet doors you will need to sand down almost to bare wood to get the primer to adhere -- talk to your paint store about the best products for your situation.

After a great deal of hemming and hawing and multiple changes of mind, I opted to have my cabinetry, doors, and all the trimwork repainted in Sherwin Williams 6385 Dover White, which has just a hint of ivory to warm it up.  I pulled the shade from the not-quite-white veining in the countertop marble.  I almost went with more of a beigey antique white with a brown glaze for the cabinetry, but then I'd have to go darker with the wall color in order to get a good contrast and I really wanted to keep the light, bright, cheerful feeling.  If I feel like the cabinets are "too white" when they're finished, I can always add a little glazing.  The walls are going to be Sherwin Williams 6120 Believable Buff, and 50% of that color is going on the ceiling.  Of course, if this project was for a client, I would have finalized fabric selections prior to specifying a paint color, but I haven't gotten that far for myself yet.  The cobbler's children never have any shoes...

Meanwhile, the painters are upstairs working away, and I need to call the glass company and schedule them to come out and measure for my custom mirrors sometime next week when the painting is done.  The Hungry Caterpillar quilt is also on today's agenda, as well as the never-ending laundry and some work I need to wrap up to prepare for a client meeting tomorrow afternoon.  How did it get to be noon already?!