Edwardian & Other Acquisitions

I recently spent a long weekend in Victoria, visiting family and friends. Besides visiting my (long list of) favorite downtown shops and restaurants, I also stopped at all my favorite antique stores!

On this trip, I purchased this pretty Edwardian (c. 1910) chair:

The chair is a little more "pretty" and feminine than my usual pared-down traditional look but I loved its graceful lines, dainty filagreed splat, and turned arm supports. I think it looks so pretty in front of this window with the light shining through. I may place it in my living room in front of the window, or perhaps the bedroom. I intend to reupholster it in a soft pastel fabric (antique rose? soft velvet green? pale blue?), in keeping with the light, airy, Edwardian ethos.

We also purchased this small dresser as we thought it would be very versatile around the house due to its scale and clean styling. It is fairly small (47" tall, 34" wide) and would be lovely in a small bedroom, walk-in closet or especially a child's room:

The piece has been well-loved and it's not at all fancy, but we like the lines and the idea of replacing some ugly but useful big-box store furniture we have. The drawers all slide like silk, which is most unusual for an old piece.

I'm now thinking it would be great in my office, for papers and loose ends. The shop is closing, so the price was right too...

We are arranging shipping this week. Have a lovely week...!

Good bye Gram

My dearest Grandma died in the night. She was 85. I loved her dearly.

She was a good, kind, generous woman of great spiritual faith. I know now exactly where she is and feel a great peace knowing that. My Grandmother had a very hard life but I never once heard her complain or compare her life to others. She believed if you didn't have anything good to say about someone, you should say nothing at all. She had great wit, however, and made frequent brilliant observations about the world and people.

She was very conservative in her values and had strong views about how people, especially women, should conduct themselves (I generally always agreed with her and it has been said that I have her values). Over the years, she frequently commented on my hair (loved it, or hated it), what I was wearing, and always commented that I should wear socks (I usually don't) if I didn't want to catch a cold.

She was, of course, a phenomenal cook. She was always so generous and was always tucking $20 bills in my pocket, from her small income. She knew I liked chocolate and always pulled a box of something or other out of the drawer when I was home. I loved having a piece of candy or a cookie with her.

I never heard her raise her voice once. She was a very gentle person. I aspire to be like her in so many ways.

She loved her family above all else and was a devoted wife, sister, mother, grand-mother, great grandmother and so on. She lost her own mother very young, as a teen, and she spoke about her mother frequently through the years. I am pleased to imagine them together now, sharing the days together again...

She was a person I would call content in life. This is so rare and something we should all strive for, to be grateful for all we have and not covet so much material and social status. She was precious and good and I will miss her.

An Art Collection

I didn't set out to become an art collector, but it seems to be a calling...

Ever since I was a little girl, I've loved art. When I was a child, Reader's Digest, which came to our house, always had an art print on the back cover. I routinely cut these out and hung them on my bedroom walls in plastic sleeves. We didn't have money for real art, but I was quite content with these. I had the bug from an early age.

Most of my prints, engravings, and paintings are pale and neutral in palette, or have gentle colours.

This is an etching I bought in Paris (from a set of three). It is a favorite of mine and I adore the pale colouring and the frame:

I am an equal opportunity collector. I like 50 cent postcards as much as expensive paintings. I love this postcard of a painting by Wm Sergeant Kendall which we saw at the American Art Museum in Washington, DC:

I also bought a pile of English country house etchings on the same trip. I have them piled on the table, as I like to swap them around, and haven't decided yet how to frame them:

I bought this beautiful lady a while ago. It's a bookplate and needs to be framed too. I find her very poised and elegant:

I shared this already - an antique oil painting by Gabriel Spat, who died in 1967. This is probably my favorite thing in the house. We paid a small fortune for this. The frame alone is a masterpiece. If the house is on fire, I will grab the cat, my hard drive, and this:

You've all seen my seascapes a hundred times. They are oil paintings by American artist Al Barker that I got for a song. They were sitting neglected in a box on the floor and each one is valued at close to $1000. I got them for $50 apiece (this NEVER happens to me). The painting in the foreground is a recent acquisition by Virginian Robert Young Clay (also a steal):

I spend a lot of time on the internet looking at art and usually have at least one "want" at any given time. I discovered artist Caroline Adams at a gallery in Georgetown (Susan Calloway here) and bought this little print. I have dreams of purchasing an original miniature landscape of hers:

This etching is a favorite (and hard to get a good photo of). It hangs at our front door and shows a lady with her suitor. It was beautifully framed for me by an excellent local framer. I found this in a dusty box on the floor in an antique shop and paid $15 for it. It was very dirty but it cleaned up well. I regret I did not take more that day as he had others (when I went back, the store had gone out of business):

Here is the remaining pair of Paris etchings. I need to have these reframed as they seem a little too plain to me:

This is a print of a sketch of William Morris's wife, drawn by Rossetti. It hangs in our guest room and should really be better framed. I find it quite charming:

This is a wee photo in my bedroom. I am a photography lover, but find many photos too busy for my liking. I prefer sedate or monotone images:

I have included this next one for fun, so you can see how I've evolved...

This is the first proper painting I ever bought, by Quebec artist Pierre Bedard. I paid $1200 for this when I was 28 and had just paid off my student loans. I loved the impressionistic quality and the colours. I find it too "loud" now (this is the only red in the house). But it brightens up our dreary and as-yet-undecorated TV room (which you have never seen, for good reason):

Hope you've enjoyed the little art tour.

Turquoise Dream

You've seen my little guest room before.

I have nice bedding here (duvet and bed linens by St-Geneve) and a d i v i n e new mattress, but the remaining decor was done on a budget (curtains, lamps, and mirror from Ikea and night tables from Pottery Barn). We are still planning to replace the window (it's the last original window in the house), so I'm waiting to upgrade my window coverings:

Lately all the white (together with the oatmeal berber carpet) just feels a little blah...I think it could use a little colour (although I still want to paint the night tables pure white...)

I positively adore this "mineral green" watery quilt from Garnet Hill (but who knows how this looks in real life...):

I will keep the white sheets and pillows, but would add a delightful decorative pillow, like these two from Etsy:

This room from Pottery Barn was my inspiration. The colours are subtle but really brighten up the beigey-white scheme:

Of course, my instinct is to get the taupe quilt instead of the green (I love my neutrals you know), but I think I need a little something *special* in here.

I received my March 2012 House Beautiful issue today and was not surprised to see all sorts of greens, blues and turquoises. After a long winter, I guess we all need something fresh to look forward to!

If you love blue-ish greens and haven't visited, you really must check out the House of Turquoise blog...here.

~ Assorted Silver ~

I thought it would be fun to photograph more of the assorted silver I bought recently, as many of you enjoyed my Danish Princess post (here).

I also decided to try a watermark-logo on my photos (I need to work on this a bit). I first tried using my name in the logo:

And then I tried using Windlost as my logo:

I love this pile of assorted Danish Princess which was amongst the pieces I bought. I was so smitten with it that I just purchased a custom boxed set on eBay to complete 10 place settings!

I love all the varied patterns. They are all silver plate, but all seem quite heavy and good quality. I like both the ornate and the simple patterns:

The cake server (second from left) has a beautiful patina - I did not want to polish it too much and lose this beautiful detail:

These little tiny servers are really fun and very useful for pickles and compotes and odds and ends:

I'm also fond of this gravy ladle which has a very Art Deco vibe:

Do you like the photos?

What about the watermark? I think perhaps I need to soften/fade it a bit more...

I was going to use Windlost for my logo, but I think having my name is nice also - which do you prefer? Using Windlost would direct people to my blog if any of my photos end up on Pinterest or other websites, but using Terri Price Photography highlights my identity as a photographer in addition to writer-decorator!

Where We Live

I sometimes complain that Calgary (and Alberta in general) doesn't have all the traditional antiques, art, and decor that I prefer (like you'd find in the US south or old east coast cities).

But it sure is beautiful!

This stunning video was shot in Alberta. It shows several scenes of downtown Calgary, the nearby prairies and Rocky Mountains. You will recognize Lake Louise from my post (where David and I went skating). They show skaters there in winter and then the lake in summer.

Unlike many travel videos that show places you've never seen in your own country, state or province, this all looks very familiar to me...but the photography is extra stunning. Most of these places are within 2h of our house - I recognize most of them. If you ski or hike here, you will recognize most of these famous spots. Wow!

Turn up your volume & click FULL SCREEN on the lower right of the video for the full effect!

Oh, and apparently only beautiful people live here. :)

P.S. The song is "Roam" by Wil.

When are you booking your trip?

The Sofa

Our new Hickory Chair sofa has been ordered!

I waited patiently for the shop's January upholstery sale to save my 15%!

This is not the look I sought initially. I wanted something traditional, with a camel back or perhaps tufting - something a little curvy and romantic. But I grew tired of searching and realized that I wanted simple elegance more than anything else. I wanted versatility, a more contemporary look to go with all my antiques and old things. I needed something to balance all the curves and cabriole legs in the room. And I wanted a top quality piece that I can reupholster a time or two. Hickory Chair makes exceptional furniture.

A high back was a must, for reading in the evenings, and the spring down seat and goose feather pillows are soooo comfortable! It also needed a really good reading arm. I also love that the seat cushions are tied down so they don't spring up!

I saw a LOT of sofas online that I liked, but decided that I must sit on the sofa and love it, so that limited my choices to the local market, or our travels (I really wanted a $12,000 Baker sofa in Georgetown, but David would not allow it). I am a slave to comfort, so it had to sit right. I don't understand how people can buy furniture they've never sat in. I have much higher standards.

I also needed the right scale for the house. Our living room is not large, so I needed a piece that was neither too deep nor too long (like many of the new sofas which are sooo overscale).

Although I really wanted a very expensive velvet, I halved my costs by choosing a mid-grade fabric, a lovely linen-cotton blend which I showed you before. It has the slubbing of linen but the softness of cotton or worn linen:

I'm already dreaming of velvet pillows, in taupes and grey-browns. Or maybe something in dark green for Christmas?!

I can't wait to take delivery. Next month I will order the chair I've been wanting. Yay!

Pretty Silver & Such

I recently purchased an assorted lot of old silver-plated flatware at an antique shop.

I'll post photos of my favorite pieces soon - there are some *beautiful* patterns and a nice variety of very interesting serving pieces.

One of my favorite patterns is this one:

The pattern is called Danish Princess (1938) by Holmes and Edwards. I think it's very charming with its acanthus-like motif:

Now I'm definitely on the hunt for more...!

With Christmas put away, I finally reorganized the dining room!

To cleanse my visual palette, I've gone with a decidedly all-white look for a while:

I did pull out my favorite blue silk pillow for a dash of colour on a side chair (to accompany our lovely Al Barker seascapes):

I never tire of these stormy scenes:

So that's my little interior update!

After a very mild Christmas, it is suddenly growing cold here with snow on the way.

I'm going to hunker down and rest tomorrow (headaches are still brutal) and dream of my next project...

Sweetness

If I weren't an engineer-writer-decorator-photographer-aesthete, I might have been a baker.

I do love the pursuit of baking but I don't indulge myself as often as I'd like (who needs the calories?).

Over the holidays, I made my first proper Christmas pudding (a resounding success), but I also tried my hand at two pumpkin desserts which appeal to the non-lovers of chocolate in our family.

The first was this Pumpkin Ginger Roulade (a 5-star recipe from the Barefoot Contessa!) - a soft rolled pumpkin cake filled with crystallized ginger finely minced into mascarpone cream:

It was so lovely with vanilla ice cream and coffee, but I warn you, it is very, very rich!

I served it on a darling Limoges platter (one of my favorite things) that I bought at the Vanves flea market in Paris:

You can find the recipe here.

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My next recipe is a definite family favorite:

~ Upside Down Pumpkin Cake with Cranberry & Pecan topping ~

I cannot say enough about this beautiful cake!

The recipe makes a soft moist pumpkin cake with a crunchy tart-sweet topping of beautiful cranberries and toasted pecans in a brown sugar-butter syrup. It is simply delicious served with whipped cream and coffee:

The original recipe calls for a 9x9 square pan, but I use a funnel pan...the wreath-like presentation is much much prettier for Christmas!

You can find the recipe, by pastry chef Emily Luchetti, here. Her book, A Passion for Desserts, is my favorite dessert cookbook.

I served the cake on my lovely pink and gold bone Limoges bird plates, which my mother gave me in October when I was home. Each of the six plates has a different bird, and the plates are very fine and appear to be quite old:

I think these two desserts make a lovely alternative to pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving or Christmas!

New Year New Furniture

I feel like I accomplished very little over the holidays except nursing headaches and drowning my sorrows in chocolate squares and cranberry cake. I switched medications and have been suffering terrible insomnia as the previous medication was very sedating and I'd taken it 10 years!! I worked down my dosage to zero, and have been paying for it these past two weeks. So the holidays feel like they were about sleep deprivation and exhaustion more than anything else.

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But yesterday, I did finally settle on fabrics for our new chair and sofa! We are hoping to replace our sofa and chair within the next 6 months. I want to do neutral solids on each as I am not pattern-adept and want to keep our small space clean and simple. I plan to do some beautiful pillows to add back colour to the room.

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The sofa fabric is the rougher linen in the background. It's a linen-cotton blend with some nice slubbing for texture:

The sofa we're planning is from Hickory Chair and looks like this:

I love the clean lines and the tight back, and also the higher back and arm for long periods of sitting and reading. I originally wanted a bench seat, but don't want to pay the customization charges and actually like this look. If I reupholster it in the future, I can always do a bench seat then.

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The sofa is 81" long, which fits our small living room perfectly (our current sofa is 84"). The frame is kiln-dried hardwood and the springs are hand-tied and all those other good things which will make this a very good sofa for a long time.

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The chair fabric is in the foreground. It is very soft and is also a linen-cotton blend:

The chair is this one, from Lee. which you've seen a few times! It is perfect - a wonderful reading chair that is more modern than I wanted, but has grown on me due to its immense comfort, tall back, great reading arms and wide curl-up seat:

I want the swivel version, so unfortunately I have to do a skirt. I'm hoping for a skirt that looks like this, if Lee will customize it for me (still waiting on this info!). Otherwise I may have to break the bank and have it slipcovered after it arrives:

That's all for now. Biscuit will miss the big arms on our current sofa, as they are his frequent perch!

The old furniture will go to the TV room, where it is sorely needed!

Hope your work week is great!