French Decorating

After shabby chic and romantic I love french decorating the best. I also like italian antiques, but french wins out as the next favorite.

I've done vignettes like this for years. Maybe from seeing this decorator and others doing it, but my true inspiration comes from a friend in a small Idaho town who did this. I go to the thrift stores and get the books with the most interesting covers. I'll usually stack them together and tie them with a beautiful ribbon and put flowers on top. Over the years I've given most of them away but it does set a romantic mood. I've also used books stacked to put our bedside clock radio on. And even small vases of flowers. It works and is so cheap to do and makes a stunning statement. You might even wish to break up the rows and rows of books with some of these ideas to create little vignettes.

This room is one of my favorite colors - RED! This is a den for a man who is a francophile. How many men would like this room?! I think quite a lot. It is very masculine even though it is red. He also subscribes to the "more is less" decorating philosophy I love. Yep, More is Less for me! He also balances it with different colors of wood in this room and lots of antiques.

I have a friend, Lorena, who has a blue dining room. It's gorgeous but a darker blue than this. I love this room because he's mixed red and blue together. Toile on the wall is red; blue is interspersed around the room on the back of the chairs, plates on the wall and dinnerware and goblets. And the whimsical part is the blue leopard print on the chairs front.

While his living is considered neutral, there really isn't anything "neutral" about it. Blue willow plates grace the wall and there are chairs in other colors thrown around the room but not visible in this photo. He also places red books around this living room to add even more color.