Extraordinary Women Blog #2 –
The Joy of Nesting
As Gloria Vanderbilt said, Decorating is autobiography.”
How you decorate your home tells the story of you. What interests you is evident in what fills your rooms- whether it is books, music, birds, or flowers. What you’ve kept provides a glimpse into your past experi- ences, maybe even people who were important to you. The colors you use, how comfortable your seating is, where the tables and seating arrangement are all tells the story of you. Gloria was right. Your deco- rating is autobiographical.
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But first I have to admit that I’m a nester. Sometimes I wish I wasn’t because I also like to move! Crazy dichotomy. But maybe moving just allows me to step into my nester mode, which makes me feel good. And nesting grounds me but because I’m a nester, I struggle with Airbnb’s, and honestly most hotel rooms. I have to find ways to make the space my own as quickly as possible so I can settle my energy.
Never trained in any design work, I’ve learned about my own design loves by observing, reading, and doing.
I remember back to my teen years. When my older sister left the family home, I moved into the tiny room my parents had previously slept in, and finally, I had my own bedroom. I loved it. My little bedroom was part of the original house, so it had windows on two sides, two goofy but tiny closets, and a built-in cup- board. I went to work.
The first summer, I took off the doors to that cupboard and painted the ceiling and the inside of that cup- board a beautiful deep green. On the cupboard shelves, I did arrangements of photos, my little treasures and of course, my books. I loved lying in bed and looking at my green ceiling. The next summer, I went completely different and painted the ceiling and inside of the cupboard a rich brown. That was the begin- ning of my nesting, which for me means trying out ideas.
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Visual images are the way to get ideas and then we have to do something like pull out a paint brush or purchase a wall paper if we want to turn our ideas into action.
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Here are a few of my favorites.
Films that have inspired me.
It’s Complicated
Meryl Streep’s home in this movie is on an amazing piece of property. You don’t get to see the entire home in the movie, but there is a tiny kitchen that is open to the large dining area. And the little interior courtyard where she had prepared dinner for her ex-husband, was spectacular. What I loved about this home was the coziness, the warmth, the calmness that was present no matter who she was entertaining.
When I moved to Minnesota for my kids and renovated a 100-year-old home, (which had real horse hair for insu- lation!) the kitchen in this movie was part of my inspiration. I took the original dining room of the home and incor- porated it into a part of my new kitchen addition at the back of the house. I didn’t stay in Minnesota long enough to create my backyard dining area, but this movie was integral part of my inspiration along with my love of books and cozy seating.
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Something’s Gotta Give
Now this is a home on a grand scale. Every room is huge so when I fell in love with it, I had to pull in what it was that I really loved in order to imagine any part of it in my home. The beautiful desk in her bedroom where she does all her writing, faces outside so her back is to the room when she’s writing.
In my old Minnesota home, I made what was once a porch into my office and my desk faced the outside. Truly, it was fabulous Covid therapy.
For my bedrooms, I pulled the photo albums, the stones in the jars, the cleanness of the color palette used throughout the home as my inspiration.
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Desk Set
When I saw Katherine Hepburn’s New York apartment, I fell in love. First of all, I like big cities, and I like the challenge reimagining tiny and elegant spaces. In the movie, there is a separation of purpose to each room. There is an entry, a dining/living room, a bedroom, and a kitchen. All small but lovely, interesting, and elegant.
This movie was a part of my inspiration for my Paris apartment. The entire building had been renovated. It started out as part of a convent, but evolved into offices of the Ministry of Education, so
they had to start fresh when the developer renovated the building.
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My apartment has one large main room, which had embraced the open con- cept American style that so many French people love. But I decided that open concept wasn’t the feeling I wanted. So, I put up a wall to separate the living area from the kitchen, added moulding and changed out the counter tops.
Not only did the wall now block out the view of my coffee and tea machines, but putting up that wall, allowed me to add upper cabinets with glass doors in the kitchen that highlighted my china and glassware addiction on one side, and a beautiful mirror with sconces on the living area side.
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You’ve Got Mail
Another NYC apartment that has character. The kitchen is off in a tiny corner but there is a large dining room and a multi-purpose bedroom. It was the books, the flowers, the comfortable seating, and the light that so appealed to me.
There is most certainly a trend here….
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Books that have inspired me….
Kit Kemp Design Secrets
I love Kit Kemp’s design style. All of it, so any of her books are fantastic.
Kit incorporates color into all her designs and as the co-owner of Firmdale Hotels with her husband, she has lots of spaces and places to try out her different ideas.
Kit also incorporates the quirky. How can you be elegant, quirky, AND comfortable? Kit has figured it out. When in London I stay at her Number Sixteen hotel and whether I’m sitting in one of the reception rooms or out in the garden, I find myself sinking into a sort of lifestyle that I want to live in. Some of her hotels are much larger than Number Sixteen, and she is still able to attain that same level of comfort, interest, and elegance.
It’s like Kit creates stories with the various places inside her hotels. Not autobiographical, but fictional stories. The library in her Covent Garden hotel has a desk that filled with interesting curiosities that make you wonder about the man who sat there…until you realize there was no man…you’ve created him! The framed book of bird cutout that hangs in one of the reception rooms at Number Sixteen is astounding. The honor bar layout is not only comfortable but provides ideas for your own home bar area. The conservatory wallpaper is the transition from the inside to the outside garden. Everywhere you go, there is a story.
I embraced Kit when I decorated my newest Boston apartment. I welcomed in colors and a casual elegance that I had never previously embraced for any home.
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At the beginning I worried a bit over getting tired of all that color. But remember, we aren’t decorating for eternity…we are decorating in the way that feels right for us now. If Gloria Vanderbilt was correct … your autobiography will have many chapters.
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Actually, all of Charlotte Moss’s books provide a wealth of ideas. Every book she writes inspires me. Now Charlotte is a Southern woman, and somehow the women of the south have a deco- rating style sense that is beyond perfection and everything I love. Every southern woman I know, has created beautiful homes. China, silver, and glassware is integral to a southern wom- an’s aesthetic, so maybe that is the draw for me. But it’s more than that. Charlotte inspires all of us to bring not only elegance into our home decorating but a good bit of romance and who doesn’t need romance in their lives even it is just you in your home.
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French Essence by Vicki Archer
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Vicki is known much more for her personal style blog than home décor, but I love this book. The photographs are gorgeous and the section on collections is especially interesting. Vicki meshes styles and is masterful at repurposing old items into new uses. Check out the holder she uses for her Chanel foundation bottles and the photo of the blue boxes, books, and porcelain sheep. Intriguing. But collections are interesting and of course carry stories…I guess I just love stories of all kinds.
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This is a book that shows you how to incorporate antiques into your home décor without having your home look like a consignment shop or an old auntie’s house. The new dining table with old chairs. The little French side tables next to your contemporary sofa. Tara takes us into several of her design projects and gives us ideas we can incorporate in our own spaces.
So important because when you go to a huge flea market like Brimfield in MA, round top in Texas or les puces in Saint-Ouen just outside of Paris, you must have a plan, or you’ll get stuck in overwhelm. She also does a great job of explaining auctions and negotiating with vendors.
The book photos also help us to see how artwork completes a room and, in many ways, creates the emotion of the room.
Also, I got a good chuckle with Tara’s suggestion of bringing garden antiques inside our homes as fun and provides warmth to a space. For years, my garden angel was inside my various apartments. It’s only since I finally acquired an apartment with a balcony, that she’s back outside. For an angel that stayed put in an outside garden in Florida for almost 100 years, she’s become a bit of a garden antique nomad.
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Remember ladies, this is YOUR home, YOUR space, YOUR nest.
What do people feel when they come into your home? How do they feel when they leave? In so many of my homes, I have gotten compliments on the decor, but even more treasured are the statements of how my guests feel when they are in my home. Hearing those shared feelings of calmness, warmth, cocooned, inspired…. are when I feel I have truly created my nest for myself and those I welcome into my home.
I hope you enjoyed my jaunt through nesting, décor, and inspiration!
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