Good Morning.
The first pieces of furniture I purchased during the 1960s would have made excellent additions to the set of Madmen. They had sleek lines with not a bit of fuss anywhere; Danish Modern was what they called it. The bedroom items were made of teak, a popular wood at the time, with the dressers a couple of simple boxes with no hardware. The coffee table was similar in style, along with a television that was a brown square with tapered legs identical to those on the dressers. I didn't go with pink or gray for the upholstery on the couch and chairs, but there was orange and turquoise here and there. Even the salad bowl, made by the Dansk company, was smooth and silky to the touch, but the everyday dishes were not as high-style; they were made from a product called melamine and were complimented, so to speak, with drinking vessels that couldn't rightfully be called glassware because they were also some kind of plastic. I didn't want anything, absolutely nothing, that reminded me of the rosebuds scattered across everything I had sat in, ate from, or gazed upon from the time of my birth until the time of my departure from my parents' house.
Within a few years I began to seriously reconsider my choices. I got the couch reupholstered in a floral pattern and threw out the chair that was shaped like a gravy ladle minus the handle. I didn't want the Picasso prints and got the barn paintings out of storage. I hung curtains with ruffles, tiebacks, and enough yardage to prompt a debate about whether they should be crisscrossed or meet in the center at the top. Either way, we're talking seriously frilly here.
Then people in my family started downsizing and giving stuff away and I took all of it. I grabbed a Victorian settee, a cedar
chest, and several old dressers to replace the sleeky teak. I acquired a table with a copper top that I decided looked just fine with various shades of green and purple swirling about. I got a couple of tea services, not the simple pewter used in colonial times, but elaborate pots with curlicues. The needlepoint chair and ottoman were the greatest thing since canned beer. So were the dishes with scalloped edges and, um, pretty little roses.
Matchy anything drove me nuts. I bought a Spanish bungalow and brought in my conglomeration of things, none of which
were Spanish. I threw down the faded oriental rugs, installed an old butcher block that nicely balanced the stainless steel appliances, and found a corner in the dining room for a beat up statuary pedestal that had been rescued by someone else from a Catholic church that was being torn down. People have reacted to it differently; some stare at it and say nothing, a few like it, sort of, and one or two I have observed shaking their heads in horror. Be careful, you folks who judge so harshly; some day St. Francis or whoever once stood upon it will have a word with you.
Now I'm in a cottage with old hardwood floors and real plaster walls. My living room is a cluttered mess with books, the settee, a comfortable, worn wingback chair, a rustic armoire that houses the TV, and an oriental rug with the edges gnawed off here and there by a couple of dogs during their formative years. One of the culprits is still with me and sleeps on a couch that is decidedly French in feeling, except for the hair, and nearby is a lamp with a pair of Greek lovers. I call them Jack and Diane which means I am not totally out of it yet. Oh yeah, life goes on.
Best regards,
Elisabeth
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