Luxury Furniture: retro

Showing posts with label retro. Show all posts

Wednesday, July 17, 2013

Fill your house with art (and gorgeous vintage furniture!)

7:56 AM art, furniture, home decor, interior design, retro, scandinavian design, sideboards, vintage furniture No comments

My recent purchased sideboard and favourite artwork in our house

One of the great things about my job is that I get to meet so many different people in very different houses. This week I picked up a wonderful 1960s McIntosh sideboard and another British-made mid-century desk from a lovely couple in Aberdeen - with a wonderfully eclectic interior. As soon as I arrived I was taken back by the vast amount of original artworks that filled their home. These people clearly were true collectors with great style and taste! Visiting their house also made me re-think my own wall space and where to place artworks. I have always had this idea that a room can only handle one very large piece and a few other smaller pictures on other walls, but the walls in the house of this couple were filled - wall-to-wall - with paintings and it actually looked good. "Just fill it!" the lady said when I told her my dilemma of having too many artworks and not enough walls. I think I'm going to take a leaf out of her book. After all, being surrounded by art can only be a good thing for mind and spirit.

I have made a collection on Pinterest of beautiful rooms filled with art and pictures, combined with iconic Danish furniture, to share this idea with you. What do you think, a winner?

A wall covered in small pictures http://pinterest.com/pin/259027416041063896/

Amazing art in this bedroom http://pinterest.com/pin/259027416041063901/

Art, sideboard and great books - what more do you need in a room? http://pinterest.com/pin/259027416041063902/

Ceramic objects, another love of mine! Great display http://pinterest.com/pin/259027416041063891/

A wonderful monochrome palette http://pinterest.com/pin/259027416041063892/

Great splashed of colour and art display http://pinterest.com/pin/25473554114710163/

http://pinterest.com/pin/229894755948987319/

Who needs a TV when you have this to look at? http://pinterest.com/pin/273030796132204724/

Who says large artworks are only for museums? Fabulous. http://pinterest.com/pin/273030796131276801/

I like how this artwork has been hung to the right rather than centrally. Great wall colour too. http://pinterest.com/pin/273030796130992110/

A vintage sewing box that turned out to be a treasure trove, full of retro fabrics

7:37 AM interior design, Nina's Apartment, pillows, recycling, retro, scandinavian design, treasure hunting, upcycling No comments

Recently I bought an old sewing box from a family clearing the house of an elderly lady who had passed away. I took the box without having a proper look what was inside as I was mainly interested in the vintage style box itself. A few weeks later as I rediscovered the box and opened it up, I found the most amazing stack of 1960s and 70s fabrics, all neatly folded and in the most vibrant colours and crazy patterns, some of them by 1960s textile designers Barbara Brown and Bernard Wardle.
It made me wonder what kind of lady she was, this woman who picked those fabulous fabrics all those years ago and used them for her own creative projects. She must have loved bold colours and graphic patterns as much as I do. She sure had great taste!

I can't wait to make them all into beautiful Summer cushions, which I'm sure the old lady would have liked very much if she she was still with us. Here are three cushions I have made so far;

Tan leather sofas, my new found love.

3:11 AM eclectic interiors, grey walls, interior design aberdeen, Nina's Apartment, retro, tan leather sofas, vintage furniture No comments

Maybe it's the Spring in the air, maybe it's the fact that I've been sitting on the same boring black sofa for years now (my husband "bought it for life" when he was still a bachelor, so I said we could keep it for a bit longer...), but I fancy a change. Not a life change, a sofa change. Normally I would choose a fabric one, either wool or linen, but with two cats and a toddler I think leather is probably not a bad idea. So I've been browsing - yes you guessed it - Pinterest, and here's some pictures of beauties I wanted to share with you today.

Tan leather seems to mix with quite a few colour schemes and styles, whether contemporary, retro or classic. I also love the mix of grey walls and tan leather, combined with some ethnic accent cushions. Natural wooden floors and kelim wool rugs combine well too.

Gorgeous vintage leather sofa and chair with great contemporary art and natural floor boards (http://pinterest.com/pin/486881409685166222/)

I love the graphic rug, ethnic cushions and metal side tables in this picture. A white backdrop is perfect to make the colours pop. http://pinterest.com/pin/486881409685166213/