By Juliette Guilbert
Adam style is named for Robert Adam, the most famous architect of the British eighteenth century, who revolutionized Neoclassical design and created a style remarkable for its freshness, fluidity, and grace.
Adam, born in 1728, traveled Europe as a young man, studying the architecture of Roman antiquity. When he returned to England, ready to reinterpret classical principles for a modern audience, he set up an architecture firm with his brother James.
The Adams’ work became enormously influential in England and America, where it was known as Federal style and remained the dominant mode in domestic architecture from the 1790s to the 1830s.
Taking inspiration from Roman art, Adam challenged the somewhat rigid pragmatism of the Georgian and neo-Palladian design that preceded him. Where Georgian design was angular, even stolid, Adam style was graceful and curvilinear. Under Adam’s influence, oval shapes began to appear everywhere, from drawer pulls to entire oval rooms. And where Georgian style confined itself to ancient Greek and Roman designs, Adam was eclectic in his influences, taking decorative elements from Byzantine, Italian Baroque, and Etruscan tradition.
The heart of the Adam revolution was in the details. Under Adam’s influence, decorative ornament exploded into a new exuberance. He brought classical architectural elements indoors, decorating domestic interiors with swags, garlands, vines, medallions, scrolls, and ribbons, painted in delicate or vibrant colors, always balanced with the overall classical proportions of the space.
Along with abundant classical ornament, an Adam room will have graceful, delicately proportioned furniture in the style of Hepplewhite, Chippendale, or Thomas Sheraton. The furniture is also decorated with classical motifs: swags, lyres, urns, medallions, sheaves of wheat.
Adam Style architectural details and ornamentation!
Ceiling medallions, cornices and moldings. Authentic Period and Historic Home architectural ornamentation.
All crafted in genuine plaster.
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Color is very important to this style -- think pastel-hued blues, greens, lilacs, and corals, with white or cream trim. Textures should be refined and smooth: gleaming furniture, satiny wood floors covered with refined area rugs, possibly with classical motifs. Draperies and upholstery should be luxurious, in silk, brocade, and damask.
Capitals and Columns
Create the period style of your dreams with this wide selection of historic, classic and contemporary capitals and pedestals.
Decorative capitals for columns, archways and more.
Period Moldings and Cornices
Moldings and cornices add attractive curves, scale and proportion to any room. They are aesthetically pleasing to the eye and can quickly create a period and historic feel to any home.
Adirondack Style
Smokey Mountain Style
It takes a while to get there, up a winding road that seems to take you back in time as well as up the mountain. When you stop at a filling station, even the gas pumps are vintage red and yellow cylinders.
Along the road, barns and water towers lean at crazy angles, and you have the sense that life in these mist-shrouded mountains hasn’t changed much for two hundred years.
American country style still lingers on small farms and in backwoods retreats. It’s in the spartan grace of a Great Smokies town, or the luxurious rusticity of a hundred year-old Adirondack resort.
But whether you picture yourself putting up preserves on a cast-iron stove or sipping a highball in a knotty-pine lodge, down-home American design means unpretentious comfort and natural beauty.
Woodwork is a good place to begin. Walls and floors of warm, plain pine boards, unfinished for a true pioneer look or stained for a more refined feeling, provide a backdrop for whatever homespun furnishings and accessories catch your fancy. 
Adirondack Bear
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Practical items like old-fashioned cookware, rag rugs and antique quilts are both beautiful and useful. Old farm and household implements have a unique beauty, like the horse-drawn plow. A butter churn, a grain mill, an antique meat grinder, and, of course, a copper kettle are all good accent choices. Restored vintage ranges and refrigerators have become more easily available in recent years, and nothing says country like a cast-iron potbelly heating stove.
If you’re looking more for a turn-of-the-century “Great Camp” and less for a pioneer homestead, try antlers above a stone fireplace, knotty pine paneling, and (for the unsqueamish) hunting trophies and motifs. A generous portion of luxury is appropriate: exquisite lace curtains, a beautifully restored old upright piano for evening sing-along. Don’t forget cozy nooks with leather armchairs in which to curl up with a book, and, if space permits, multiple fireplaces. And bearskin rugs may have fallen out of favor, but plush carpets scattered across wood or stone floors will keep out the chill mountain air. 
This antler framed mirror adds interest
and is a guaranteed conversation starter!
Elk, Mt. Tacoma, Washington
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Meandering country walls made from local stones establish boundaries as well as rustic, country charm.
By: Juliette Gilbert
Outside the early American farmhouse, a wooden sign, carved in the shape of a pointing hand, sternly admonishes: "America: Love It or Leave It." And judging from the contents of the Americana-inspired home, the inhabitants choose to love it.
The house itself, built in 1783, testifies to 200 years of American ideals: simple, forthright lines, welcoming but plain spoken color, only the barest ornament in the form of a weathervane or whitewashed trim. Inside, though, a wealth of treasured Americana provides a touching testimony to a love of home -- and homeland.
The basic furnishings of an Americana house are unpretentious, even homespun. Wide planked oak or pine floors and historic color tones such as muted greens, slate blues and red or coral tones provide a rich historical backdrop. But it is in the details that the space is truly defined.
Decorative arts both naive and accomplished display patriotic colors and themes. Stars and stripes abound, in classic as well as quirky forms. In formal spaces, prized folk art like a beautifully crafted flag quilt can add historical heft to the decor. In less-traveled areas of the house, Old Glory can be put to more quotidian uses.
A flag bedspread and pillows perk up a simple white bedroom set. A comfortable upholstered sofa is adorned with stars-and-stripes throw pillows, making for equal parts Betsy Ross and Edith Bunker.
The Americana home must be neither a museum exhibit nor a kitsch palace. A combination of antique utilitarian artifacts with patriotic crafts can make for an intriguing blend of national history and postmodern junk shop wit.
In one inspired corner, pictured above, austere early American paintings hang beneath a ceiling exuberantly decorated with red and white stripes.
Inside and outside the house, loosely painted commonplace objects in red, white and blue -- like a flag-themed section of picket fence -- add a funky, down-home tone. And for decorators unafraid of the junkyard aesthetic, even old farm machinery, tools, and auto parts can take on a patriotic air.
The most treasured finds of all for the Americana enthusiast may be the commonplace objects -- toys, whatnots, household wares -- of the past, particularly if they have a patriotic theme.
An Abe Lincoln dancing wooden doll reminds us that patriots past also had a sense of fun. When coupled with more substantial pieces of Americana like an antique pie chest or simple country furniture in Shaker or Pennsylvania Dutch style, these whimsical items can take on a touching reverence.
With the advent of the machine age, the rounded organic shapes of Art Nouveau crumbled before the angular, streamlined onslaught of Art Deco. Deco had its roots in the early twentieth century, but really took off after World War I, popularized by films like 42nd Street and Grand Hotel, and made accessible to the masses by modern production techniques.
Art Deco Room
Mcknight, Thomas
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The new style paid homage to industrial design, discarding Art Nouveau’s sinuous curves and pretty pastels in favor of clean lines and starkly modern colors. Deco was an eclectic style, drawing on sources as diverse as industrial machinery, Hollywood glamour, Bauhaus architecture, and Cubist painting. Contemporary fascination with travel and archaeology found its way into the style as well, and the sensational discovery of King Tut’s tomb contributed motifs like papyrus, pyramids, and sphinxes as well as basic Deco building blocks like stepped profiles (the Chrysler Building) and zigzag shapes.
La Flore Decorative-Nympheacee
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La Flore Decorative-Caryophyll
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During the period between the world wars, Art Deco style was everywhere, from the Radio City Music Hall, the ubertemple of Deco design, to the humble Electrolux vacuum. Eighty years later, Deco’s glory is undimmed, its elegance still fresh. Its simple lines and affinity with modern architecture make it a good choice for contemporary interiors, and it is not a terribly hard period look to achieve. There are many fine reproductions of Deco furniture on the market. With the right accessories, a thirties-style leather club chair, a streamlined birdseye maple bedroom set, or a black lacquered cocktail cabinet can anchor a Deco-themed room.
French Fashion, Art Deco
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Art Deco Style architectural details and ornamentation!
Ceiling medallions, cornices and moldings. Authentic Period and Historic Home architectural ornamentation.
All crafted in genuine plaster.
For commercial and residential environments.
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Pair antique or reproduction furnishings with period colors -- black and chrome or white on white in the living room, cream, beige or pale green in the bedroom -- and backdrops like geometric-patterned rugs, faux leopard skins, terrazzo or polished parquet floors. Deco accents are distinctive, but varied. Bakelite and chrome ashtrays. Frosted glass and silver cocktail shakers. Art glass with Aztec or Egyptian designs. African-style figurines. Modernist painting. A lamp in the shape of a nude female figure. The possibilities are as limitless as, well, modernity itself.
Casting off the previous hundred years of architecture and design, Art Nouveau style created a sensation when it exploded onto the Paris and London scenes at the turn of the twentieth century. Although Art Nouveau may appear harmlessly pretty now, late Victorians found its flamboyance shocking, and most either loved it or hated it. It was the first truly modern design style, making a conscious break with history and tradition and beating down the barriers between the fine arts and the decorative arts.
Art Nouveau practitioners like Aubrey Beardsley, Antonio Gaudi, and Gustav Klimt took their inspiration directly from the curvilinear forms of nature, developing a new design lexicon of highly stylized natural forms and exuberantly flowing shapes. “Applied” artists like architect and designer Charles Rennie Mackintosh and glassmaker Louis Comfort Tiffany were not far behind, and spiderwebs, dragonflies, dogwoods, peacock feathers, poppies, locusts, and thistles soon buzzed and blossomed on wallpaper, furniture, textiles, and accents. Sinuous lines, elaborate patterns, and flat, asymmetrical Japanese-inspired compositions were carved or painted onto every available surface. Colors ranged from elegantly muted sage and mustard to opulent lilac, gold, salmon, and robin’s egg blue.
Art Nouveau Lamps
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Ornament is the soul of Art Nouveau design, which held that no object was so mundane that it could not be beautiful. Must-have Art Nouveau accessories include art glass -- jewel-toned Tiffany stained glass, etched Lalique glass, or Galle “cameo glass,” which has a raised design cut out of the glass with acid, are good places to start a collection.
Mackintosh-style ornaments are widely available -- he designed everything from the Glasgow School of Art to jewelry boxes -- and elegant posters by Alphonse Mucha or Jules Cheret add a period flair to an Art Nouveau-inspired space. And while an original Tiffany lamp costs a fortune, Art Nouveau pieces were designed for mass production, and reproductions are widely available.
Decorative friezes, often hand painted, help establish the flowing,
organic feeling to Arts & Crafts interiors
Picking up on the styles and philosophies of William Morris and Charles Renie Macintosh, the American Arts & Crafts movement offered a total way of life-grounded first and foremost in the design of the home and its furnishings.
The Arts & Crafts ideal stressed simplicity, natural materials like wood and brass, and a return to individual craftsmanship-as opposed to the newly dominant methods of mass production. Ornament in Arts & Crafts pieces is limited, and when present, it is meant to echo the function and construction techniques of the piece.
Arts & Crafts pieces were made between about 1895 to 1915 in the U.S. They are based on heavy, rectilinear forms balanced by exquisite details that serve to visually lighten their lines. Visible tenons connect parts of a chair, and Corbel brackets reinforce joints to create graceful profiles. Open parallel slats abound, and stained glass is a staple of Arts & Crafts lamps and home design, contrasting the stability of wood with the soothing presence of air and light.
Arts & Crafts house plans emphasize integration of the house and its environment, using indigenous materials and open visual and physical passage between interior and exterior. Porches, terraces, and porte-cocheres are key to this merging of house and nature. Floor plans are asymmetrical and open, often blending living rooms, dining rooms and reception areas into a flow of spaces.
A blend of natural textures; wood, ceramic and fabric.
American Arts & Crafts was dominated by Gustav Stickley of Upstate New York, Greene & Greene of California, and of course, Frank Lloyd Wright. While Greene & Greene and Wright were heavily influenced by Japanese design, and worked mostly in the high-end market, Stickley and his counterpart Elbert Hubbard tried to bring the earnest 'Craftsman Ideal' to the mass production process. They each designed and manufactured the heavy, slatted oak and leather furniture that now fetches top dollar at auctions. They also published magazines-Hubbard's The Roycrofter and Stickley's The Craftsman: An Illustrated Monthly Magazine in the Interest of Better Art, Better Work, and a Better and More Reasonable Way of Living-featuring bungalow blueprints and other craftwork guides that are still used by devotees of the Craftsman Ideal.
Proportion and scale, along with the interplay between linear movement and the spacious qualities of light play an integral role in creating balance and harmony within the room.
Doors: As the entrance, and welcoming space of the house, doors and porches played an important role in the Arts & Crafts movement.
Early Arts & Crafts doors were often of plain plank construction, fitted with elaborate hinges and latches, rather than knobs, inspired by medieval forms. Later in the movement, painted motifs became popular--either freehand or stenciled--and were supported visually by the use of stained glass.
Windows: The importance placed on light and air is reflected in the large window areas of later Arts & Crafts houses. Sash windows were commonly used, often incorporating leaded glass as a key detail. Elongated window proportions exemplified this style and one would commonly see the pairing of an upper sash bearing small rectangular panes with a tall, single-paned lower sash.
Walls: Color played an important role in the decorator's approach, and a 3 part division of the wall into dado, field and frieze was almost always employed. Full paneling on walls was used on occasion, and stenciled friezes were also favored. With the design of fine wallpapers, lead by Morris and Company of London and Warren, Fuller and Co. of NY, wallpaper was also an accepted wall covering. Early papers boasted floral and medieval designs while the later period would take on Japanese influences. Tapestry hangings were widely used in late interiors.
Ceilings: In the early period, remaining true to medieval designs was preeminent. Treatments included chamfered beams, designed plaster ceilings, with occasional painting and gilding. Decoration that incorporated painted stenciling was desirable, but as the cost might be prohibitive, ceiling papers, often embossed, became much more common. In the later periods, intricate, prefabricated plaster work was frequently used.
Floors: Being true to this movement, it was generally considered that only wood or stone was acceptable for floors. Indigenous woods in America were used, oak or maple, most commonly.
Carpets were regularly used, and though authentic Indian, Turkish and Persian carpets were favored, often machine-manufactured carpets were the norm.
Furniture: A strong design element of the Arts & Crafts movement was the regular use of built-in furniture. It was practical and minimized the clutter that was common in the Victorian era. A window seat beneath a bay window or a bench and sideboard against a wall in the dining room might be incorporated into the house design, for example.
Details: The desire for openness and light stimulated the use of stained-glass in the Arts & Crafts environment. Doors, windows, wall partitions to lamp shades were all treated with this colorful material. With the development of the electric bulb, lighting took on a new meaning within this period. Glass in combination with fine ironwork resulted in innovative ways to accent - as well as provide functional light for - the indoor environment.
Interior Spaces
Stenciled mosaic patterns and hand painted scrolls embellish this Arts & Crafts powder room.
In the Rome and Paris of the seventeenth century, the houses of the wealthy and powerful reached new levels of dynamism and grandeur. Everything from furniture to building facades spilled over with carvings of birds, beasts, fruit and flowers. Elaborate decoration overwhelmed the senses, often alongside fantastic works of painting and sculpture.
Baroque Facade With Stonework.,Verona, Veneto, Italy
Jeffrey Becom/Lonely Planet Images
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Baroque domestic architecture was theatrical, extravagant, seeking to flaunt wealth and astonish the viewer. Where Renaissance design had appealed to the intellect, the Baroque worked on the emotions. Even Counterreformation religious conversions were miraculous visions inspired by lavishly ornamented churches and flamboyant devotional art.
If you don't have the means to build your own Versailles, you can create Baroque opulence with a few well-chosen pieces and the right decorative objects. Materials should be luxurious: silk, damask, velvet, tapestry. Colors should be strong and placed in bold, regal combinations like purple and ochre, indigo and gold. Baroque decorative arts are intricate and rich: large Chinese floral motifs, carved and painted geometric designs, wood inlaid with gold, ebony, or mother of pearl.
Baroque Style architectural details and ornamentation!
Ceiling medallions, cornices and moldings. Authentic Period and Historic Home architectural ornamentation.
All crafted in genuine plaster.
For commercial and residential environments.
Visit architecturalFX.com
Elements of Style
Furniture: Chairs can be carved, inlaid, painted, gilded -- whatever will make them ornate and extravagant. Bed hangings, an oak armoire, and beveled-glass mirrors in the bedroom. In the living and dining rooms, heavy carved built-in cupboards, an oak buffet. Wide, low dining chairs with crossed legs, lion paw feet, and velvet upholstery for a throne like feeling.
Floors: Inlaid wood floors with intricate patterns are typical of this period. Also excellent: black and white tile in diamonds or squares, rush mats, Persian rugs, stone floors, particularly with a painted geometric pattern.
Baroque Architecture (HC)
Pozzo, Andrea
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Walls: Paneling was often painted in geometric shapes. Walls featured lavish floral or figural carvings or paintings, gilding, faux marble or tortoiseshell. Moldings and cornices, however, were plain. Tapestries -- painted fabric, gilded or tooled leather, velvet, damask -- go far in creating this style.
Windows: Full, dramatic draperies, with gold and silver tassels or embroidery. Floral designs, matched with the upholstery, are quite authentic. Window and door latches were widely used during the period.
Lighting: Baroque houses were lit with candles, solid brass, wood, or pewter candlesticks or mirrored sconces are the most authentic. Large chandeliers are appropriate also.
Decorative objects: Chinoiserie is the most important type of decoration: lacquer ware, Chinese snuff bottles, porcelain, fans. Also authentic: blue and white Delftware, gilded frames, small sculpture, busts.
Baroque Portrait of Lady
1923 German Bauhaus Gallery Poster
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The Bauhaus, an architectural school founded by Walter Gropius in 1918, introduced a design principal that would dominate architecture and interior design for the rest of the century: form follows function. The original Bauhaus aimed to create decent housing for the post-WWI German worker. Emanating from the Arts and Crafts movement, Bauhaus immerged as a post war design style that favored simplicity. However, unlike Arts and Crafts, Bauhaus embraced technology, new materials and the mass production of furnishings and fixtures.
Gropius and his followers created classical forms without extraneous ornament. They stressed the search for solutions to contemporary design problems in areas like urban planning, housing and utilitarian mass production methods. The Bauhaus school also offered courses in music, drama and particularly painting. Thus the Bauhaus was rooted in the Arts and Crafts movement but with vision firmly set on the requirements and opportunities of its day.
The Bauhaus principles quickly caught on in the international design community, becoming strongly influential in architectural design. Bauhaus buildings, with its various workshops, studio, school and administrative offices, firmly established the principles of the International Style, an expression of the machine age as the Europeans of the 1920’s wished to see it. The floor plan was designed as a series of cells, each with a specific function, becoming a direct expression, in glass, steel, and thin concrete, of the use of the building (that is, the function – hence form follows function).
The feel of a Bauhaus interior is contemporary and modern. Plain white walls with no moldings and narrow baseboards are de rigueur. Window frames should be simple. Huge picture windows, even walls of glass, are emblematic of this style. The floor plan should be as open as possible, and the space divided with modular furniture, low cabinets or bookcases or perhaps a partial wall made of glass bricks.
Elements of Style:
Colors: Walls are treated as background incorporating sparse tones of black, white, brown, gray, beige, and chrome. Bursts of color are used as accent and accessories, primary colors often adding the splash of red, yellow or blue that livens the austere modern interior.
Bungalow Style
"When you see a cozy one storied dwelling, with low-pitched roof and very wide eaves, lots of windows and an outside chimney of cobble or clinker-brick half hidden by clinging vines -- that is a bungalow, whatever other houses may be."
(Sunset Magazine, Jan.1913)
In the early twentieth century, the modest, welcoming bungalow represented a democratic vision of exceptional home design. Built with wide, open front porches and small shared yards, bungalows turned outward toward their surrounding communities. Indigenous materials, open floor plans and horizontal lines created harmony with the natural landscape.
California Bungalow
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After the fussy, parsed spaces of the Victorian house, the bungalow was an architectural revolution. Dealers in bungalow kits like Sears made professionally-designed homes widely available. Sophisticated design, the integrity of natural materials, and an easygoing style were the driving forces behind the movement.
Decorative patterns were often created using the exterior shingles as an unique design element.
Like the Arts and Crafts and Mission schools that influenced it, Bungalow style emphasizes artisanship, local materials, and rustic detail. Asian influences are common, particularly in the California bungalows of Greene and Greene. Informality and openness are key features of the interior space. Many bungalows replace the formal dining room with a breakfast nook. There is usually no front hall, and the rough stone or brick fireplace provides the focus for the living space.
Pasadena Bungalow, California
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Today's bungalows continue a living, eclectic design tradition. Wall sconces, art glass and stenciled decoration highlight the original beauty of architectural features like wainscoting, box-beam ceilings, and wide wood moldings around the fireplace.
The palette is muted: quiet greens, creams and mustard enhance natural wood, stone, terra cotta and brick. Natural light and the treatment of the garden as an "exterior room" link indoor and outdoor space. Craft is made visible in mortise-and-tenon furniture, hand-hammered copper fixtures, built-in benches and bookcases.
Elements of Style:
Walls: wainscoting, stenciling, muted cream, yellow, sage. Fieldstone, brick.
Ceilings: beams, log accents.
Floors: wood, tile or stone.
Cabinets: built-in shelves or hutches; details like mullioned doors, beveled glass. (Bungalows in California tend to use redwood, while Midwestern and east coast Craftsman houses use more oak.)
Fireplace: stone or brick with wide wood molding on the sides, a mantel above, a beveled glass mirror. Decorative tile around the edges. An over mantel rustic landscape or scenic tiles.
Furniture: built-in benches, breakfast nooks. Mahogany with mortise-and-tenon and peg construction, inlaid tiles, green marble.
Lighting: Craftsman lights on either side of mantel. Prairie style lamps with leaded glass panels, brass base. Simple hanging globe fixtures in inglenook. Hand-hammered copper candlesticks.
Windows: Lots of windows for natural light; many-paned windows, particularly large lower panes and small upper panes; stained glass with Arts and Crafts designs.
A stroll through Old Havana transports you to another time!
You take in pastel-hued colonial buildings, arcades, wooden balconies, and interior courtyards. In Barbados, you come across Georgian townhouses built of coral limestone cut from ancient sea cliffs. Candy-colored, Dutch-gabled facades jostle each other along the narrow streets of Curacao. In Montego Bay, brightly painted cottages surround a cobblestoned town square -- the perfect place to take refuge from the tropical sun with a tall, cool drink.
The Caribbean is a lively array of cultures, set like jewels in a landscape of white beaches, blue mountains and emerald jungle. Along with steel drums, relaxed island culture, and cuisine both spicy and sweet, the charm and vibrancy of Caribbean design make an indelible impression. While many of the basic forms are European -- Dutch, Jacobean, Spanish baroque -- the colors are as vivid as the natural landscape. Houses in shades of mango, lime and dazzling whitewash glow alongside jewel-toned orchids and clear blue ocean. Perfectly manicured green lawns give way to pure white sands.
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Caribbean design reassembles diverse indigenous, African and European elements to suit a tropical environment. Steep gabled roofs and low facades deflect powerful tradewinds. Gingerbread fretwork, wide verandas, and shuttered windows shade interiors from the island sun. Materials like coral and palms come from the local landscape; the region's history as a crossroads adds ballast bricks from colonial ships, hardwoods and corrugated tin.
Simplicity with a touch of colonial elegance provide the foundation for a Caribbean style room. Furniture in white wicker, of course, and mahogany. Floors of natural tile or hardwood, and walls in bright white or tropical color. Shutters (if possible, on three-part jalousie windows) and ceiling fans are a necessity -- as are white linens and a mojito at your elbow...
Elements of Style:
Fabrics: Colorful table cloths with images of regional items such as fruits, hibiscus flowers and sea life. Light weight, sheer cotton, blowing lazily in the wind, hang from most windows. Colorful batique fabrics are worn as sarongs and accents to island dress.
Walls: Lime washed walls, and strong color over stucco wall surfaces. Indigenous woods are used as paneling for the more stately colonial homes. Contrasting colors, such as blues and coral tones, accent trim and window surrounds.
Floors: Rough, bleached pine floors are covered with sisal carpets or cotton rag floor throws. Tile and stone are common choices, easily cleaned with a bucket of water and an aggressive mopping.
Unruly vines fringe an elegantly symmetrical Loire Valley manor house, and a rough stone wall encloses its tangled gardens. In hidden corners of the surrounding French countryside, rustic arches frame rolling hills.
Family life often focuses around meals
Tarragon and rosemary bushes scent the air. Wine and cheese are set out in preparation for dinner al fresco. Rustic French style, inspired by this ancient pastoral landscape, creates welcoming, airy interior space with interesting, antique textures.
artSparx Special
FRENCH GARDEN JEWELRY ARMOIRE
Antique white bombé style chest hand painted with olive green and multi-color floral design in solid wood and wood veneer construction. Top lifts open revealing mirror and lined, separated compartments with ring pads and open storage. Three small divided drawers and two deeper open drawers with removable hidden panel. Side pocket doors with hooks for chain and necklace storage. Light beige lined interior.
$ 429.00
The "maison a pains de bois" (wooden beam house) is a fine example of the evocative crookedness at the heart of Rustic French style. This Tudor-style building's slanted walls, gently undulating roof, and geometric beams are at once imposing and humble. The timber and stone show the traces of the hands that shaped them hundreds of years ago, and the house seems to speak of the generations who have looked out from its weathered shutters.
A 'maison a pains de bois' home in
Chinon, France.
Inside the Rustic French house, the set-up is comfortable, earthy and timeless. Natural materials are all-important in achieving these effects: wood beam or brick on the ceiling, stone walls, slightly irregular painted surfaces. These textures recall the hand-made, antiqued materials of rural French architecture. More refined touches, like Persian rugs and framed etchings, add grace to unpolished spaces.
In the bedroom, sunlight warms sisal floor mats, woven throw rugs, and terra cotta tile. Simple, airy comfort prevails. Delicate botanical prints with plain white frames adorn color washed walls. Bedroom furniture -- head and footboards, side tables -- is whitewashed, bleached, distressed.
Form follows function in the rustic kitchen. A brick ceiling, weathered wooden cabinets, and hanging pots evoke earthy meals -- cassoulet, coq au vin -- cooked for family and friends. Straight-backed chairs are placed at a scarred wooden work table for trimming fresh vegetables or enjoying a morning coffee.
artSparx Country French furniture special
French Country Campaign Desk
Elegant and divine, this desk will give your room a touch of sophistication. Its rich distressed black finish defines the shapely lines of this piece that can be closed when not in use. A perfect place to jot down your thoughts or write a letter, this desk will instantly become one of your favorite treasures. Please see Bellacor item 65453 for the matching bench.
In the dining room, family and friends are welcomed by a massive stone
fireplace. Wood paneling glows; the panes of leaded glass windows reflect the firelight. For a special occasion, this room can be dressed up with candlelight and white linen.
And on the way down to the wine cellar, a surprise: floral tiles peek out from the stair kick boards.
Distressed French Country Wall Bracket
Distressed pastel hues and a faux marble top enhance this French country resin wall bracket.
Upholstery is minimal and unfussy, and windows are covered with sun-bleached shutters or plain curtains.
Sun bleached, colorful shutters protect the home from the strong southern sun.
The rolling country side of the Loire Valley epitomizes the Rustic French Style. Organic, time worn charm, and a sense of being connected with the earth, root the rural French traditions.
French Country Harvest Table
This contemporary French country harvest table brings the classic French design up to date with the addition of sleek chrome towel bars and a large capacity drawer. Constructed of solid wood it features two slatted shelves and leveler feet allowing for adjustments to compensate for uneven floor. It has a 2” thick butcher block top that will provide the perfect surface for cutting and food prep. This item is made in the USA.
Craftsman Style
Drawing on Arts and Crafts principles of simplicity, fine craftsmanship, and a preindustrial aesthetic, the early twentieth century furniture maker and architect Gustav Stickley developed a peculiarly American style that eventually came to be known after the popular design magazine he published from 1901 to 1916, The Craftsman.
Once a month starting in 1904, The Craftsman featured a home plan based on the Arts and Crafts philosophy, usually featuring deep, overhanging eaves, large groupings of casement windows, open floor plans, and an abundance of natural materials like wood and stone. Craftsman style became widely popular during the early twentieth century, giving Americans of relatively modest means access to high-quality architecture and design for the first time.
Stickley’s furniture designs took their inspiration from William Morris, but their honest, somewhat utilitarian aesthetic is distinctly American. Usually made of quarter sawn oak in rectilinear shapes, Craftsman-style furniture ranges from sturdy, slatted “Mission”-style desks to bed frames with long, elegantly tapered bedposts. Armchairs and rockers are upholstered in natural, simple materials like canvas and leather. Like English Arts and Crafts furniture, Craftsman pieces are often constructed with traditional cabinetry techniques like mortise-and-tenon joinery and hammered-metal hinges and handles.
But Craftsman interiors do not necessarily have to consist of de rigeur early twentieth-century antiques. Any wooden furniture with good craftsmanship and clean, simple lines will work with this style -- particularly if the natural beauty of the wood is the main attraction. Accessories are important, both to evoke the period and to lighten up the dark wood tones that predominate in Craftsman homes. Against the background of simple white walls, hardwood floors, oak-beamed plaster ceilings and built-in cabinetry, use stained glass accents, Tiffany lamps, and the glint of metal in the form of pewter accents or brass candlesticks to add sparkle. With accessories, the honesty and warmth of the Craftsman basics can be customized to your taste, whether that runs to more contemporary elements like sisal floor mats, period pieces like Lalique glass or pre-Raphaelite art, or ethnic accents like Mexican textiles and pottery.
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Proportion and scale, along with the interplay between linear movement and the spacious qualities of light play an integral role in creating balance and harmony within the room.
Doors: As the entrance, and welcoming space of the house, doors and porches played an important role in the Arts & Crafts movement.
Doors were often of plain plank construction, fitted with elaborate hinges and latches, rather than knobs, inspired by medieval forms. Later in the movement, painted motifs became popular--either freehand or stenciled--and were supported visually by the use of stained glass.
Windows: The importance placed on light and air is reflected in the large window areas. Sash windows were commonly used, often incorporating leaded glass as a key detail. Elongated window proportions exemplified this style and one would commonly see the pairing of an upper sash bearing small rectangular panes with a tall, single-paned lower sash.
Arts & Crafts Stained Glass
Walls: Color played an important role in the decorator's approach, and a 3 part division of the wall into dado, field and frieze was almost always employed. Full paneling on walls was used on occasion, and stenciled friezes were also favored. With the design of fine wallpapers, lead by Morris and Company of London and Warren, Fuller and Co. of NY, wallpaper was also an accepted wall covering. Early papers boasted floral and medieval designs while the later period would take on Japanese influences. Tapestry hangings were widely used in late interiors.
Ceilings: In the early period, remaining true to medieval designs was preeminent. Treatments included chamfered beams, designed plaster ceilings, with occasional painting and gilding. Decoration that incorporated painted stenciling was desirable, but as the cost might be prohibitive, ceiling papers, often embossed, became much more common. In the later periods, intricate, prefabricated plaster work was frequently used.
Floors: Being true to this movement, it was generally considered that only wood or stone was acceptable for floors. Indigenous woods in America were used, oak or maple, most commonly.
Carpets were regularly used, and though authentic Indian, Turkish and Persian carpets were favored, often machine-manufactured carpets were the norm.
Furniture: A strong design element of the Craftsman movement was the regular use of built-in furniture. It was practical and minimized the clutter that was common in the Victorian era. A window seat beneath a bay window or a bench and sideboard against a wall in the dining room might be incorporated into the house design, for example.
The classic oblong steel and glass diner represents one of the most uniquely charming and completely American of styles, much beloved and sought after. Originally inspired by the glamour of railroad dining cars, the train-car shaped metal restaurant structures are a mainstay of 20th-century roadside and "hometown" culture. Although their heyday peaked in the 1950s, diner cars are still manufactured today.
Burlington Diner, Chicago, Illinois
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Inside a diner are the dazzling colors, comforting curves, and reflective surfaces that invite us to settle down with a chunky white mug of coffee and a slice of apple pie. Catch a glimpse of a stranger reflected in the polished stainless steel behind the open grill.
Neon lights, as detail or on its own, evokes the definitive diner
Contemplate the donuts in their countertop display. Ask the waitress in her pale blue uniform for a refill on that coffee. Watch the streetlights shining in the hoods of cars outside. And of course, don’t forget to put a quarter in the jukebox, whether it’s the miniature version at each table, or the big one at one end of the oblong room.
Diner style evokes a special kind of comfort—more public and industrial than we expect from home, but offering more privacy and solace than a formal restaurant. It’s a place to be a regular and talk about the good old days. Perhaps your kitchen has the soul of a diner, waiting to be released.
Soda pop or a milk shake, as long as we can share the straw, we'll keep coming back!
Elements of Style:
Walls:
Stainless steel abounds, from kitchen back-splashes, and polished refrigerator doors, to napkin holders and creamers.
Glass blocks, tile, and Formica paneling become mainstays of this style. They are some of the newest and best examples of innovative materials developed during that day, helping define the 1950's style.
Linoleum checked floors and glass blocks counter bases.
Details:
It's all in the details; glass bricks, a nickel jukebox on each table, restaurant accessories like napkin holder, sugar dispenser, and ketchup squeeze bottles.
Furnishings:
Share a soda pop at the counter, lazily swaying on the polished spinning stools. Bright-colored wood booths with red and white checker patterns tracing the rounded and curved back rests. Formica table and counter tops, with spider-web patterns of gold and fleckels of green and blue.
Floors: Linoleum is a staple in vintage Diner style. A new comer to interior design in the 1950's, it is durable, colorful and available in a multitude of patterns. Most common floors are faux granite in appearance, or the classic white-black, or red-black checker board pattern.
Perhaps more than any other design element, a door tells the story of a structure's past and present. Entryways can be welcoming or forbidding, rustic or formal, and frequently express essential features of the culture that has created them, the people they enclose, and even the natural environment they keep at bay.
A weathered Irish garden gate, embedded in an ancient stone wall, intimates that the space within has kept its secrets for a long, long time -- but that those who gain entry will find a landscape of enchantment inside.
A plainspoken Connecticut red barn door, though designed with pure function in mind, evokes a rich regional history of cornhuskings, barn dances, hay rides.
Cuban shutters and Greek door curtains close out fierce sun glancing off blue water, but also tell a story of color, song and family.
And the carefully tended flower baskets that fringe a carved Swedish door suggest delight in a brief, blooming summer -- as well as long winters devoted to handicrafts.
Door styles can express individual personality as well.
A colonial doorway-- simple and unadorned -- offers a genuine but somewhat austere welcome.
A large, arched stone entryway with imposing steps and formal plantings creates a grand feeling, but the small windows keep the huge doors light and proportionally interesting.
An English door in the Arts and Crafts style offers natural wood, a hand-fitted frame, wrought iron hardware, and a blown glass window: an artisanal design aesthetic as well as a cozy but sophisticated feeling.
Door details:
Door details can be regal or quirky. Knockers with animal and face motifs. Hand-fitted hinges, bolts in weathered iron or gleaming brass. Paneling, both recessed and raised.
Rich carvings or bas-relief in gleaming solid oak. Even plain pine boards are evocative when painted an intriguing cobalt or an earthy sage.
When Edward VII ascended the throne in 1901, the English-speaking world was ready for the dawning of a new century -- and a new age in interior design. It was time to jettison the dark, heavy clutter of the Victorian era for something lighter, freer, and altogether more exuberant.
Early twentieth-century architecture was eclectic, so much so that in
England, some militated for a unified national building style. The Edwardians resurrected elements of Georgian, Medieval, and Tudor style, constructing everything from quaint cottages to columned neoclassical townhouses.
Light, air and simplicity of detail were the unifying principles of this
mix-and-match revivalism. Colors were fresher than during the Victorian era: pastel blues, lilacs, leaf green, muted yellows, pearl gray. Floral fabrics and wallpaper were complemented by the liberal use of fresh flowers in informal arrangements. Along with Sheraton, Chippendale, Queen Anne and even Baroque reproduction furniture, wicker and bamboo began to be widely used, adding further delicacy to the style.
Edwardian Style architectural details and ornamentation!
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Art Nouveau added a modern, original flavor to the period's historicism.
Taking their inspiration directly from nature, rather than from the past,
Art Nouveau designers adorned a vast array of ordinary household objects with stylized flowers, vines, leaves, birds, dragonflies. An Edwardian interior would not be complete without a Tiffany lamp, an Art Nouveau clock, or perhaps a graceful, high-backed black lacquer chair after the fashion of Charles Rennie Mackintosh. Other possibilities: Beardsley drawings, iridescent art glass, silver frames with botanical motifs, or even a few peacock feathers artfully displayed.
In the English countryside, pretty villages dot rolling hills and cobblestones line narrow medieval streets. Come in through the garden gate, and you'll find a steep thatched roof overhanging ancient leaded glass windows. Old garden roses creep around the carved oak door. The grounds, whether a picturesque cottage garden or the rolling parkland of the local manor house, are lovingly cared for. Everything is fresh, tidy, and welcoming.
On country walks one passes by charming brick walled and slate roofed homes surrounded by welcoming gardens.
Rural England is best seen on foot or bicycle, the better to appreciate ancient towns, medieval chapels, hills full of wildflowers, and enjoyable local traditions. The pace of life is slow, the rural environment unspoiled. Some tiny hamlets seem almost to have escaped modernity altogether, and the summertime fete, the cricket field, and the local rugby team provide the traditional focus for community life.
In ancient towns in the Cotswolds or the Lake District, public space is built on a welcoming, human scale. Honey-colored stone shop fronts form a pleasing corridor along busy sidewalks. Charming architectural detail, whether medieval or Victorian, is still carefully maintained. Slate roofs, thatched cottages, wood beam ceilings, and flagstone floors evoke scenes from Dickens or Hardy.
Regional stones are used to construct the walls of many country cottages. While thatched roofs create cozy character.
The local pub is homey, with low ceilings, cozy rugs, and dark wood bathed in warm yellow lamplight. Stories, gossip, and local politics are traded here over pints of local ale. For the weary traveler, a bed and breakfast offers rustic charm, time-darkened wood wainscoting, low-hanging leaded windows.
go for the Bangers and Mash,
or Fish and chips
A pub interior is quaint and comfortable, perfect spot to down a local English Ale
Craftsmanship is important in English country style: carved wood and stone, wrought iron, the simple yet imposing lines of a classic stone manor house.
English country colors are natural and subtle: dark wood, gray or beige stone, warm ivory walls, perhaps a dark red or green accent wall. Furniture and wainscoting are carved wood, with Victorian lines. Lamps are key, with wall sconces or perhaps a rustic iron chandelier creating intimate pools of light and making hand-rubbed wood carvings gleam. A rug in a nineteenth-century floral pattern can add color, or perhaps a basket of dried wildflowers. 
Most rural towns / villages have there own summer 'fete'. Bringing together the local community to celebrate with old fashioned fun, car boot sales, games and vintage tractor rides
No visit to the English country side would be complete without a visit to the cricket field, or a stomp in the mud watching a rugby team
In the summertime, the all-important cottage garden serves as an "outdoor room" where tea and lunch can be served. The lawn or stone courtyard is surrounded by clipped hedges, climbing roses, forget me nots, bluebells. An old well cover, a low stone wall, or perhaps an arch clothed by clematis add architectural interest. Ever-practical, the English cottager includes some vegetables in the landscape: a cucumber frame, a fruit cage for red currants and gooseberries.
A local street in Woodstock near Oxford. Flower pots hang from every window.
By Juliette Guilbert
With the end of the Revolution and the birth of the new republic,
Americans looked to ancient Rome for cultural as well as political
inspiration. At the same time, newly professionalized American
architects sought to express the power and influence of their patrons
by creating dignified yet democratic homes. The result of this
political and aesthetic cross-pollination was the Federal style, which
soon became identified with the hopes, ideals, and character of the
young nation.
Ironically, the guiding light of ancient Rome shone on the new republic
by way of Old England. Federal period architects like Charles Bulfinch
enlivened a somewhat poker-faced Georgian colonial template with
classical detail straight out of stylebooks of the Adam brothers, the
most renowned architects of the British eighteenth century. A typical
Federal home had pragmatic Georgian bones (symmetrical brick facade,
balanced rows of windows around a central door) adorned with graceful
Adamesque flourishes. A semicircular fanlight over the front door,
arched three-part Palladian windows, dentil moldings or a balustrade
around the roof all served to soften square Georgian lines. The
centrally placed front entryway was the focal point, with the door
flanked by sidelights, pilasters, or slender columns and possibly
topped by a small portico.
But it is interiors that truly distinguish the Federal-style house from
its colonial predecessors. Unlike the exterior, interiors could be
asymmetrical and curvilinear, a major departure from the early American
layout of a central hall opening onto four square rooms. Circular or
oval spaces were common (the most famous Federal style oval room is the Oval Office). Decorative ceilings and mantels, adorned with elegant
garlands and swags, rose above simple curved plaster walls.
To create a convincing Federal setting, use a judicious mix of homespun
American colonial furniture and more refined Adam-style pieces
(Chippendale, Hepplewhite, Sheraton). Pewter and silver, luxurious but
understated textures -- cream-colored damask, polished wood floors --
suggest the optimism and increasing prosperity of the new nation.
Colors should be light and delicate: powder blue, cream, yellow, soft
pink and muted rose. Of course, the quintessential Federal detail is
the American eagle, soaring above the mantelpiece. And while some
might consider a plaster bust of George Washington to be a bit over the
top, for the true neo-Federalist it will add just the right patriotic
Federal Style architectural details and ornamentation!
Ceiling medallions, cornices and moldings. Authentic Period and Historic Home architectural ornamentation.
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Fifties Style
Whether your inspiration is the Guggenheim Museum or Marcus Welby’s waiting room, fifties design allows you to mix sophistication with fun in whatever proportions suit your fancy. From Eames chairs to tiki-room kitsch, the fifties can be high, low, or anywhere in between.
If you live in a Victorian cottage with gingerbread trim, carved mantels, and chair rails, you may want to consider another style. But if you are decorating a circa 1961 split-level ranch, why not revel in your home’s mid-century pedigree and furnish it with chrome and leather sofas, atom wall clocks, and amoeba-shaped coffee tables?
In the fifties, radios were cool and chic. As television grew in popularity, radios emphasized style, design and 50's funkiness.
Fifties style works best in an open floor plan with simple, clean lines, a minimum of woodwork, and an abundance of natural light. Blond wood floors or low-pile wall-to-wall carpet and a neutral, pale paint palette (except in the kitchen, where vivid color reigns supreme), provide a fine backdrop for fifties furniture and accessories.
The kitchen is one of the most fun -- and cheapest -- fifties rooms to reproduce. All you need is black and white checkerboard flooring in tile or linoleum, a chrome and formica table with a sparkly-swirly pattern, and simple fitted cabinets. Bright period colors -- red, lemon yellow, chartreuse -- can (and should) appear on the table and countertops, cabinets, or appliances.
Fifties Kitchen
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In the living room, look for sleek leather, plastic, and chrome furniture by Charles and Ray Eames; Heywood Wakefield pieces in streamlined blond wood; or anything by the influential Finnish architect Alvar Aalto, who pioneered the process of molding wood into curvilinear shapes.
Fifties Living Room Ensemble
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For a high-modernist look, invest in Arne Jacobsen egg, swan, or ant chairs. The sculptor Isamu Noguchi’s beautifully simple glass coffee table is another haute-fifties design icon.
If you’re more interested in Ozzie and Harriet than Eero Saarinen, pair a boxy sofa, upholstered in chartreuse and balanced on slender legs, with low-slung bent-wood armchairs and a glass or molded plywood coffee table. Add accents like space-age clocks, coat racks that resemble molecular models, spun resin table or floor lamps, wire sculptures, and fabulous fifties ceramic ashtrays in burnt orange or avocado green.
Then shake yourself up a pitcher of martinis!
GOTHIC STYLE
Gothic style, originally a purely devotional
building mode, has endured almost a thousand years.
Revived more than once as a public and domestic architectural style, the Gothic has also inspired literary genres, art, music, fashion and, at the close of the twentieth century, a synthetic design- and lifestyle known as "Goth."
The Gothic was first and foremost an ecclesiastical style, and symbolized
the triumph of the Catholic church over paganism in Europe. At a time when most people's homes were the humblest possible turf or wattle-and-daub cottages, churches sported arches, pinnacles, vaults, stained glass, and elaborate sculpture.
Medieval builders discovered new ways to support the weight of a soaring cathedral: piers and buttresses, ribbed vaulting, and structurally
integrated arches took the building's load off of its walls. The resulting
thinner walls could contain large expanses of glass -- leaded, stained,
decorated with stone ribbing called tracery.
Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, France.
Now churches, which during the Romanesque period had been massive, gloomy affairs, were flooded with light and air. Lavishly carved cathedral spires climbed ever higher, expressing the medieval belief in the essential
divinity of earthly creation.
In the fourteenth century, war, famine and plague put an end to this
extremely labor and resource-intensive building style. During the
Renaissance, increased attention was given to domestic architecture and
Neoclassical style reigned supreme. In the early nineteenth century, after centuries of variation on Neoclassical themes, Western scholars and artists developed a new interest in the Middle Ages. This Romantic backlash against rationalism eventually produced the architectural movement known as the Gothic Revival.
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In Europe and North America from about 1840 to 1870, historically accurate Neo-Gothic churches, government buildings, colleges, and eventually private homes were built. These grand stone houses sported quatrefoil or pointed windows with decorative tracery, leaded glass, and even gargoyles, pinnacles and battlements. In America, where timber was cheap, a style called "Carpenter Gothic" developed, characterized by an abundance of elaborate wooden gingerbread trim.
In designing your own Gothic castle, start with architectural detail:
pointed or ogee arches, tracery, exposed wooden beams, leaded or stained glass windows in complex trefoil or rose designs. But even if you're beginning with a modern interior rather than a scaled-down reproduction of Reims Cathedral, you can still create an imposing and mystical Gothic environment with furniture, surface detail, color and accents.
Parliament Buildings and Big Bed, London England
Elements of Style
Flooring should be stone -- large flagstones are best -- or dark wood.
Colors should be rich, dark and dramatic: purple, black, ruby, gold, forest
green, ochre. Decorative painting on the walls -- scenic murals,
trompe-l'oeil architectural features, or stenciled heraldic designs -- can
add medieval drama to a dining room or entryway.
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Victorian Gothic reproduction furniture can be used, which simplifies things, but any massive oak furniture, either rustically simple or adorned with Gothic motifs, will do. Chairs, bed frames, and cabinets can feature arches, spiral turnings, carved trefoils, and rich upholstery. A trestle table with matching benches creates a monastic flavor. Even Arts-and-Crafts era built-in cupboards and storage benches will work, as that movement borrowed many decorative motifs from medieval art.
Wall hangings are essential, tapestries if possible. If not, you can cheat
with dark red velvet curtains, silver tasseled tie-backs, brocade throw
pillows, a midnight blue velvet duvet cover. Stained glass, of course, is
quintessentially Gothic. Pewter, wrought iron, and lots of candles are the indispensable Gothic accents. For a truly ecclesiastical look, create your own niche altar with candles and devotional statues.
The paneled Georgian door, flanked by flattened columns, topped with a filigree fanlight or crown, makes an imposing, elegant impression. The door is set in a flat stone or brick facade, punctuated by symmetrical windows, paired chimneys and perhaps -- in a grander house -- a stone terrace. Wrought iron lampposts or fencing, a stone walkway, and shutters complete this traditional, gracious house style.
Georgian architecture, the style of choice throughout the eighteenth century in England and America, took ancient Greece and Rome as its inspiration. From grand English country houses to the humbler colonial pattern-book homes of early America, Georgian style recreated the balance, harmony and dignity of its Classical sources.
Georgian doorway with 'fanlight' above the entrance.
Georgian interiors, in keeping with the architecture, emphasize an elegant sense of proportion. Rooms are airy and light, color schemes pale, and classical symmetry is paramount. The furniture is delicate -- Queen Anne wing chairs upholstered in pale cream damask, a carved Chippendale highboy. The fireplace is the heart of the room, and should be fully outfitted with cast iron, carved pillars and medallions, and a fire screen.
Georgian Style architectural details and ornamentation! 
Ceiling medallions, cornices and moldings. Authentic Period and Historic Home architectural ornamentation.
All crafted in genuine plaster.
For commercial and residential environments.
The contemporary decorator can choose among austere and intricate Georgian design elements. Baroque decoration was commonly used atop the style's neoclassical, rectilinear foundations. Plaster walls, paneled halfway up (called a "dado") and painted cream or sage, might be adorned with elaborate crown molding. Ceilings were commonly festooned with decorative plaster: ribbons, swags, classical urns and even figural sculpture. Bolder decorators can use faux marble or gold on wall paneling, and even scenic or historical murals are not out of place.
Decorative objects, particularly Chinoiserie, add color and authenticity to a Georgian room: everything from knick-knacks to wallpaper was being imported from the Far East during the period. Ming-style blue and white porcelain and celadon table lamps, lacquer work, and bronze ornaments are good places to start. Wooden picture frames should be heavy and elaborately carved. Items with a British feeling, like silver tea services, are also appropriate.
Twilight view of a Georgian-style house in the snow
Joel Sartore/National Geographic Image Collection
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Elements of Georgian Style:
Walls: Wood paneling, stained or painted, up to dado height; crown and baseboard molding; chair rails. Plain plaster walls with molding will also do. Wall colors are generally pale: cream, dusky rose, sage or pea green, powder blue, gray-beige. Florals are fine, particularly Chinese motifs like peonies and chrysanthemums. In grander houses, antiqued wall finishes, gold, and murals can be used.
Furniture: Delicately carved, graceful furniture in walnut, mahogany.
Hepplewhite, Queen Anne, Sheraton, and Chippendale style furniture are all appropriate in a Georgian room. Fabrics should be luxurious -- brocade, damask, and tapestry -- and colors and patterns subtle. Polished cotton and chintz, perhaps with a small flower pattern, will work nicely. Georgian upholstery and curtains often had matching fabric.
Windows: Dramatic draperies: swag, rope tassels, fringe, backed with sheers, wood blinds or shades.
Floors: Wood floors covered with oriental rugs are best. Plush carpet,
perhaps floral, is fine also. In grand houses, marble floors were used.
Lighting: Chandeliers in brass or crystal; Chinese motif table lamps. Wall sconces in silver or brass.
Accessories: Chinese porcelain, lacquer ware, silver tea services, linens, carved picture frames. Small sculptures, busts. Fans, bronze, snuff bottles.
After WW1 architecture and design in Europe sought to eliminate the seeming blind alley of the Art Nouveau. Artists and designers found interest in the works of Frank Lloyd Wright and became eager to expand his influence into broader acceptance. So closely the did international designers, particularly architects, agreed on the fundamental principles of this new style, the practice would come to be known as the International Style.
The foundations of this style can be traced to the Bauhaus, an architectural school founded by Walter Gropius in 1918. The style arose from the need to create decent housing for the post-WWI German worker, and to address the needs of a growing technological and mechanized world. Breaking from the Arts and Crafts movement, Bauhaus embraced technology, new materials and the mass production of furnishings and fixtures.
In the form of the International Style, the Bauhaus' influence eventually extended around the world. The followers of the new style created classical forms without extraneous ornament. Access to new building technologies like reinforced concrete, and steel framework for buildings designers sought a whole new approach to what is known as the plan, or the layout of the interiors of buildings. The enormous strength of these new materials opens new worlds for designers that were unheard of in building before.
Le Corbusier, a Swiss architect (1887-1965), became a leader in this style, establishing new interiors with what became known as the ‘open plan’, where load bearing walls became virtually extinct, allowing interior spaces to be arranged and rearranged with moveable partitions or opened wide for a completely ‘open plan’. Glass wall often were used creating ambiguous interior spaces. “In” and “out” became relative. And the early examples of International Style show a close relationship to Cubist Art, just as in the cubist ideals of “front” and “back” become ambiguous.
Naturally, these open floor plans and use of industrial materials lay the foundations to what became known as the Modern Style.
Elements of International Style:
Today, the ultra-modern look still adheres to the original Bauhaus ideal of functionalism, but its austere building blocks can be leavened with earthy or colorful accents. Forms are simple and modular, ornament minimal but not prohibited. As with the original Bauhaus style, furnishings should be attractive, industrially produced, and high-quality.
Colors: Walls are treated as background incorporating sparse tones of black, white, brown, gray, beige, and chrome. Bursts of color are used as accent and accessories, primary colors often adding the splash of red, yellow or blue that livens the austere modern interior.
Walls: Walls are simple, with out moldings or embellishment; painted white or neutral tones. The use of glass as walls becomes an important innovation in Modern Style, largely due to the advent of new material use, like steel, in construction. Glass bricks are installed, often in combination with raw concrete - for that Le Corbusier touch. Contemporary art, such as Abstract Expressionism and Pop art add life and organic interest to the clean angularity of modern design.
Floors: Natural elements become the mainstay. Wood, stone, brick, and cork compliment the open, airiness of modern interiors, adding just the right amount of natural organics to compliment the concrete and glass structure. Abstract patterned rugs, such as kilim rugs, help soften the linearity and add character to the modern interior.
Windows: Plain white curtains or Venetian blinds allow light to enter the interior without detracting from the open, uncluttered spaces. Or for a daringly modern look, no window coverings at all!
Accents: This is the place for color and organic forms and textures. Modern art, particularly in Mondrian-style primary colors, and geometric, black and white. Throw pillows can be exiting influences, covered in primary colors or interesting fabric patterns. Curved glass ashtrays, translucent or colored art glass, and mobiles continue the contemporary feel by implying light and airiness. Natural objects and materials like twig arrangements, bamboo, sisal or coir balance industrial design. Period style can also be used for accessories: Art Deco style for the thirties; kitsch for the fifties; Pop Art for the sixties.
Japanese Style
By Juliette Guilbert
A neighborhood Shinto shrine at the end of an urban back alley. A monumental Buddhist temple alongside skyscrapers and neon-lit pachinko parlors. A traditional post-and-beam farmhouse tucked behind a suburban neighborhood. Even in the hodgepodge industrial landscape that has sprung up in Japan in the past few decades, places of startling beauty -- both sacred and secular -- abound.
Traditional Japanese design, shaped by the animistic tradition of Shinto, prizes natural materials like stone, wood, and rice straw. From Buddhism, it takes a sense of worldly impermanence, expressing life’s ephemerality with ikebana flower arrangements and cryptic Zen rock and gravel gardens, raked in concentric circles to represent the ripples of time.
Japanese style can run the gamut from sophisticated to rustic, but it often creates a pleasing mix of both extremes, with an emphasis on minimalism and natural materials. Refined teak and bamboo chairs alongside a roughhewn timber post exemplify the blend of earthy and elegant that characterizes Japanese design at its best.
Even the most modern Japanese homes frequently incorporate traditional rustic elements: wooden posts and beams, ceramic or copper roof shingles, bamboo, tatami, and delicate rice-paper shoji screens. Irregularities are prized -- a chip in a teacup becomes part of the object’s history, rather than a flaw -- and everyday objects like handmade brooms or an earthenware food jar are often works of art.
Nature is always kept in sight in Japanese design, whether with a formal bonsai garden or simply a loosely-constructed wood or bamboo fence enclosing cedars, Japanese maple or cherry trees. Indoors, bird, flower and tree motifs appear on painted scrolls and screens. 
Sacred elements can create a special atmosphere even in the most mundane context. A simple Shinto temple washbasin can imbue an everyday space like the bathroom with a tranquil air. A daruma or wish doll, which represents the Buddhist saint Bodhidharma, makes a colorful accent (to make a wish, you paint in one of the pupils in black ink; if the wish comes true you paint the other and discard the doll).
Stone temple lanterns, bells, and incense-holders are also wonderfully evocative. For the diehard Japanophile, a torii gate, which marks the beginning of sacred space in a Shinto shrine, can be a stunning garden element.
Between winter-barren ridges of the Great Smokey mountains, a solitary log cabin nestles. A thin wisp of blue smoke rises from the stone chimney, and a homemade swing beckons from the snowy porch. Glimpsed through windows edged with frost, a Dutch oven simmers above a blazing fire. The glowing hearth beckons the chilled, weary traveler, who pauses only to brush off the snow before lifting the latch. 
An American tradition of handmade beauty is contained within the rough-hewn walls of this snug home. Like the bluegrass music that rang through Appalachian hollows, decorative folk arts brought color and joy to a hardscrabble existence. Log Cabin style recaptures this uniquely charming aesthetic for modern times.
The hearth -- andirons, an ash hopper, a bellows -- is the soul of the Log Cabin. Its radiance casts a glow on simple pine furniture. Braided rugs in cheerful blues, greens and reds add color to the scene, and rocking chairs provide a place to read, talk or simply contemplate the fire. A classic copper wash boiler holds newspapers or kindling.
In the bedroom, a colorful quilt covers a whitewashed cast iron bedstead. Curtains in plain checked cotton and old-fashioned house wares lend an authentic look: straw brooms, a speckled enamel kettle atop the woodstove, oil lamps.
Naive art, or perhaps a particularly fine antique quilt in an intricate pattern, makes the perfect finishing touch for this tribute to homespun design.
Elements of Style:
Walls: In addition to exposed log beams, pine plank paneling, brick or stone add character, reinforcing the closeness of the outdoors and nature. A blending of natures elements, wood and stone strengthen the rustic ideals of the Log Cabin Style.
Floors: Large pine planks or river bed stones seem most appropriate. Braided or hooked rugs imply coziness as well as providing some needed warm to cold feet on winter mornings.
Fabrics: Simplicity is emphasized in this style, therefore a white bedspread might be your easiest choice. Checked cotton, lace bed throws, crocheted blankets and, of course, hand made quilts can quickly complete the room, inviting color and visual texture.
Furniture: Shaker chairs and tables fit nicely. The simplicity of design, based on functionality, seem to lend casual comfort to the Log Cabin room. Pine furniture, knotty and distressed, re-emphasis the closeness to nature that is so enticing in the Log Cabin home.
Accessories: Fireplace tools, naive art, quilts, carved/whittled objects, washboards and boilers, hearthrugs, andirons, and the wood stove will easily fulfill the needs of this style.
The kitchen should display hand-woven baskets, cast iron pots, enamelware, tin plates and cups, and no cabin would be complete without the necessary hurricane lamps.
Windows: Simple cotton checked curtains, light and airy, is all that is desired. Simplicity with an emphasis on accessories truly creates the rustic, comfortable Log Cabin Style.
The Fontainebleau and the Eden Roc. The Deauville and the Carillon. The Bel Aire and the Casablanca. The names of Miami’s great resort hotels evoke a time when nymphs in mink bikinis frolicked on Miami Beach, when Frank Sinatra, Jackie Gleason, and Lucille Ball were regulars in local nightclubs, and when thousands of newly-minted middle-class Americans flocked to South Florida to enjoy themselves after enduring nearly two decades of hard times. The post-World War II period was a time of optimism, faith in technology, and a belief that the future would bring ever improving conditions for all. These beliefs were made manifest in the period’s exuberant architecture, and nowhere more than in the postwar style known as Miami Modern, or MiMo.
MiMo’s Jetsons-style motifs -- boomerangs, fins, kidney-bean shapes - paired with an over-the-top Hollywood sensibility and a tropical environment to create a style that was modern, luxe, and local all at the same time. The great MiMo architect Morris Lapidus, reviled by the International Style-worshipping architectural establishment of the time, called his autobiography “Too Much is Never Enough” -- and put this credo into practice with projects like the Fontainebleau, whose lobby featured a terrarium with live alligators, bellboys clad in purple and gold braid, and the infamous “stairway to nowhere,” built solely to provide guests with way to make a grand entrance in their evening clothes. If you’re the sort that favors grand entrances -- and views the living room as a stage set for your fabulousness -- the MiMo is the style for you.
MiMo interiors are modern -- but with as many, twists, turns, and flourishes as can be crammed into them. They should feature curving, sweeping lines, theatrical lighting effects, lots of color and drama, and, if possible, multiple floor levels (i.e., the classic “sunken living room”). Morris Lapidus devised a large catalogue of design “tricks” that became the lingua franca of fifties and sixties popular architecture: curved walls, circular or amoeba-shaped cutouts (he called them “cheeseholes”), metal rods with no structural purpose, and purely decorative mirrored dividers.
Elements of MiMo Style
Floors can be tile, highly polished stone, or terrazzo, perhaps topped with a curvilinear rug. Low-pile wall to wall carpet is another good choice, preferably in a vibrant color like electric blue or burnt orange (or even in a curvy, busy pattern). Furniture should be midcentury modern, but avoid Miesian austerity: you want kidney- shaped coffee tables, curved sofas, anodyzed aluminum pieces in gold and copper tones, colors like avocado and eggplant, and glamourous touches like white fur throws and tiled mosaic murals.
In the bedroom, a round bed with white-on-white linens would work brilliantly, along with metallic accents, mirrors, and rattan or bamboo room divider screens. In any MiMo room, tropical elements add the unmistakable Miami touch, transforming mere kitsch into resort glamour: potted palms, louvered windows, a salt water aquarium, tropical and animal prints, and neon. When you look your creation over and say to yourself, “Enough,” go out buy two more accessories, then come home and fix yourself a champagne cocktail.
Designers' Chairs
Emerald jungles, palm-fringed beaches, whitewashed villages, gracious haciendas, imposing Mayan ruins. Mexican style draws on a rich array of natural, artisanal and historical materials. Like the country itself, Mexican design is welcoming and colorful, elegant and quirky.
Art is integral to the fabric of Mexican life. In Oaxaca, El Dio de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) is celebrated with hand-crafted painted skeletons, candy skulls, elaborate altars adorned with fruit, flowers and food. Guadalajara, the "Florence of Mexico," boasts spectacular murals depicting social and political issues. Throughout Mexico, "las indigenas" produce exquisite artifacts colored with the rich, warm hues of the natural landscape.
Color Washed wall brings out the rustic character in Mexican Style.
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Mexico's climate allows a great deal of everyday life to take place outside in both public and private settings. In cobblestone town squares, music floats from bandshells. Family and friends often gather in outdoor cafes against a background of colonial architecture. The vaulted arches of cathedrals give way to fragrant enclosed gardens. Dulcerias proffer intriguing sweets that mix chocolate and cinnamon, tamarind and chilis. Indoors and out, in Mexico, everyday existence satisfies the senses and delights the soul.
Vibrant hand woven rugs
Exuberant decoration juxtaposed with solid structure is the basic recipe for Mexican style. Tile inlay on a mesquite table fashioned with mortise-and-tenon joints. An imposing carved armario (armoire) alongside a handwoven geometric rug. And the decorative possibilities of Mexico's vibrant regional folk art -- wood carving, clay figurines, baskets, pewter, candleholders, yarn paintings -- are virtually limitless.
Elements of Style:
Furniture: Mesquite, heart of pine structures. Mortise and tenon and dovetails corner details. Large iron hinges, and multi colored wood inlays. A-frame tables, armoires with heavy hinges and drawer pulls.
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Fabrics: Hand-woven blankets and rugs. Brocade are seen in more formal spaces.
Floors: The use of tiles and stone are Mexican staples. Rugs woven in traditional Mexican geometric designs or simple stripes, always with bold or vibrant color themes.
Lighting: Lighting is diverse and imaginative. One will find fixtures made of wrought iron, or wood. Candles, colored glass, pottery find comfort in this style. Wrought iron chandeliers hang in large, open rooms.
Accents: Mexican style uses many different resources to accent the environment. From clay figurines, masks, candles, and pottery, to wood carvings and pewter objects. Many accents are colorfully hand painted. Hand blown glass, often irregularly formed. Silver frames are commonly used mirror and picture surrounds.
With its slick lines, open spaces and lack of ornament the Modern Style is a mélange of 20th Century design styles. Stemming from the Bauhaus and the International Style, the Modern Style develops its distinctive character by incorporating elements of Art Deco, Cubism, The Abstract, mostly in Paintings, and Pop Art with the successful ability to address the needs of contemporary society post WWII. With the advent of television, pop culture enters into the common home along with the styles, needs and wants of the every day man.
In the Modern interior, plain white walls with no moldings and narrow baseboards are de rigueur. Window frames should be simple. Huge picture windows, even walls of glass, are emblematic of this style. The floor plan should be as open as possible, and the space divided with modular furniture, low cabinets or bookcases or perhaps a partial wall made of glass bricks.
The most fascinating and fun part of the Modern style are the variety and exuberance of the furnishings. From Le Corbusier's cube armchair to Serridan's egg and swan chairs, the modern period produced an explosion of innovative, imaginative and lovely furniture forms. Favorite pieces: modular sofas in tubular steel and black leather, Eames chairs, daybeds after Mies van der Rohe, and stacking chairs and tables of any kind. If a touch of warmth is desired, choose leather upholstery in an earth tone.
Elements of Modern Style
Colors: Walls are treated as background incorporating sparse tones of black, white, brown, gray, beige, and chrome. Bursts of color are used as accent and accessories, primary colors often adding the splash of red, yellow or blue that livens the austere modern interior.
Floors: Natural elements become the mainstay. Wood, stone, brick, and cork compliment the open, airiness of modern interiors, adding just the right amount of natural organics to compliment the concrete and glass structure. Abstract patterned rugs, such as kilim rugs, help soften the linearity and add character to the modern interior.
Lighting: A contemporary, industrial approach is often appropriate. Track lighting, in combination with recessed ceiling cans or halogen ceiling spots, are utilized to direct light onto specific areas of the interior. For example, spotlighting a painting or centering an open plan room by emphasizing an object with a focused light beam. Smaller lamps will add interest. Items like globe lamps, or tubular lamps, for example. Truly, anything simple and industrial can find a comfortable home in the modern interior.
Windows: Plain white curtains or Venetian blinds allow light to enter the interior without detracting from the open, uncluttered spaces. Or for a daringly modern look, no window coverings at all!
Accents: This is the place for color and organic forms and textures. Modern art, particularly in Mondrian-style primary colors, and geometric, black and white. Throw pillows can be exiting influences, covered in primary colors or interesting fabric patterns. Curved glass ashtrays, translucent or colored art glass, and mobiles continue the contemporary feel by implying light and airiness. Natural objects and materials like twig arrangements, bamboo, sisal or coir balance industrial design. Period style can also be used for accessories: Art Deco style for the thirties; kitsch for the fifties; Pop Art for the sixties.
When the ruins of Pompeii and Herculaneum were excavated in the eighteenth century, new information about the ancient world sparked a revolution in architecture and interior design. In various forms -- Georgian architecture in Britain, the Federal and Greek Revival house styles in America, the Napoleonic Empire Style which dotted Paris with triumphal arches -- Neoclassicism dominated Western architecture for 100 years. Emphasizing proportion and grace, embellished with Classical detail, the Neoclassical style remains influential in the design of public buildings and modern traditional homes.
Fireplace with Frieze, 1780
Pergolesi, Michel Angelo
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Neoclassical architecture ranges from the rectilinear Georgian style to the more graceful, curvilinear mode devised by the Scottish designer Robert Adam and adopted in America in the form of Federal style. Symmetry, arched Palladian windows, a fanlight over the centered front door, dentil molding below the cornice, and decorative columns or pilasters are the basic elements of this architectural style. Circular windows, oval rooms, and decorative arches also characterize the Adam and Federal styles.
Neoclassical Style architectural details and ornamentation!
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Neoclassical interior design selects elements from Greek and Roman antiquity to create balance and refinement. Colors are pale and calming: cream, stone, gray, pale blue. Floors are light pine, stone, or marble, covered with Persian or floral woven carpets. One can also use stronger color, sparingly: black and terra cotta for a Greek feel, or deep red and gold for an imperial, Roman look. Wallpaper in geometric, floral or Classical designs is also appropriate.
Classical detail can appear anywhere you like. Columns or pilasters flank
the fireplace. Geometric marble or inlaid wood graces the entryway floor.
Murals or wallpaper depicting mythological scenes or ancient architecture
create drama in the dining room. Crown molding is important, and can
feature a dentil pattern, swags, garlands, egg and dart shapes.
Fine-Art Link for Neoclassical Columns
The column is the most recognizable element of Neoclassical design. The
Doric column, the oldest and plainest Greek style, found on the Parthenon, has fluted sides and a smooth, rounded capital. The Ionic column has scroll-shaped ornaments at the top, and the Corinthian column's capital is decorated with olive, laurel or acanthus leaves. Early nineteenth-century American houses, whether Federal, Greek Revival, or Southern Colonial, frequently feature columned entryways or front porches. In more modern homes, columns can transform any room into a Greek temple: the dining room, the entry hall, the master bath.
Neoclassical furniture is typically light, graceful and simple: Chippendale,
Adam, Sheraton and Hepplewhite are the traditional choices. Sheraton's lyre back chair and Hepplewhite's shield back chair are two fine examples of Neoclassical style. Accessories from the eighteenth or nineteenth-century -- silver tea services, Wedgwood china, candlesticks, chinoiserie, fireplace tools and screens -- should be used alongside Greek and Roman accents like urns, statuary, and designs from ancient pottery.
Renowned for its easy charm and exotic, nostalgic atmosphere, New Orleans is home to a piquant mix of cultures -- French, Spanish, African, and Deep Southern. This historic city blends the antique with the funky and the old with the odd. The architectural heritage here is the richest in America. All over the city, European elegance is jazzed up with Caribbean and African vibrancy and a dash of Carnival.
Picture these inviting scenes. Above a cobbled street in the Vieux Carre, potted ferns cast shade over a wrought-iron balcony.
Just uptown, a ceiling fan stirs the lazy air in the upper gallery of a Garden District mansion. A simple Acadian rocking chair waits on the ginger breaded porch of a Victorian cottage. Live oaks shelter wide boulevards lined with grand Greek Revival and Italianate mansions. Lush banana trees shade Creole cottages painted in tropical shades of mango and lime. Gardenia and night-blooming jasmine scent the air.
Painted accents in porch ceilings create personality and charm.
New Orleans style combines classic structures with bold color and accents inspired by the city's festive, eccentric traditions. Crown moldings, floor-to-ceiling sash windows, and pocket doors mix it up with oyster-bar octagonal tile, wooden ceiling fans, Mardi Gras masks and beads. A touch of bordello style in the form of velvet swags or gas lights lends a true Vieux-Carre feeling to a room. Tropical plants such as potted banana trees, an palms, orchids and fichus evoke the intimate jungle of the French Quarter courtyard. Laissez les bon temps rouler!
Elements of Style:
Walls: Bold color with ornate or substantial crown molding and picture hangers are a mainstay. The French influence is present all around, exemplified by pocket doors, and the multiple paned French door. Mantels frame fire places and create a focal point for design of the New Orleans room, as well as being the traditional gathering place for families to pass down tales and traditions, the lore of generation to generation.
Ceilings: Tall ceilings mark this style, often 12-14' high. Many are capped with stamped tin with antique wood ceiling fan to cool the whole room down.
Floors: You'll commonly find "barge board" or antique heart of pine floors. Wide planked and firm under the feet.
A local restaurant is the perfect place to relax around a cafe table, eat some craw-dads and hush puppies, while the sound of jazz plays in the back ground.
Furniture: You might find a Cypress plank table, perfect for layering with newspaper and piling up the crab legs. Or the rich colonial feel of mahogany, used to create side boards to house quirky collections. And the easy going, casualness of wicker line porches, as if in anticipation for the afternoon nap of it's owner.
Windows: Floor to ceiling windows, often beveled glass provide an airiness that lights the New Orleans room. Louvered or solid wood exterior shutters, help protect from the occasional downpour. While rich velvet or brocade curtains imply a coziness and comfort.
Accessories: Brass or copper light fixtures complement wrought iron balconies and entrances. Mardi Gras masks, beads, hot sauce bottles add color and character to local interiors. And, or course, tropical foliage reminds us of just where we are.
Walking down the main boulevards offer unique and sometimes unexpected wares, appealing to even the least curious passer-by. 
Queen Anne Style
Clad in clapboards and patterned shingles and dressed to the nines
with wraparound porches, stained-glass windows, gingerbread trim, and turrets, the romantic Queen Anne house is the last word in over-the- top American picturesqueness. Originally developed by the English architect Richard Norman Shaw, the Queen Anne style was popularized in the US by a new abundance of factory-made architectural elements, a tendency toward excess during the “Gilded Age,” and the proliferation of home pattern books promoting the style.
A subset of Victorian design, Queen Anne style shaped a wide swath of American domestic architecture: from modest workingman’s cottages to the imposing piles found in old industrial cities like Buffalo and Pittsburgh; from the exuberance of San Francisco’s “painted
ladies” to the the elegant restraint of Brooklyn brownstones.
Although some Queen Anne's have classical detail like dentils and
ionic columns, their facades are asymmetrical, a departure from
earlier neoclassicism. Their cross-gabled or mansard slate roofs are
steeply pitched, and there is always at least one porch and often
large decorative bay windows, orienting the house strongly toward
public space.
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Taking a cue from the exterior architecture, Queen Anne interiors
often feature crown moldings, plaster cornices, and beveled glass
mirrors. Staircases are bordered with turned balusters to match the
railings on the porch. In this environment, furnishings must be
chosen with care: in keeping with a Queen Anne home’s overall style,
romantic eclecticism is the order of the day, but Victorian ornament
can quickly descend into excess and clutter. (For this reason, Queen
Anne eventually came to be known as “bric-a-brac” style.)
Queen Anne exteriors were sometimes painted in four or five different
colors to accent the various trim and textural elements, so it’s
fair to use a good deal of strong color inside the home as well.
Earthy tones like ochre, red, and deep green can be left to their own
devices or accented with gilding and richly patterned wall paper.
Textiles are also key, from velvet upholstery to oriental carpets,
and bric-a-brac is indeed an element of this style: china figurines,
portraits, and miniatures are displayed on walls, occasional tables,
and the ubiquitous carved mantelpieces. Of course, Victorian antiques can work beautifully in a Queen Anne, but as they tend to be heavy and dark it is wise to use them in moderation. While an entire parlor set in plushly upholstered wine-red velvet may be a bit too Gone With the Wind, one Victorian settee will look dynamite when paired with some simpler pieces against a richly colored and detailed backdrop.
Elements of Queen Anne Style:
Walls: Wood paneling, stained or painted, up to dado height; crown and baseboard molding; chair rails. Plain plaster walls with molding will also do. Wall colors are generally pale: cream, dusky rose, sage or pea green, powder blue, gray-beige. Florals are fine, particularly Chinese motifs like peonies and chrysanthemums. In grander houses, antiqued wall finishes, gold, and murals can be used.
Furniture: Delicately carved, graceful furniture in walnut, mahogany.
Hepplewhite, Queen Anne, Sheraton, and Chippendale style furniture are all appropriate in a Georgian room. Fabrics should be luxurious -- brocade, damask, and tapestry -- and colors and patterns subtle. Polished cotton and chintz, perhaps with a small flower pattern, will work nicely. Georgian upholstery and curtains often had matching fabric.
Windows: Dramatic draperies: swag, rope tassels, fringe, backed with sheers, wood blinds or shades.
Floors: Wood floors covered with oriental rugs are best. Plush carpet,
perhaps floral, is fine also. In grand houses, marble floors were used.
Lighting: Chandeliers in brass or crystal; Chinese motif table lamps. Wall sconces in silver or brass.
Accessories: Chinese porcelain, lacquer ware, silver tea services, linens, carved picture frames. Small sculptures, busts. Fans, bronze, snuff bottles.
Swedish Folk Style relies on simple structures, exuberant art embellishment on walls, ceilings, and furniture, and an overall sense of harmony. Painted wooden furniture, often with neoclassical lines, becomes a mainstay. On the walls and ceilings, trompe-l'oeil paintings suggest draperies and sculpture. The palette is natural, the accessories functional and uncluttered, the floors unfinished pale wood.
The drama of the outdoors -- wild fjords, deep forests, and the long night of winter -- has encouraged the Swedish to create design in harmony with nature. Flowers, birds, and fruit, the longed-for shapes of spring, decorate furniture, walls, and ceilings. A loose and novice painting style imparts a warmth of color and subject matter that seem to belie the earthy environment. Simple choices in antique linens, tapestry, and embroidery, as well as painted wood carvings of animals and fruit, lend an unpretentious air. A few ornate touches -- a gilded mirror or a crystal chandelier -- can add a hint of manor-house elegance.
In winter, you may find the path to the door is lit with ice candles set in the snow, and in each window a single taper burns. Gilded rococo mirrors reflect precious light from wrought-iron chandeliers. Vivid embroidered tapestries and a glowing ceramic-tiled stove keep the cold at bay.
In the summertime, Swedes throw their houses open to sunlight and fresh air. The tapestries and draperies are removed to reveal pale, scrubbed wood floors, an open, airy floor plan, and subtle colors on walls and furnishings: white, slate, gray-green, cerulean blue. Flowers are planted in every available corner of the garden. A summer smorgasbord of fresh vegetables, fish, flowers and herbs is set outdoors on plain blue and white dishes. At the windows, sheer curtains, perhaps in pretty botanical prints, are pulled back to welcome the light.
Overall, a sense of whimsy prevails in Swedish folk design. The friendliness of people and countryside are reflected in the home, on furnishings and fabrics and in the essential rhythms of the Swedish folk lifestyle.
During the reigns of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I, English domestic architecture and interior decoration blossomed. As the economy boomed and the Church lost influence, the attention and resources previously reserved for cathedral building were transferred to the secular realm. The simple thatched roof cottage and spartan, portable furniture of the Middle Ages gave way to substantial, permanent housing with relatively luxurious appointments.
The unmistakable "black-and-white" Tudor house, with its massive dark timbers, reinforcing diagonal beams, and whitewashed plaster, is the period's design archetype. Upper stories often overhang the ground floor, as building space was at a premium. The chimney is massive and ornate, with a curving shape and patterned brick.
Medieval ecclesiastical splendor survived in somewhat homelier form: the
Gothic arch was flattened; windows and doors were ornate, but smaller;
decorative colored glass in the home echoed cathedral stained glass.
Dramatic color reigned -- sky blue or orange, ruby, sapphire and other jewel tones, gilding. Textiles adorned walls, as during the Middle Ages: tapestry, crewel work, damask, velvet.
In the sixteenth century, the invention of the wall fireplace revolutionized architecture and interior design. (Earlier hearths had occupied the center of a room, and smoke had escaped through a hole in the roof.) An impressive fireplace of stone or brick, with wooden or stone lintels, should be the centerpiece of the Tudor interior. The woodwork and overmantel can be plain or decorated with dignified, unfussy period designs like carved strap work or heraldic designs.
Another Tudor innovation was the wide availability of glass for windows.
Windows -- and with them, natural light -- became a common feature of
ordinary houses as well as palaces. Mullioned windows were popular, as was the oriel, a projecting bay window cantilevered on an upper floor. Window coverings should be rich -- velvet, damask, brocade -- as textiles were an important means for adding comfort and beauty to the Tudor home.
Oak paneling is the typical Tudor wall covering, although lime-washed
plaster was also used. Paneling can feature geometric or botanical designs, and tapestries or hanging rugs add warmth and period authenticity. Linen-fold paneling, which is carved to resemble folds of cloth, is emblematic of Tudor design.
Floors can be stone, brick or wood -- particularly granite, flagstone, and
wide-planked oak. Oriental carpets were still a rarity, and were most
likely to be found as table coverings. Rush matting was the most common
Tudor floor covering. Sisal or coir mats, or even a heavy, textured wool
carpet in a neutral color, make a fine substitute.
Tudor furniture, in keeping with the new aesthetic of permanence, is heavy, carved wood. Built-in cupboards were essential to the Tudor home, along with hinged storage benches, canopied bedsteads with curtains and carved headboards. Wrought-iron studs, hinges and latches add authenticity to furniture, windows and doors.
Glassware and pewter were commonly housed in open cabinets during this period. Near and Far Eastern imports like porcelain were beginning to reach English shores, and can be displayed sparingly. Another luxury item made more widely available with the invention of the printing press was the leather-bound book.
The northern Italian region of Tuscany offers visitors an overwhelming experience for the senses, with the sounds of its music, the smells of its cooking and the visual richness of its distinctive style.
"One need never to go into a museum in Florence," wrote Brian Storts, "for that fair city is a feast to the eyes. It is like walking into history itself." Florence and its surrounding towns-Sienna, Montepucciano, Pisa, Arrezo-are situated in the heart of Tuscany’s rolling hills. The Tuscan landscape is flecked with Terra-cotta rooftops and cypress trees, and by the soft, sun-drenched hues of local marble and clay.
Terre-cotte tile roof tops mark the Tuscan landscape.
Tuscan style evolved through layers of history, taking cues from the earliest Etruscan metal craft and pottery, and of course, from the sumptuous world of the Italian Renaissance. In Tuscany one finds frescoes, cracked and worn by time, still vibrant with original pigment, depicting ancient deities and the decadence of the late Roman empire. Mosaic tiles, wrought iron gates and portals, distinctive bridges and architecture all reinforce the unique Tuscan identity, a particular expression of the Italian soul. Michelangelo, Caravaggio, Brunelleschi, Botticelli, and Cimabue all contributed to Tuscan splendor. It’s no wonder Tuscany plays a substantial role in Italian culture and identity. 
Elements of Tuscan Style
Tuscan rooms typically are beautifully proportioned on classical lines. Ceiling height, the size and scale of such features as the fireplace, windows and doors--as well as the furniture--all play an important role in creating balance and harmony within the room.
Walls: The wall treatments of the Italian home act as support for the rest of the interior. One sees wall painting, from Frescoes to murals, beginning in the earliest days of Italian culture.
Plaster walls, stucco-lustro and marmorino walls all evoke the classic Italian feeling. Hand painted wall treatments and decorative patterns enhanced common spaces, as seen on the right.
Use of Tapestries, gold leaf and ornate detailing such as plaster moldings all helped to define the interior, often bringing historical context and stylistic vigor to the home.
Interior Accents 
Tuscan Furniture
Tuscan Style Lighting 
Exterior Style
Victorian era bridges allot of different design styles and sensibilities. It is generally considered that the Victorian period found it’s beginnings with the demise of Napoleon’s expansionist policies, continuing thru the reign of Queen Victoria, and culminating up to WW1 in 1914. The styles developed from each other not only as an extension of the current political situation but also to the needs of the rising middle class during the industrial revolution.
When we speak of the ‘Victorian Style’, distinct images come to mind as an overall feeling develops. The ‘gingerbread’ house with eaves and gables. A verandah with turned porch posts, spindles and fan-like brackets become characteristic of the style. Steeply pitched roofs and turrets are sometimes seen. The use of color played an important role, both on the exterior as well as the interior. Multiple colors on the exteriors, now have become known as ‘historic colors’.
The interiors were rich and exciting. Entering into a home you could enjoy decorative plaster moldings or cornices. Intricately patterned friezes, ceiling medallions, even mirror frames were highly embellished. Wonderfully turned balusters to support your stair railing reminds us of the grand entrance. Parquet floors might call for our attention as well as inlayed wood patterns or painted/stenciled borders. Rich carpets were freely used. 
Damask patterned wall paper with raised texture became the norm for upscale Victorian homes.
Tile was not overlooked and early linoleum found it’s start in this era. The decorative elements of the home might begin with color. With stronger, darker colors becoming more fashionable by the second half of the 19th century. Decorative paint finishes can be seen liberally. Graining, marbling, gilding, distressed lacquer-red walls contrast marble fireplace. Influences from around the world become prevalent with animal prints being very popular in the Victorian home.
Victorian Style architectural details and ornamentation!
Ceiling medallions, cornices and moldings. Authentic Period and Historic Home architectural ornamentation.
All crafted in genuine plaster.
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Because of the new revolution in mass production methods the textile industry flourished with developments such as the power-loom weaving and machine-printing. Richly textured and colored, often finding elaborate floral designs. Heavier fabrics such as Velvet became more common. Wallpaper became a source of decorating.
Wallpapers and paper borders become fashionable
William Morris and his studio became leading examples fro these new styles. Paisley prints abound. Asian/Indian influences in fabrics and furnishings mark a distinct style in the Victorian era known as Japonisme.
Large Armoires. Styles varied greatly, often ‘reviving’ older styles. Couches and sofas become quite plump, with soft upholstery. A heavy pedestal mahogany dining table might be found, exemplifying a growing feeling that solid, weighty furniture reinforces the wealth and status of the home owner. Butler trays and side tables help fill unused spaces. Collections of all kinds become popular, from Straffordshire figurines to doll houses to china-ware.
Lighting fixtures, iron chandeliers and wonderfully shaped shades for the many table and standing lamps become a renewed source of interest, with artisans such as Tiffany and his workshop creating wonderful stained glass lamps and other decorative objects. China and dishware find a new resurgence, showing off wonderful patterns and intricate details.
By Juliette Guilbert
Dutch Colonial Architecture with diagonal paned windows
Windows do much more than simply admit light and air to a room. They can be utilitarian or decorative, countrified or classic, formal or rustic, shuttered or elaborately draped. Windows can be a purely practical matter, but they can also dramatically alter our experience of interior and exterior space.
Rustic Country
Classic French
Although the Romans used cast glass windows in important buildings as early as 100 AD, glazing was a great luxury until the late Middle Ages.
Blown-glass, leaded panes were reserved for cathedrals and palaces, set in massive stone arches that reached heavenward like the Gothic spires that surrounded them. Ordinary windows were simply shuttered against the weather or barred against hostile force.
Leaded pane windows offered soft, diffused light, as well as protection from the elements.
As the medieval era drew to a close, glass windows became more widespread.
An increasing number of public buildings, inns and the homes of the wealthy were fitted with decorative, often colored glass depicting historical scenes and coats of arms.
Windows set in stone
in Tuscany, Italy
Sun bleached shutters
in Provence, France
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Eventually, of course, glass was installed in the windows of even the most modest European houses. A double casement set in Tuscan stone, sun-bleached shutters in Provence -- these small, timeworn windows have framed centuries of everyday life. Their weathered, ancient look is nicely offset by ephemeral ornamentation like a flowerpot or delicate lace curtains.
Period and Historical Styles
Colonial
simple, double framed windows
Shutters for blustery days
The regional and period styles of the New World are often a simple, but nonetheless visually appealing, response to the natural environment. Sturdy shutters protected against colonial New England winters.
Southwest
Burlap curtains shade a rustic, sun-drenched Southwestern bathroom.
New Orleans Style
New Orleans adorns a down-home crab shack with graceful six-over-six panes, shaded, of course, by a porch overhang.
Toward the end of the nineteenth century, architects began to reassemble Old World window forms with striking results.
Victorian
Grand, elaborately detailed Victorian arches in colored glass have a pre-Raphaelite feeling.
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San Francisco
San Francisco jumbles ornate baroque and classical elements for an eclectic, colorful prettiness.
Sometimes, a new approach to design emerges in the treatment of a window. The geometric forms and wide sash windows of an Arts and Crafts bungalow create light, airy interior space as well as a striking facade.
Arts & Crafts - Bungalow Style
Sash windows, geometric forms
And the crazily tilted, quirkily adorned frame at bottom abandons the "rules" of design altogether, making the humble window an expression of individualistic flair.
Love it!!! Love the tile designs (wish I could be that creative with tile!) Can't wait to see it in person!
ReplyDeleteMing green marble Mosaic