above via LONNY.com
Last year I worked on a
unique home perched high on the hillside above Sonora. It has magnificent, 360
degree views of the Northern California country side. To maximize the views, the
home’s architect Cooper Kessel designed it with wide expanses of glass. The light
filled home has a circular design with a central cupola surrounded by structural
Douglas fir beams and tapered oak dowels from Vermont. It has a tall, strikingly
beautiful, natural stone fireplace; oak floors; a pool; tennis courts; and Cooper’s
trade mark, energy efficient features.
The residence is home to a local
historian/videographer and his daughter. He is a retired engineer who has a
local cable TV show in Sonora. He and his late wife had the home built in the
nineties and two of their requests for Coop were to build a home that made the
most of the views and was energy efficient. His daughter owns and runs a
company that provides business solutions and coaching for small and large
companies. She is a talented, classically trained flautist often performing at
special events.
The work I do is much simpler
than Kessel’s but it has its challenges and rewards as well. The home was previously
decorated in powder blue, country style checks and floral prints and was ready
for an update. They called me in to rework the existing furniture with up-to-date
fabrics. We were to work around the architecture, the stone, the wood, the
traditional furnishings, and of course, the phenomenal views.
above GEORGIA VAN VICKLE
Once the daughter had shown
me some of the things she loves, I began to get a feeling for her style. She likes
things that are simple and elegant. My challenge in this particular project was
finding fabrics to pull the contemporary architecture and traditional
furnishings together, and do it in a way that would coincide with her classic
aesthetic. Color is a great common denominator and I suggested a scheme that
would go well with the colors and
tones of the architectural elements yet adhere to her personal taste:
transitional style fabrics in soft, sage and Celadon greens and pale, “spun” gold’s.
above via EBANISTA
About the Fabrics
We looked at a lot of fabrics.
I love this part of my job and it’s alright to devote the time to perusing so
many fabrics if the client is serious about doing the work. If the client is
uncertain, I am hesitant to put forth so much effort. I have a lot of fabrics
in my own studio but for bigger projects like this, I usually spend a day at
the San Francisco Design Center looking at a wide variety of fabrics till I
come upon two to three “just right” schemes.
The first two schemes I came
up with had too much pattern and were a bit too contemporary for her taste.
However, one of the schemes I was able to tweak by replacing a floral fabric with
a tone on tone stripe in a light sage green. That stripe went on the Danish
Modern, tufted, wood framed arm chairs and on the hand crafted, maple dining
room chairs. For their two settees, we had originally planned on a golden
ribbed fabric that she loved but when I threw in an outstanding striated silk
in a soft gold color, she opted for that one instead. The more casual, gold
ribbed fabric was then allocated to game table chairs.
above via BADASS-BUNGALOW
About the Fabrication
A work room with a minimum 15 years of experience is necessary to get the professional results expected when you hire a designer. I have several window treatment and upholstery workrooms I work with and all have well over twenty years of experience. You’ll see the difference in the tautness of the fabric, the straightness of the seams, and the matching of the patterns.
Less experienced workrooms
show inconsistent work with lumps and bumps. Their products don’t look
“perfect” like an experienced work room. Once you’ve seen quality workmanship
on sofas, chairs and in window treatments and bedding, poor quality fabrications
stand out like a “sore thumb”.
above via THE HUNTED INTERIOR
Window Protection
Originally, the windows had
one continuous blue floral valance. We agreed the valance visually detracted from
the view but it was necessary because it concealed the head rails of the
existing accordion pleated shades.
above via VERANDA
With so much glass,
protection is a must. We opted to replace the existing window treatments with semi-transparent,
non-decorative sunshades in a warm white. Their UV protection keeps the home
cooler during hot times of the day and protects the furniture and floors from
fading. They wrap around light weight metal cylinders and raise and lower on a
pulley system. Matching valances conceal the head rail when the shades are
raised. Because the valances match the color of the window’s wood work they are
barely discernible. Normally, I prefer to do a darker sun shade because the
darker colors are barely discernible when in use. However, many residential
customers prefer white, while commercial customers are easier to convince.
The shades ended up being a challenge.
Though it was a company I’ve worked with for years, there was a quality control
issue with four of the valances and I had them removed and returned immediately.
They came back looking “sharp” but unfortunately this time they didn’t fit. They
were immediately removed and returned again, and were replaced finally with
perfect valances. These things happen from time to time and it’s wise to let
clients know this from the beginning. Managing expectations is important and
one way to accomplish this is to advise clients of potential delays, then do
your best to foresee and avoid them. In this case, there was no way of knowing
because I’d worked with the company for years with virtually no quality control
issues.
above via ysvoice
Rugs
I tried but wasn’t able to
find rugs that worked with their aesthetic. They ended up finding them on their
own: one rectangular shaped rug for the living room and two matching round ones
for under the dining room and game tables. The rugs’ muted green with golden
tan leaf motif compliment the furniture and fabrics perfectly. I was pleased to
see what good choices they’d made.
above available through SHIREE HANSON SEGERSTROM
The mark of a good designer
can be seen in a project’s fabric quality as well as the quality of fabrication.
But there’s more to it than that. Often time’s a client wants to utilize their
existing furniture and I don’t discourage them. At that point we need to
understand how to visually pull together disparate elements as we did in this
project with its contemporary architecture, traditional furniture and the
client’s own personal aesthetic. Creating a cohesive design scheme requires
considerable time.
In the end, it’s well worth it to have happy clients.
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