Art Deco gets a chalk paint makeover

This is one of my projects for Painters In Residence, a commission I had from Annie Sloan Chalk Paint to use the paints, varnishes, and other products from her range.  This cupboard and chair were bought on ebay, the chair was missing its seat and the cupboard had seen better days but the shape and detailing was lovely and typical of the Art Deco style with big cog like shapes on the legs.

The photos above show my progress.

I chose the colours Florence and Graphite with leafing in brass and copper.  The copper under the brass gives it an extra depth and ties in nicely with the skull fabric on the chair seat.  The fabric came from Van Asch who, as you probably know, I work with regularly on ideas and looks. To achieve this finish paint the area required with Gold Size, wait until it becomes clear and then lay the leaf over the area, brushing away the loose bits to leave the metallic layer stuck to the gold size. Very easy to use and highly recommended. 

I painted over the Florence chalk paint with a crackle finish that is also an Annie Sloan product. It comes in two pots called Craqueleur, paint on the first layer and let it dry, then paint on the second layer, in a warm place, and it will dry with fine cracks in the surface.  It changes the colour in a different way to the wax.  Over this I applied both clear and dark wax, purposely leaving it dark in places to give depth and age to the surface. 

Graphite on the cupboard was also dark waxed to make it more black. 

I styled this all together with a graphite wall and cut a deco style stencil for the wall above. To this I also applied brass leafing.  

If you have lovely shaped furniture but don't like different wood colours or too much brown this is a perfect way to give a cohesive look in the room, keep the colours in the same tone range and take some onto the walls as well.  A carefully chosen  palette is a brilliant way to tie a look together. To continue the look choose frames to add leafing to, gold stands out so well on black, its timeless. The prints in the frames were original book pages bought on ebay by Erte, the father of Art Deco, a Russian born artist living in France. His images are the antithesis of that period. 

Decorative Living

This week I finally made it along to the Decorative Living Fair at Chelsea Town Hall, I say finally because I've been meaning to go for some time. The fair is organized by Caroline Zoob and is a beautiful collective of stallholders, chosen for their high quality in the decorative living arena.  

Every stall has combinations of antique and handmade items, clothing and craft supplies. The venue is gorgeous, it makes such a big difference to the shopping experience to be in beautiful surroundings. I was so impressed with how much attention to detail had gone into making the stands, especially considering this is a one day event, hats off to all the hard work that went into it by everyone.

Three French Hens

Beyond France

The Old Haberdashery.  The owner has recently been to China and brought back some great pieces. 

Belle Epoque

Lisa Brown Vintage Flower Paintings

part of the Homes & Antiques stand.

  

There was also the extra surprise of bumping into Alice and Sam from Homes & Antiques magazine.  Alice was the first person from H&A that I ran into some years ago and drew my attention to how great the mag is now. I also love love love the fact that they get out and meet their readers and this must surely be the reason for why the magazine is so appealing, as they listen to their public.  The November issue has a gorgeous feature on Annie Sloans latest book and photographs of some of the homes featured in it. Apart from my little cottage is the home of Alex Russell Flint, an artist with a home to die for, an amazing place in France with the wow factor for sure. 

It was lovely to see so many familiar faces. Some of these businesses will be at Petworth House in November. Under the banner of Winter Brocant, the Petworth House fair is organised by Love Lane Vintage and sounds like a very glamorous affair. 

If Ive missed out a credit please let me know, I seem to have mislaid all the business cards I collected. 

Petworth House Winter Brocant is now firmly in the diary for November, hope to see you there if not before at the great MK Handmade and Vintage Fair in October.  

Enigma, Colossus, codes and Bletchley Park

It was my great fortune to be taken on a guided tour of Bletchley Park by the author of a book based there.  Andy Mellett-Brown has just published his first book called The Shelter, using his extensive knowledge of the place to set part of his story there during the war.  My tour was personalised to show me the places where, the main character - Harry Stammers - worked and operated as a BP employee and amateur sleuth.

Vintage fans, particularly for WWII will love BP as much of it is set up as it would have been back in the day of the code breakers. If you are unaware of the history then please have a thorough google, basically, here during the war, code breakers de-cyphered the codes of the enemy, a breakthrough which helped us win the war eventually.  Inventions in code breaking lead to  the first computer and on the site of Bletchley Park is a computer museum which houses the most famous of all machines, The Colossus. So if you are motivated to go then please don't forget to find Colossus which is round the corner. 

an Enigma machine, one of many portable code generators

The American Bombe - on of the many code breaking machines developed at the park

Lorenz Cipher machine, a large non portable code generating machine 

Andy Mellett-Brown the author of The Shelter

most of the staff at BP were women and its great to see the huts furnished with clothes and handbags

not authentic war time food, more like school dinners.

the whole place became derelict, as some of it still is, but with the perseverance of dedicated volunteers, the park was saved, although there is still plenty more to do and they need your help

sculpture of Alan Turing soon to be played by Benedict Cumberbatch in a new film about his life called
The Imitation Game 

Colossus

If you like a good detective story then get yourself over to Amazon and order a copy of The Shelter

Charleston, the house not the dance

It would be remiss of me not to feature Charleston House at some point as its influences on modern interior decoration were groundbreaking.  Home to artists and country retreat to the Bloomsbury set, this quintessentially British country farmhouse was transformed by its owners by their unique use of paint and surface decoration, so to me, this house embodies all that I love and strive for.

As photos are not allowed in the house and I always use my own on this blog, I can only show you the ones I took outside and through the windows (which was a bit cheeky I know), and when I go into more detail about my "Painters In Residence" term for Annie Sloan Chalk Paint, I will doubtlessly give examples and refer to the interior decoration at Charleston.

The gardens are very wild and painterly, nothing formal here for these bohemian artists, colour and texture are foremost in the planting.

Statues and busts are everywhere, and placed so that their presence makes sense with the overall aesthetic.

It made me very happy to think that such acclaimed and renown artists as these also painted their own walls and tables, it gives some validity to interior decoration, often seen as something separate from art.  
Heres a cheeky peak in a window, one of the many sitting rooms. 

 You can just catch a glimpse of a sponged stencil wall decoration to the right of the fireplace.  

I have long since held that view that if something is handmade it ought to look handmade, I revel in the imperfections and individuality they bring. So for me a house where the paint on the walls is patchy and you can see the brush strokes is heavenly. One of the reasons I first fell in love with Chalk Paint on walls is that it can, if required,  look a bit patchy, you can see brush strokes and it has a thickness and depth that normal wall emulsion lacks.  Of course, it depends on how you apply it, and thats also its strength, that because the paint is an artistic decorative paint you can manipulate it to suit your needs.  

Through the riot of garish dahlias you can peak the artists studio.

Pink and grey are very prevalent in the colour palette of artist Vanessa Bell.

This is Vanessa's bedroom, with the portrait of her son who was killed in the war. Its very plain compared to the other rooms in the house. Several rooms have walls of black/dark grey with stencilled patterns and gold framed paintings.  The works of art here collected from their contemporaries like Picasso and Matisse, nestle amongst the handpainted beds, screens, tables, trunks, bookcases and doors. The lines aren't perfectly straight, the finish is patchy ad swirly, and most of all, the colours are brave yet subtle all at the same time. 

The interior of the house has a lot of stencilled walls, which if you know my style you will understand why I love it so much. The colour palette is very similar to that of Annie Sloans paint collection and when I asked what paints were used on the wall of the house I was told "whatever paint they had to hand, with chalk in it possibly", how funny. 

I have lots of looks I now want to emulate, the black walls with red corners (never seen that before), the runny watery wash, more stencils (of course), and more unusual colour combinations.  Charleston house I haven't finished with you yet.

(Charleston is in East Sussex near Lewes).