SEASIDE COTTAGE STYLE

Seaside Cottage Style is my friend, Laura Petersen's, business.  You can see all the fabulous things she does on her site.  

I did these faux-wing chairs for her living room.

Buttons, of course, down the back.

The cool looking burlap lamp shade that is visible in all these pictures is one of Laura's creations.

This view is from the kitchen, looking towards the front of the house.

And the sofa is wearing a slipcover I did for her about 7 years ago!

PILLOWS IN PARADISE

Last year at this time, I was spending 10 days in the Bahamas on Cat Island at Fernandez Bay Village. While there, Pam Armbrister, one of owners of the resort, ask me to make pillows for all of the cottages, once I got back to California, that is.  To make it more cost effective for her, I had her order already-made pillows from IKEA, remove the inserts and ship me the covers so that I could get them printed.  There were total of 30 pillows, 10 each of three different sayings.

My parents are there right now and sent me a picture of the pillow on the bed in their room.

Our plane from Nassau to Cat Island

Sunset

The beautiful water, and yes, it really is that color!

Relaxing in the hammock

The beach

The cottage we stayed in is called The Beach House

Shoes are definitely optional and bare feet are welcome everywhere

Sunrise

Stand up paddling

The whole crew- in the front, me, my mother, my nephew and back row, my stepfather and my brother

ANOTHER BOAT JOB

This boat is being renovated, so the pictures aren't so great.  You can get the idea, though, of what I did.  Perhaps when it is all done, I can go back and take better shots.

All of the striped curtains are in the master stateroom.

They are on three sides of the room, but I can't get far enough back to show this.

On this wall, there are 8 separate inverted pleat panels.  Luckily, they range in length from 18" to 20", so they were a little easier to work with than 90" panels.  They are lined in blackout and when all are shut, the room is definitely dark.

Yes, there are portholes behind the curtains.

I could have cropped me (to the right in the mirror) and Pat (to the left, owner of Cotier, which is the shop this job was done through), but I figured you need the perspective.

This is in the salon.  I'm not sure why these turned out so dark, but they did.  

In this area, there are windows on both sides.  The inverted pleat panels are strictly decorative and do not function. 

I also made the small pillow in the same fabric as the bedroom curtains.  It has a contrast welting from the tie-back fabric.  The larger pillow is available at Cotier, and comes in many different colors.

THE EVER-POPULAR WHITE DENIM

Originally, my client wanted black slipcovers.  I told her with her dark wood floors, I thought it might not look good.  With a sofa, a chair and a half and an ottoman, it seemed to me like it would be too dark in the room.  Even with the high ceilings and French doors on three sides.  But, ultimately, it would be her decision.  In the end, she changed her mind and went with white.

The sofa has a bed inside, so I put a zipper around the deck so you can get it out without removing the slipcover.  

The chair isn't photographing that way, but it is considered a chair and a half, and it is pretty big.

Buttons down the back for easy on and off.  The sofa has them, too.

The family room - looking so much better.  I forgot to take pictures of the before slipcovers, but just know that they were way past their 'expiration date.'  They no longer fit properly because fabric does continue to shrink, and after repeated washings, they were a mess.  Not to mention the skirts were coming off and had to be pinned back in place.

My client no longer has to be embarrassed when someone comes to visit.  She's happy, which makes me happy!

SLIPCOVERING LEATHER

It has been years, like almost 20, since I did slipcovers for leather furniture.  The first time I did it, the pieces had no loose back or loose seat cushions, and this made for a true slip cover -- in that it slipped because there was nothing to grab onto.  I swore then that I would never do it again.  And I didn't, until now.

My clients wanted to have this sofa and loveseat slipcovered.  I explained to them why it might not be such a good idea, but they really liked these pieces and wanted to do it anyway.  Since they were in the process of moving away from Coronado, and to make it a little easier for me, I went ahead and cut a pattern using a fabric I had, while the furniture was still close by.  All they needed to do was find a fabric they liked and I would then make the slipcovers.

Jump ahead three years, and they still had not decided on a fabric.  And by this time, they had moved back to Coronado.  Finally, they found a heavy linen that they loved and ordered it.

Because they like a 'cleaner,' non-wrinkled look, they decided against having me wash the fabric, and will have the covers dry-cleaned.

Both pieces got the buttons down the back, more for the look than out of necessity in getting the slipcover on and off.  And the wrinkles here will fall out in time.  It is very difficult, oh yeah, impossible, to fold a slipcover, so wrinkles do occur.  The overall look and feel, though, is not that of linen, but of a heavier fabric.

The 'new' sofa and 'new' loveseat with their existing throw pillows.

Although these turned out nicely, and having loose seat and back cushions definitely helps, I still would discourage slipcovering leather.  The important thing, though, as always, is my clients were happy with the finished product and can still enjoy the furniture they love.

FUNNY STORY

The pillow below, the blue and white toile with red brush fringe, is on the bed in the house of a friend of a friend's mother.  Confused yet?  Okay, last May I was invited to go to a birthday party of a friend of a friend, both of whom live in Miami.  They were coming out to California, where Sarah (the friend of my friend, Lisa Michelle) had grown up and where her mother still owns a home.  Oh yeah, the mother, Ann, was also coming from Miami to attend Sarah's birthday party.  So, Lisa Michelle and I drive out to Jamul, a town sort of east of San Diego on that Saturday morning in May.  Never having been there, I wasn't really sure how long it would take.  Turns out it's not all that far, but once you get off the freeway, it is more slow going, and the road to the house is very twisty and curvy.  I was driving and still managed to get car-sick, which I normally do not get.  The road was that twisty, though! 

In the picture below is, from left to right, me, Donna, Sarah, Perry, and in the front, Lisa Michelle - turns out all five of us are former models who lived and worked in Spain in the 80's.  Sarah, Donna and Perry all met in Madrid in the mid-80s, and Lisa Michelle and I met in Barcelona in 1989.  Lisa and Sarah met in Miami sometime in the 90s.  What are the odds?  Now, here's where the pillow comes in.  I woke up the next morning and was looking at the pillow.  I kept thinking that it looked somehow familiar.  I can always tell my work if I look inside, so I unzipped it and just knew that I had made it.  But how in the world did it end up on this bed?  I was completely baffled.  Lisa came in and I asked, did I make this pillow?  She said, "You did; you made it for me, oh, 15 years (!) ago, and at one point when I was staying at Sarah's, I had the pillow with me and I ended up giving it to her."  Somehow that pillow made it to the house in Jamul, California!  Talk about a funny story!

IKEA CHAIRS

This chair is from IKEA.  Normally, if a client inquires about having something slipcovered, I find out as much as I can about it.  Things like, how comfortable it is, if they are just tired of the existing fabric, how old it is, stuff like that.  In the case of this chair, and this is just one of 4, my client simply liked it. The size fit her home.  I explained that because furniture from IKEA is so reasonably priced, it is not really meant to be kept long term. 

She was aware of this and still wanted to have slipcovers made.  She found this heavy upholstery fabric at Home Fabrics, which means she got it at a GREAT price.  She bought all they had.  Unfortunately, there was only enough fabric to do three slipcovers.  

Still, it was exactly what she wanted.  I thought they turned out pretty well.  And she loved them, which is always my intention!

LINEN SLIPCOVERS - PARSONS CHAIRS

I delivered these parsons chair slipcovers right before Christmas.  Since we had spectacular (Christmas Day was in the low 80s) weather, the timing was perfect.  I did, however, forget my camera.  Luckily, even though my iPhone is as old as dirt, it still takes pretty good pictures.

The slipcovers these replaced were incredibly tight-fitting, and you literally needed a second person to get them on and off.  

Plus, my client's dogs decided they would make good chew toys and proceeded to destroy several of them.  Not the chairs, thank goodness, but the slipcovers did not survive.

Front of chair

Back view, with buttons, to make putting them on and off much easier.

THE BOATING LIFE

Second Friday of the New Year and I am posting again…Yeah!  I would have done it earlier in the day, but I had to get this job delivered, and then I had another appointment.  So, finally, I'm getting to it.

 This is the master stateroom and I 'made' this fitted coverlet.  I used quotations around made because I used a blanket from Pine Cone Hill, so, to me, it seemed a little less something I made than something I re-purposed.  Not sure why using a blanket instead of fabric made a difference to me.

 In any case, it was a bit challenging because I was making it from my clients' existing comforter.  I have always found this to be tricky.  Unless I can take something completely apart and use it as the pattern, (and not have to put it back together,) it doesn't quite work the way it seems like it ought to.

 I also made a small pillow and re-sized a twin blanket into a throw for the sofa in the salon.

Close up of pillow

and of the throw.

The sun was very bright and made it hard to get a nice shot.  

It is a gorgeous, 50' boat, though.

The boat all decorated for Christmas.

And last, but not least, their adorable dog, Tyler.

HAPPY 2014

I know, I know, I've said it several times before and I have to say it again--it has been almost 6 months (how can that be?) since I last posted, and, really, I have no excuse except I simply did not do it.  It was not a priority.  The truth is I used to be really good at posting just about every other day, and then in July of 2010 I threw my back out and ever since then I have never been able to get back in a routine of regularly posting on this blog.  And then I had other traumatic stuff happen and, well, my focus was on getting myself healed and back on a more positive track.  Now, for 2014, my resolution is to recommit myself to this blog and, for those of you who follow my other one as well (www.atlonglastheard.com) which has also suffered from lack of focus.  I decided that, at least initially, I'll post once a week, on Fridays for A Little of This That and the Other and every other week on Wednesdays for At Long Last Heard.  I know it is just a matter of getting into the habit again.

I also had this crazy idea that every post needs to be long and involved, with lots of pictures.  How silly is that?  If I want to post just one photo or one simple paragraph, then that's what I'll do.  And today's post will be just that:

I did this cushion just before Christmas for a nursery.  The baby, a boy, is due the beginning of January.  The fabric is a flannel, meant for pajamas, not for a cushion cover, so I felt I had to line it with duck cloth to give it the necessary strength.  I even went so far as to line the welting.  Normally, I wouldn't have done that, but it was only about 4 yards and I figured, why not?