Meet Abstract Garden, now starring in my dining room...

Getting to use my own designs as I decorated our new house was a particular thrill, I must admit. My designs took center stage in several rooms, including my dining room. Let me introduce you to Abstract Garden, above, a blue-green floral that just makes me happy. It has a starring role in my dining room, along with another pattern I created called More Green Than Blue. But more on that later.

Back to my latest decorating project, our new house. I showed you what I did in the entryway here ~ and I just went back in and added a “before” photo to that post, if you want to check that out ~ so now we’re on to the dining room, which is in the middle of the house, just off the entryway. It also has a second doorway that connects to a small hall and what I think of as the great room.

Here’s the before photo:

Beautiful hardwoods and moldings, as you can see. But also pretty boring. And I’m not really into boring.

Here is the after:

I knew a few things before I started. First, I knew I wanted to display my antique purple transferware collection. I also wanted to use my little black lacquer cabinet. And I wanted to use the color green somehow.

The dining room was the last room I worked on, largely because we were using it as a catch-all room. So that gave me time to mull over different ideas and hope inspiration would strike. Luckily for me, it did, in the form of a pair of fabulous lamps with gold hardware and velvet green shades. Once I found them, I knew where I was going. 

Above are the transferware dishes, one of the lamps, my paint swatch for the room ~ Heart of Palm by Sherwin Williams ~ and the swatch for my curtains. I decided to use a leaf pattern stencil in the room rather than wallpaper, as you can see below. I repainted all the walls in Timeless White by Sherwin Williams first ~ it’s a lovely, creamy off-white. I wanted a white that could handle the warmth of the green but didn’t match all the wainscoting and molding, which is a bright white.

The leaf stencil, from Cutting Edge Stencils, turned out beautifully, despite my flubs here and there. I had originally planned to do the leaf stencil around the entire room, but my husband really liked it just on the one wall ~ he said he didn’t want to feel like he was in the jungle. Since the stencil was time consuming, and I was tired, I saw the wisdom in his advice.

I decided on a narrow console table to serve as a buffet in the room, a place to finish displaying my transferware and tea cups. And then there were the curtains.

I went back and forth on what sort of pattern I wanted, but then I decided on Abstract Garden. It had just the green in it I wanted. And I just loved the teal blue ~ a perfect complement, and so bright and cheerful.

I used plate hangers to hang some of my transferware collection over my black lacquer chest. I love this little corner ~ it feels cozy and provides another focal point in the room. 

Below, you can see how great the dining room curtains look when you look through the house since the areas outside the dining room are painted a blue green. It’s just nice on the eye.

And last, but not least, is the dining room table, which my husband picked out. It’s great to be able to easily seat 8 people, even if the table is a tad large for the room. I got my husband to turn the chandelier to run in the same direction as the table, which made a huge difference. And then I topped off the table with a striped runner I designed to pull together the green leafy wall and the curtains ~ More Green Than Blue is the name of the pattern.

All in all, I am thrilled with how the dining room turned out. I love the colors, how warm and welcoming it is, and how comfortable it feels.

What do you think?

Photos by The Pink Home