A little more on the showhouse-

The showhouse has been in full swing for a week now, and getting a lot of attention.

 Visitors to the guest bedroom by Susan Marocco Interiors  love the draperies and the horizontal stripe silk bedskirt that we created. 

Gala night.... Susan Marocco, her husband Joel Goren, me, and Heidi Holzer who created the marvelous wall and ceiling decorative paint treatments.

For more on the showhouse, click on "showhouse" in the topic list to the left.

Showhouse Opens!

At last, the Designer Showhouse of Westchester opened to a gala preview last night!  A guest bedroom by Susan Marocco Interiors was a favorite, exuding her trademark "Approachable Elegance."

A steady stream of visitors sighing with delight rewarded all the hard work that went into creating the room.  The three-layer trim on the draperies and the curved mounting board were a great success.

It was too chaotic to concentrate on taking a good full-room photo!  These will have to do, for now.

The Euro shams are flanged with the silk pleated ribbon that provided the base for the drapery trim treatment; for the pillows, it is folded in half and sewn in.

Fragments from earlier projects provided a hint of contrast to the mostly monochromatic palette, the front pillow also showing off the drapery's three-layer trim treatment. 

The horizontal striped bedskirt peeks out from under the quilted silk coverlet; the asymmetrical stripe is repeated in two pillows, not in place for this photo, but you can see them in one of the above photos.

Another showhouse peek

Packing up goodies today.  The furniture is in place and tomorrow we'll put the bedding in place.

Horizontal stripe for bedskirt; the three-layer trim repeated on throw pillow.

More on Showhouse Draperies

The showhouse draperies were installed this week- and I continued to have camera woes.  I forgot my regular camera, and thanks to some lighting issues, the iPhone pics I took are not too great.

But here is one shot, at least.  The panels are stapled to a curved board, and dressed with luscious, luxurious tassel tiebacks, which, as you can see, are not shown here.

Once the panels were sewn, I made a sampler of pleats for Susan to choose from.  

We both had the same favorite: a three-finger fanned pleat, henceforth  dubbed "the showhouse pleat."  The center finger of the pleat is more prominent than the two side fingers, and the back of the pleat is fanned out and tacked- actually once on the board, the fanning is reinforced by the staples inside the pleat that attach it to the board face.

Also in the running: a regular three-finger pinch pleat, side-tacked:

Two-finger pleat, too casual for this room, though it's one of my favorite pleats:

Goblet pleat, nice enough but too predictable: 

Three-finger regular pinch pleat, front-tacked, which I really love, but for this situation Susan preferred the side tack:

And top tack, which is just wrong in this context and with this fabric:
because of the embroidery, the fabric was not consistently pliant, so the embroidered parts were stiff and bulky while the plain parts were supple, making it impossible to create even fingers.

The original inspiration was a storefront drapery display Susan saw at Cowtan & Tout in London, with a four-finger flared pleat; but this bulky, interlined, embroidered silk was impossible to shape into four fingers, for the same reasons as the top tack above, as you can see:

The showhouse- a preview

How about this amazing trim? 

When I saw the sample I wondered who makes it.

Actually, it turns out there are three separate trims, and we are creating it ourselves.  The loop gimp was adhered to the pleated silk band.

Then the tassel trim was glued to the back of the banding.

I'm afraid this multi-layered trim will have to be hand-sewn to the drapery, because it is really, really heavy.  I like to do hand-sewing during Yankees games.  Hey, there's a game this afternoon!  Guess what I'll be doing?

Showhouse!

I have some exciting news!- Susan of Susan Marocco Interiors, a designer I have worked with often over the past 8 or 9 years, has been invited to participate in The 2011 Designer Showhouse of Westchester, and she in turn has invited me to help her create window treatments and bedding.

Susan will be decorating an upstairs guest bedroom in this $11,000,000.00 Bedford Corners home, a room with two windows facing the front, to the left of the door as you face the house.

We met there yesterday with the decorative painters to measure and plan wall and window treatments and set up a timetable.  Susan has chosen some sumptuous silks and trims that I can't wait to get my hands on.

I've always enjoyed attending showhouses and being inspired by the multitude of fresh ideas I've encountered at them, but this is my first opportunity to contribute to one.  Cool!