Some Italian Furniture Design

glass draw pull - a nice detail

I believe that design preference is often just a contrasting reaction to the generation that came before us.

Our eyes want to see something new.

What’s nice about design now is that it is a big mix up, something old, and something new.  A little modern – clean line next to ornate with color, smooth and shiny paired with old and worn.

Today we are going to take a look at a store I love Savini here in Foligno.  The owner Grazia has a wonderful eye for design.  Keep in mind we are in Umbria, although there are many cities it is not Milan or Rome.  Umbria is the only region in Italy that the land does not touch a sea.  This I believe (since I'm a San Francisco girl) grandly affects people mindset.

black and white check chair comfortable and simple

love this little chair for in front of the fireplace

Eco Christmas tree a decorated branch -gorgeous!

I like the idea to hang a love note or gift in mesh bag

dark red always a good accent color -the lamp is made of thread spools 

wooden table framed in metal very masculine

this door I painted in gold paint, then gold leaf and antiqued

colored glass is always timeless

way cool shelf in aged mirror

gray distressed wood dresser - I like it for the kitchen

page holder and weighty letter opener a great gift for the book worm 

little metal table paired with folding wooden chair

off white-gray wood table and chairs

Was that fun, see anything that could go in your home?

Natalie

  

Christmas in Italy

Christmas lights

 

Christmas in Umbria.

Here in Italy there is an old saying:

“Natale con i Tuoi e Pasqua con chi vuoi.”

Christmas with yours (family) and Easter with whomever you want.

In Umbria all the jewel like hill and valley towns string the historic centers with lights.  It is so fun and festive to go around and see the other cities glowing.

Friends chatting in the rain

Special moments when family is together.

Cappeletti made by hand in broth.

Citrus leaves painted gold framing doorways.

holiday glow

Wet pavement and snow covered mountains.

Nativity scenes made in tiny figurines and even constructed big as live human statues.

Running into friends and having a Prosecco at a cafe.

hot chocolate is waiting

Christmas theater and music concerts at school.

Gobbi (thistle) alla Parmigiana (Parmisian).

Taking the kids out for a hot chocolate served warm and thick like pudding.

Everyone – everywhere saying Auguri – Buona Festa – HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

I say the same to you!

Natalie

12 Photos for 12/12/12

For the fun and joy of today which is 12/12/12.  I am going to post up some simple photos from my life here in Umbria.  And I will leave you with a funny quote from the fabulous Muhammad  Ali.  It makes me laugh every time.

"If they can make Penicillin out of moldy bread, they can sure make something out of you."



1.

my studio

2.

an angel

3.

ceiling on an outdoor terrace

4.

a job site

5.

our front door -very classic Italian

6.

cutting out venetian stucco

7 7 7 7 7 7 7

medieval wall with fig tree behind

8.

a night photo -gorgeous wall

9.

our main piazza

10.

strawberries and flowers

11.

wet cafe chairs

12.

a red bike -love the basket!

With affection,
Natalie

3 Little Italian Houses

a little house in Spello

I had an epiphany this summer.  I knew how I wanted to spend my old age.  I was working painting a huge villa here in Foligno, it was hot all summer, suffocating and hovering around 40C./100 F.  I started waking up early to beat the heat.

Early one morning I was biking to work through the vacant streets, on my way I passed an old woman in her garden.  There in her garden was a little out building, a studio type structure with arched windows.  I instantly fell in love with her, the garden, and her studio (even if I think she actually had wood stacked in it).  Right then I knew and I made a big wish, that where ever I was in the world, when I grow old I want to have a little house, with a garden and a studio nestled in the garden.  Then I will go to work in my studio (doing whatever I want).  Every hour or two I’ll take a break and have a cappuccino or a cup of tea in the garden, maybe I’ll even cut some roses and put them in a basket.  Isn’t that just sublime?

right below the Basilica in Assisi waiting to be loved

When you look at these little houses, don’t you just want to fix them up?  That little house in Spello, is just begging for me to put some fuchsia bougainvillea climbing down from that roof terrace.  Oh man and what color would I stucco it?

in Sperlunga, Southern Italy in front of the Tereno sea

What is fun about this Diario di Design is that I am starting to have readers from many little corners the world.  It makes me happy to think of all you the creative types out there, working in your studios or dreaming of having a studio, and just working at your kitchen table.  Then there are some of you who are getting ready, to start thinking about working at your kitchen table. I hear ya!  Promise me you will at some point SOON get a cup of tea and think about it.  I confessed about my silly old age dream.

Happy December 10^th.

Natalie

December in Umbria

  

december in umbria

Nature never said to me:  Do not.

Still less did she say: Be rich.

Her cry to me was always: Be independent.

-Nicolas da Chamfort, Writer (1741-1794)

This week I have been painting furniture and touching up some walls in a villa up in the hills in Umbria.  It isn’t deep into nature but it still gives one the feeling of peace and freedom and it is possible to get a little lost up there if you don’t know your way.

umbria is all about olive trees

man it is cold out there

In the morning it was -1 C. and the fog was in deep.  Inside it was warm compared to the bone chilling cold outside.   I was working fast, yet I grabbed a few moments to savor the view and the fog.  I love the fog, as I have mentioned before.  I promise to be redundant in this blog (diario di design).  I had brought my beloved thermos of hot coffee – how cool is that, hot coffee, gray fog and silver-blue-green olive trees everywhere.

which way to go?

Remember you can choose your path.

Natalie

The Princess and the Firemen

Palazzo from the 1400's

Yesterday I wrote about my crazy romantic perspective of life – what’s the harm I asked?  Then later I thought about an incident that happened this summer that was completely the cause of my stupid, dreamy, romantic mind.  I was working in a beautiful Medieval Palazzo, the one you see above.  I had brought my Italian girlfriend by to see the space.  She has a furniture store that I paint furniture for and she has great style and we love to talk about colors and process.  While looking at the apartment we stepped outside into the inner courtyard to look and I stood at the top of this staircase and said, hundreds of years ago I could have been a princess standing on the top of these stairs, descending them in a flowing gown.

   

princess staircase

 

SLAM – the wind blew the apartment door closed.  We had a good laugh for a few moments until the reality dawned on me.  I was now locked outside of work, my cell phone, purse and even keys to my house were inside.  Now in this world of cell phones, nobody in Italy even has landlines to look up a number in the phone book.  I couldn’t call the owners of the apartment.  I felt pretty bad because they had trusted me with their keys and I was not working and instead pretending to be a princess.

Hours later I got the fireman to come and open the door.  They brought the huge fire truck right into the center of town.  The fireman were not mad and scolding me for wasting their time.  They were distracted by the beauty of the Palazzo, proud of this hidden treasure, of their Italian culture.  They opened the door in seconds, mouths hanging open in awe, laughing and good spirited and maybe quietly, secretly standing on top of that staircase, for a split second imagining they were noblemen descending the stairs with swords resting on their hips.  Firemen all over the world are cuties it seems.

The project came out well.  The clients were really happy.

I apologize for my low technology camera and basically simple knowledge of all computer stuff.  It is a small miracle that this blog is even up and running.  Today I am taking a huge leap to even try to put up a video.  I hope it works.

It is interesting to note that the crown moldings and ceiling panels are all fake, Styrofoam with real gold leaf on the panels.  I didn’t do any of that work.  I just painted the space.  The question of if it is correct to put Styrofoam into a Medieval Palazzo, you can answer in your own mind.  The job did get completed in a very fast time frame. 

A before shot

Before

Here is a photograph of the finishes. Pearl dragged kitchen, pale grey blue living room, second living room taupe (that changes from mocha to lavender with the light) and a pale grey bedroom with rich sky blue ceiling (not shown).

wood floors installed diagonally

Here's a little video, lets hope it works.

A few photographs of the apartment being decorated.

i love these chairs in mixed pattern

this taupe color changes with the light

these walls are actually that gorgeous pale blue

Was that fun?

Natalie

A Golden Bridge

medieval wall

I am a single Mom, I live in a foreign country and I have many difficult situations in my life.  Yet I also have a cool job, a good man, two terrific daughters and a funny hamster named Coco.

Plus I live in a Gothic Palazzo in front of a golden bridge. It helps to keep a down right, positive, crazy romantic perspective on my life. Why not?  What’s the harm? 

golden bridge

 

“Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage.”

-Anais Nin, Writer

Do you believe that?  It is definitely a thought to consider.  I think I better think about that quote some more and maybe "get my butt moving".

This weekend parked below my studio window was a VW with the word Speranza on the back window.  Speranza means hope in Italian.  That’s pretty cool to have parked below my window, no?  Someone else who didn't need the hope might not appreciate the hours that Speranza was waiting below my window.  If you look closely you can also see the reflection of a blue sky.

hope

It was a very rainy weekend, later the sun came out and turned our bridge gold.  Then forming above the bridge, up came a rainbow, the full arch.  Moments later, looking out the window with my daughter Lucia and her friend Shakti we watched while a double arched rainbow appeared.  I told the girls it could be a long time before they might see a full double arched rainbow again.  Savor this moment.

Then Sunday night it dusted thick powdered sugar snow all over the mountains surrounding our valley.


The festivities are here.

Natalie

Painted Flowerpots - A Gift Idea

moss green flowerpots with tangerines

Today we are going to paint some flowerpots.  I am always painting flowerpots and giving them away as gifts.  It’s a nice idea to paint little ones and fill them with candies in a brown bag tied with a hot colored ribbon E’ VIA. It’s good to go!

Some of you out there might say that they these looked better before I painted the designs on them.  You might be right!  And why because the green is so fantastic that it made them look great right away.

is simple better

I had it in my mind to get a good moss green.  I already had some light taupe acrylic paint in my studio, to that I mixed a Kiwi Green color in a universal tint and a little Raw Umber also.  I came up with just the color I was searching for.

painted flower pots, see my crocuses starting to pop up

  

For the designs I did them free hand, but the bold design one, I penciled in first because I was insecure about it.

 Then I painted the designs in a metallic bronze acrylic. 

I outlined the designs in oil paint (I think oil paint makes everything look good).  For the oil paint, I just get the tubes at the art store.  This one was a dark brown Bruno Van Dyck.  I love it that oil paint colors seem to be the same in Italy and the U.S, maybe all over the world – artists unite! 

I mixed in some turpentine and if I’d had a liquid dryer I would have used that too. This way I got the shading of light and dark brown.

If you are not a painter but enjoy crafts, it is so simple just to paint polka dots.  If the dots come out messy, it will look good too.  You can even cut up a kitchen sponge into any form and press that into the bronze paint.

See how fun that is.  What do you say better painted or simply green? The thing about the designs, if you leave them outside for a few seasons and they start to patina, then the designs look gorgeous.    

-Happy Weekend

Natalie

        

Make Your Own Trail

Topino River

 

Here is my trail along a Medieval wall in front of the river Topino (little mouse). It snowed the last two nights on the mountains toward Rome. In our valley the leaves are falling fast off the trees, flying about mixed in with cold rain.  It’s a mess out there.  A large cup of tea is in order and some poignant words from Kate.

Don’t give in.

Fight for your future.

Independence is the only solution.

Woman are as good as men.

Onward!

You don’t have too much money but you do have

independent spirits.  Knowledge!  Education!

Don’t give in! Make your own trail.

Don’t moan.

Don’t complain.

Think positively.

--Katharine Hepburn, actor

Onward!  I like that.

Natalie