|
The House in the Garden
Barty Phillips
Suffering from
horticultural withdrawal symptoms brought on by wintery
days? Barty Phillips suggests ways of introducing garden
images into your home…
November mornings
are dark and dank outside and evenings are dismal. Few
of us are able or even want to spend much time in the
garden, which is soggy underfoot anyway. If you’re
anything like me, now is the time when you get withdrawal
symptoms and long for some images or reminders of the
garden to enjoy indoors. This year’s up-to-the-minute
home style is based on the plain and simple. Textiles
are in natural fibres and plain colours, anything from
heavy linens and cottons to will-o’-the-wisp muslins
and stiff, sheer, silk organzas. Smart tableware is
all in white. How can garden images fit in with this
trend?
The subtle approach
There are two ways you can co-ordinate plant images
with a minimal interior. You can choose the subtle approach.
Shops are full of hand-painted china with sketchy images
of perhaps a single leaf that looks as though a puff
of wind would blow it away or a simple flower looking
as though painted in watercolours. These are images
to blend in unaggressively. You’ll probably never
get tired of them. Rather than build up a complete set,
however, they might be more interesting and more truly
garden-like if you mix and match the images. Maple leaves
are popular, there are small, floating leaves (perhaps
willow?), bamboo designs and the ever-popular poppy
and marigolds – there’s definitely a leaning
towards wild flowers or traditional cottage garden plants.
A celebration
of the bountiful If all this is a bit neat and well-mannered
for you, you can go for the rumbustious approach and
choose really colourful fruit and floral images that
will stand out positively against the plain colours
of your curtains and walls. There are plenty of jug
and bowl sets, a sort of play on the traditional washbowl
and jug. These are useful for celebratory entertaining,
since they hold a lot of food or drink. Fruit is a favourite
image for these: pears, plums, grapes, apples, cherries
found in fruity colours depicted large and bold. Many
are hand-painted and will look good against almost any
plain colour, from cotinus purple to glaucus green,
or even white. For something really exclusive, Dartington
Pottery (whose high-fired tableware is already in the
permanent collection in the V&A in London) has a
range that includes painterly images of fruit, trees
and flowers.
Ceramic tiles traditionally
celebrate the gorgeousness of the natural world and
their highly glazed finish adds an even more exotic
quality. And, incidentally, if you’ve had enough
of plain good-taste fabrics, Fired Earth has some splendid
embroidered crewelwork fabrics from Kashmir and a range
of colourful printed cottons including ‘Summertime
Rose’ (rose hips) and ‘Summertime Plum’
each 136cm wide with a repeat of 68cm…
Articles
reprinted with permission from Greenfingers.com
|
