Roman Shade details

These shades were made with a special blackout lining/interlining because they are in a home on the side Missionary Ridge here in Chattanooga. This location gets a huge amount of afternoon sun. The view of downtown Chattanooga is spectacular from this dining room, ...but sometimes the sun is so intense, the window treatments needs to be able to close. Roman shades were perfect here. The windows are tall & narrrow and the shade can be drawn to any height that suits the homeowners needs!

Gossamer Roman Shades

Spring 2008 installation of unlined Roman shades in an arts and crafts style home... fabulous!

Slipcovers for French Chairs

Here's two French chairs recently created and sent off to Columbus, Georgia to a beautiful farm/estate. The house, that sits on many acres, is elegantly rustic with huge hewn beams and stone floors. These French country dining seats, of which there are 2 arm chairs and 8 side chairs, have rush seats. We created the shaped cushions with foam inserts and placed jaunty scalloped skirts on the welted perimeter. They are tailored and fitted to the max with simple closures and done in an embroidered check. If you look closely, you can see the embroidered leaf inside a check. These took many hours to create and consist of lots of pattern pieces. The effect is sublime. The designer, Carol Brown of Lookout Mountain has such an eye for proportion as well as the subtleties of color.
This week, it is on to other challenging projects...we have 2 wing chairs, 1 ottoman, 1 sofa, 1 loveseat, and 2 club chairs coming in to be slipcovered!

It's all about the details!

Here is a picture of some pillows Lori recently created. As you can see, they have down/feather inserts that make them "karate chop" so well. It is a 25%down/75%feather blend...very nice! The great little flange is pleated on the corners for a little bit of pizazz and interest. The designer chose this updated traditional print for it's eyecatching boldness.

2 layer window treatment panels

This is a picture of our most recent window treatment installation mentioned in the previous post. The rest of the room is not completed yet, or I'd include the bedding and pillows that go with this project. The underlayer is a silk rod pocket drape with "English Bump" interlining. It is more like a blanket than anything! The front drapes are an English style chintz, also with an interlining of English bump. English bump is an interlining often used originally in Europe for it's heavy insulating properties. Now, it is most often used for the heavy, over-the-top elegance. If you can look closely, the pleats are actually a petite, lady-like goblet shape!

The Latest for 2008

Well, its a new year for The Brick Path Studio. It was a rather busy holiday season, but we were able to get a bit of rest after Christmas deadlines were met. We're now fresh and ready for the next "wave" of slipcovers, bedding and window treatments.
We are now completing a bedroom project that includes heavy 2 layered drapes in a Scalamandre' floral & dotted Travers silk.....Wow!
This project belongs to a high energy, adorable lady on nearby Lookout Mountain with 3 children in various stages of being grown. It seems she is rewarding herself for all the hard work of mothering a busy household and creating herself a private getway with luxurious fabrics, stacks of deep fluffy pillows and an amazing detailed bedspread. This bedspread has a unique feature of a box pleated flange (created from the floral print fabric we're using) with a purchased rope trim. A thick brush fringe has been applied to the pillows to coordinate with the silk with large embroidered dots...(adding a bit of levity.)
Attention to detail is what is this project is all about! The designer involved is a former Lookout Mountain resident that is currently living on Hilton Head Island, Jan Shoffner. She has an amazing eye and really knows how to address the dreams of her clients. This room is truly going to be a lush retreat. I'll be posting pictures as soon as the bedspread is complete.

Flying away on a wing...chair

Well, we thought the Spring rush would be peaking by now, but its not the case. We've had a "flock" of wingback chairs decend upon us and they all need slipcovers!

We've had up to 3 wingback chairs at a time, but never 5...and there's one more on the way! These are from a historic Greek Revival home and they need to remain in their original condition - so reupholstering is out of the question. In fact, that is one of my favorite uses of slipcovers; when you need or want to perserve the original upholstery yet change the look for current use. At present, these "elderly gentleman" are sporting an interesting array of old fabrics on them and when you poke around on the upholstery, you can hear the crunch of horsehair and straw.

To start this project we will be using purchased mattlesse coverlets as slipcover fabric and the scalloped edging will be employed as skirt hems. This customer is very inventive and has decided to use a second richly-colored fabric for an underskirt that will peek out about 6 inches. She's great fun to work with and really has a fresh eye.

This run on wingback chairs reminds me of the run we had recently on Chippendale sofas! We turned about 5 dusty & stuffy old sofas into soft, friendly and beautifully inviting showpieces. I see amazing before & after comparison photos coming up! Check back in a couple of weeks and I'll have some pictures of our "wing-men" wearing their new suits!