Ancestral Texture

If there were a ranked collection of my most beloved images, this one of Hardwick Hall's Green Velvet Room would make the top 5. Apart from the fact that it's visually stunning, it also may as well be a lesson in texture. I am now convinced that the combination of threadbare luxurious velvet damask, heavily carved 17th century stools, and oversized nubby rush matting is a recipe for happiness. In particular, I'm craving a rush mat with a gigantic weave to offset the gilding and pick up the decay inevitably a part of the objects and decor that I'm so fond of.

Hardwick Hall in World of Interiors, November 2008.

I'm in love with ancestral homes to an embarrassing degree; there is nowhere that rivals these dwellings when it comes to decor that is perfectly disheveled and exquisitely luxurious simultaneously.