Thrift-Store Victorian

ictorian and Romantic style is big these days. Soft and pretty seems to be back in style, often combined with more modern decorating elements to create a curiously 1990s version of eighteenth and nineteenth-century décor. This style can be expensive to acquire, especially if you covet perfectly preserved antiques, original artwork, or fancy reproduction textiles. You can get the feel of the period without maxing out your credit cards, though. Heres how, with a little help from:

The ten commandments of Victorian and Romantic style

1. Haunt thy neighborhood flea markets and thrift stores.
From mismatched floral plates and cups, to scraps of antique lace, to odd crystal glasses or tiny pewter pitchers, thrift stores, flea markets, estate sales and yard sales can yield wonderful treasures. You may not find Spode china or Royal Doulton figurines for 50 cents apiece, but you will probably find many other beautiful things. A single crystal wine glass can become a lovely vase for dried lavender or rosebuds, and a pretty old soup-bowl can become a beautiful potpourri holder. Pretty scraps of fabric can become cushion covers, quilt panels, or any number of other pretty things. Don't worry too much about an item's pedigree if you like it, and the price is right! Unless, of course, you're a serious collector--more about showing off your collections later!

2. Thou shalt consider thy family's lifestyle.
While the all-white rooms that appear in so many Victorian decorating magazines may be beautiful, they are hardly practical when you have children or pets! I once knew someone who decorated her living room to match her golden retrievers, so she wouldnt have to worry about them shedding. While I wouldn't suggest that you accommodate your pets to that degree, it is a good idea to decorate your home so that it will be comfortable for the whole family! Remember, if you spend thousands of dollars on cream brocade upholstery, Murphy's Law will almost certainly ensure that the couch will become your child's favorite place to have a gooey chocolate chip cookie and a glass of grape juice, or your dog's preferred spot to dry off after a swim in the lake. If you really must go for the whiter-shade-of-pale look, make sure everything is treated with stain repellent, and easy to steam-clean! And, if you have small children or large pets, you will need to display fragile collectable items out of reach, or behind glass doors. It's easier on everyone concerned to child-proof or pet-proof your home than to be vigilant 24 hours a day.

3. Cherish thy collections, and display them with care.
One of the hallmarks of Victorian decorating is clutter. This doesn't mean that everything you own should be on display all at once, but that your collections of special objects should be exhibited carefully, perhaps in rotation. Try to group items according to a particular theme, or reserve one area of a room for collectibles, and de-clutter the rest of the living space as much as possible.

Small objects look good clustered together. A selection of framed miniatures can be artfully grouped together on one wall, perhaps linked together by a length of taffeta ribbon. A small shelf or wall niche is a great way to display small collectible items, especially if you are trying to keep them out of the way of the aforementioned kids and pets!
Box-style frames are also a good way to display precious, fragile things; they are available at most large craft stores, and don't cost a lot. I have seen antique baby clothes preserved in these deep frames, as well as old theater programs and memorabilia, toys, needlework, and many other items. There are many other display possibilities. Cruise second-hand stores and auction houses for pieces of furniture that you could paint or refinish, such as old vanity tables, small curio cabinets, and hutches.

4. Thou shalt not acquire dust-collectors unless thou art willing to dust them!
While true Victorian décor did involve a lot of clutter, most middle and upper class Victorian lifestyles also included servants to keep everything clean! Trinkets and knick-knacks can really add to the old-fashioned atmosphere of a room, but they can also choke the atmosphere with dust.
I am not the world's most diligent housekeeper, so I try to keep the dust-collectors to a minimum in my home, and I keep what I do have clustered together for easy cleaning. I would love my home to look like an antique store (which it never will, by the way) but I don't want it to smell like one! I also don't want people to have asthma attacks when they walk through my front door. I motivate myself to go on occasional cleaning binges by thinking about poor Miss Havisham in "Great Expectations", who spent her life surrounded by cobwebs, dust, and the moldy remains of her uneaten wedding cake!

5. Thou shalt welcome nature into thy home and heart.
One of the most important principles of Romanticism is that people should open their hearts and minds to Nature (with a capital N!), rather than simply trying to impose order on it and civilize it. The controlled, ultra-formal landscaping of the 17th and early 18th centuries gave way to a softer, more casual approach as the 18th century drew to a close, and developed into the pretty Victorian cottage garden style that springs to mind when most of us imagine English country life. Just read almost any poem by Wordsworth or Keats, and youll get an idea of the philosophies that encouraged this style!

Embracing nature's beauty, and bringing some of it indoors, is a wonderful way to add a little romance to your home, but this doesn't mean you have to be a great gardener. I'm very skilled at killing houseplants, no matter how good my intentions, so I try to surround myself with dried or fresh-cut flowers instead. I keep bunches of dried lavender in small pewter jugs, potpourri here and there in pretty bowls, and dried rosebuds in a terracotta pot decorated with a frieze of cherubs all these things bring easy-care flowers into my home.
I love fresh flowers too, especially in season when they are relatively inexpensive, or even free in some cases. Right now, my whole room is lilac-scented, thanks to a beautiful bouquet from my friend Ruth's garden! Floral wreaths--fresh or dried--are also a wonderful way to welcome visitors to your home, and small topiaries made of rosebuds or laurel leaves add a classically beautiful touch to hallways or table centerpieces. Wreaths and topiaries are easy to make too, and they can be relatively inexpensive to put together, depending on the components you choose.

If you do have a knack for keeping plants alive, you can even create live topiaries. A small bay tree can be trained into a topiary fairly easily, though it does take a while. I know this can be done with many other plants too, but I don't have the nerve to try it. Perhaps if my brown thumb ever takes on a greenish tint, I'll consider it!

Fresh fruit arranged in a beautiful bowl always reminds me of Dutch still life paintings, and is practical as well as beautiful. Don't leave it in full sun, though, or you may end up with a heap of over-ripe pears and an invasion of fruit-flies! Display fruits that take a long time to ripen, or (better still) eat as you go, and add to the arrangement as necessary.

6. Use pretty textiles, but keep thy chintz under control!
A Victorian room can be a beautiful riot of floral chintz, punctuated by gingham or plaid, and topped off with pretty lace accessories; it can also just give you a headache, if it's overdone! Try not to go crazy with chintz. No matter how much you love the stuff, restrain yourself to just one or two chintz fabrics per room, and use solids, stripes, checks, or tiny prints for everything else. If you have wallpaper with a large floral print, consider going easy on the floral fabrics in the rest of the room.

Decorator fabrics, especially pretty chintzes, are often very expensive, so keep your eye on the remnants table at the fabric store, since you will often find just enough to make a cushion cover or a couple of placemats at a much reduced price. If you can sew a straight seam, you can make any of these things, so don't be daunted if you lack sewing expertise. Roll-ends of upholstery and drapery fabric are also sometimes available from furniture/decorating stores, often much cheaper than their original price-per-yard, and will provide you with high quality materials for many different projects.

Beautiful tassels and interesting old buttons are another inexpensive way to pretty up a room. Use the tassels on curtain tie-backs or cushion corners, and make button collages on picture frames, box lids, and more.

7. Thou shalt not underestimate the work of thine own hands.
If you do needlework, display it with pride! In the 18th and 19th centuries, many English and American gentlewomen were never without a basket of needlework to help them avoid idle hands, and much of their handiwork has been passed down through generations, becoming valuable heirlooms. Even the embroidered samplers made long ago by young girls just learning to stitch now command ridiculously high prices in antique stores!
If you happen to have the time or inclination to be a needlepointer, knitter, quilter, cross-stitcher, embroiderer, or crochet-er, be proud of what you do--don't keep your work packed away in a linen closet or a trunk full of mothballs, but rather show it off, enjoy it, and integrate it into your home in the same way that women of earlier generations might have done.

8. Honor thy ancestors and/or borrow someone else's.
I once met a man who had a room full of beautiful family pictures, many of them in antique frames. There were painted portraits, old sepia-toned photographs, and even hand-colored photos. I looked at them longingly, wishing I had such a large collection of well-preserved family pictures but then he admitted to me that he didn't have a clue who any of these people were! He had acquired the pictures from various second-hand stores and flea markets over the years, and had decided that if the descendants of the people in the pictures didn't value their ancestors enough to keep them around, he would adopt them as his own great-great-grandparents, long-lost aunts and uncles, and so on.
My point is that old photos and portraits either of your own forebears or someone else's add a wonderful touch of history to a home. The restrained stress and excitement in the eyes of the young man in his military uniform, the proud stare of the patriarch surrounded by his dogs and his favorite horse, or the tired smile of the young mother posing with her children in their swaddling-clothes or leading-strings--these faces bring the past to life, and give us a glimpse into the hearts and minds of people who lived long before we entered the world.

9. Read, surf and dream, and thou shalt discover many fine ideas and objects.
There are a lot of great sources, both on-line and off, for ideas, materials, and pretty objects that fall into the Victorian/Romantic category. One of my favorite magazines is Victoria, which provides me with a monthly infusion of beautiful things and intriguing decorating ideas. Their website can be found at http://www.VictoriaMag.com , and their editorial staff hosts a weekly Reader to Reader chat (accessible from the site) where readers can exchange ideas, chat about the magazine, or talk with one or two of the editors. The unrelated Victoriana: Reviews for Victorian Living website has a huge selection of links to explore, including a great selection of articles about Victorian lifestyles.

For people who enjoy shopping through home parties, there is an up-and-coming business (based in L.A.) called Parties Victorian. The owner, Sheila DiMatteo, will bring her beautiful and affordable Victorian reproduction wares into your home, complete with tea and scones! Her website is still under construction, but it promises to be full of lovely stuff. Even if you aren't in the Los Angeles area, she has distributors around the U.S.

There are a lot of excellent decorating/design books out there, many of which may be available at your local library. Laura Ashley books are full of great ideas and beautiful (though expensive) fabrics, and Victoria publishes lots of books as well as magazines. There are numberless books on Victorian decorating, Romantic style and English Country style! If you're looking for suppliers of Victoriana and related objects, check out the Victorian Yellow Pages.

10. Thou shalt strive for harmony between North and South, West and East, past and present.
Colonialism brought a multi-cultural flair to the decorating styles of the 18th and 19th centuries while the ethics of the British Empire were questionable, and their treatment of those they colonized often reprehensible, they did bring many of the most beautiful elements of those cultures back home to England, and eventually to North America. Gorgeous fabrics and collectibles from India, China, and Japan were very much a part of European decorating during the last century, and many of the most prized antiques from the period have a distinct Oriental flair. (If you are lucky enough to live in a city that contains a Chinatown or a Little India neighborhood, many of these beautiful textiles, as well as wonderful reproduction collectibles, are within your reach, often at surprisingly affordable prices!) However you feel about the historical forces that created the Colonial style in England and (in a very different way) America, the borrowing of elements from Eastern cultures enriched traditional Western style immensely.

If you like some elements of Victorian/Romantic style, but don't want to replace everything in your home, don't worry! It is possible and very desirable to combine old-fashioned touches with streamlined modern furniture, and still come up with a finished look that is both beautiful and practical. While your lace cushions may not work too well with your lava lamp, they will probably look just fine on your pine futon. And pretty china looks just about as good on a simple pine table as it does on polished mahogany, believe it or not. If you're still not sure, well, thats what tablecloths are for!
So just move the lava lamp into the guest bedroom, and you will probably be able to work with just about everything else. A completely Victorian room would probably seem somewhat dark and oppressive to most of us, as most people's expectations of light, space, and comfort are much different now than they were a century or two ago. Compromise is the key to success; your home is not a museum, nor should it be, but you can combine the best of past and present to create a comfortable living space that suits your lifestyle, and surround yourself with objects that you love, regardless of their value.

Related items:

• Victorian Homes Magazine is devoted to the restoration of period homes, but you can get a lot of good ideas even if your house is new.

• Debbie Travis' Painted House: A very cool site with lots of painting technique tutorials.

• The Internet Wallpaper Store: Sonia says: "This site is full of the most incredible stuff! I have never papered a room before, but I'm yearning to at least add borders to my living room now."

• Waverly Fabrics home decorating site: Lots of fantastic information on this site, including a "Lifestyle Quiz" to help you decide what style may be right for you. Also has information on their glorious product line. It may be expensive, but even just looking at it sure can give you some wonderful ideas! Lots of info on paint finishes and such, as well.

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Sonia Michaels is a writer, parent and homemaker, and the owner of The Magic Wardrobe, a home-based maker of handcrafted knitwear for children and nursing mothers. She lives in Victoria, BC with her husband, daughter and parents.