Eclectica

Eclectic: deriving ideas, style, or taste from a broad and diverse range of sources.

It takes a very skilled eye to pull together a broad range of eras, colors and styles. It's sort of the abstract of the design world - you have to be well versed and experienced in achieving everything before you graduate to creating an eclectic interior. It's only for the most seasoned and accomplished who make it look effortless; without that knowledge the result becomes a mess. Classicism, Mid-Century, Contemporary and Baroque are just a few of the styles in the picture above by Francis Sultana...yet, it works. It has the look of someone collecting treasures for decades, but was collated from scratch only this year. It helps to have a unifying base to give it a look of cohesion, but even then, there's no guarantee of getting it right. So sometimes it's a color thread, and sometimes it's a mood. Often, it might be one standout shot of modern color that's the one thing to zing a room to life, the juxtaposition, the finishing touch. Let's have a gander at some talented hands who have crafted just that. Great modern chairs in a period setting:

Mid-Century meets Marie Antoinette

London minimalism and Eames chair

Chinoiserie, rustic, 20th century and contemporary black and white photos. Shouldn't work but it does.

David Bastos puts a new twist into play in a spectacular Rococo room with classic Greek mural, modern chandelier and acid yellow dining. Pretty brave.

Chair by Kamil Kurka. This is precisely the kind of piece that would sit well next to something with equal wood warmth and grace of lines. It's superbly designed, and good design lasts a lifetime. It's really about not wasting the good, but making it work with the new, thereby making modern pieces and old alike stand out in their own right.

From L'Univers d'Ines, a real mash up. Cheerful, hip and modern. Love the 18thc gold framed oil smack in the middle of the noise.

Living In Style Paris shows again how a startling neon or acid green can instantly make a period room current.

For those working within the confines of a period property, why lose the very ethos that is worth keeping by fighting or obliterating it? With contemporary and 20th century design icons such as this dining table, they can have both in complete harmony.

Digging the blend of old and new brought into one by sympathetic colors from Love Is Speed

Moooi's design showcase for Milan - a marvelous mix.

Vincent Darre's daring and brilliant melange of Baroque and modern. It packs a punch!

Weathered & Leathered

There's one item of furniture that is utterly at home in almost every genre you place it in. The short cut to style, elegance and fashionable, a statement of antiqued but humanly down to earth, farm house, retro, Art Deco, Industrial, loft, sophisticated and rustic. Really - it works with everything. Quite amazing, actually. 
It is the humble leather chair. These days, unless you're lucky enough to inherit an ancient and beautifully aged one, they go for a fortune - £500 to £5000 - because simply everyone wants them and the more battered the better. Possibly the only example of single items that the worse they look, the more they cost.
Have a wander through some real beauties in diverse and awesome settings.
Three very masculine concepts from designer Timothy Oulton in London, who showcases fantastic antique collections. The Union flag curtains are impressive, such a grand sweep to the room. 
The biker mariner...

The boxer...

..and the film maker. That chair is incredible. Such gravitas.

Art Deco: vintage Le Corbusier

Clean early Deco lines:

Classic clubbiness:

Andrew Martin antiqued:

 Lofty aspirations:

The real deal:

Blood and Champagne design, letting the pieces quietly complement the orderliness of the portraits:

Eclectic collector

Seventies Sass at Deerhurst Road

The showcase loft

Spectacular chaise in just about the most traditional setting imaginable. You can't invent that, it takes centuries to get right.

You'd think, looking at this fabulous gathering of beaten up leather at Studio East, that it doesn't come any more weathered than this. You'd be wrong.

I present Walnuts Farm. Guestimating the couch to be early 19th century. Glorious, isn't it? 

Delft Obsessed

Of course, Delft has been around for three or four centuries, imported from the original city of manufacture, Delft, via Amsterdam...and centuries before that when the Chinese first invented blue glaze on white porcelain, most commonly seen as the 'willow pattern'. Not new, then, but the ways it's being employed certainly are. Today there is but one remaining factory in Holland, Royal Delft, but I want to start out with a Chinese artist who is harking back to his cultural roots and creating afresh. Ah Xian, below:

 

And some other fun takes on Delft...

Stacking elephants from rstyle.me

Strewn bodies...

Dressing Delft

Framing miniature sweetness from Beyond The Fringe Crafts

 

So what happens when a designer lifts the concept and applies it elsewhere, not on a pot or a tile? Heritage Cabinet, Portugal:

Ana Rosa dresser:

Boca de Lobo

And Paolo Moschino for Nicholas Haslam in a Surrey Farm...

Lastly, a progression in a good kind of way...when an interior designer says 'Sod it, I'm just doing the whole room Delft Blue.' I like that kind of abandon. 

Nice with the urns, innit?

 

Double Whammy

Changing tack this week and featuring only two property interiors, because they have too much going on for one picture each. First up is an artist called Miranda Lake, who has created a surprise around every corner and drenched her eclectic New Orleans home with color. Not stopping there, the woman has a bus in her back garden. Not a mini bus. A 1953 London double-decker. And it's parked for hanging out. Oh, and a 1962 caravan. I love this place. Enjoy the tour!

 

The second home with painting studio I'm featuring belongs to David Bromley, artist and his fashion designer wife Yuge, nestled in Byron Bay, Australia. You can see that David has used the walls as an extended canvas and they have created a blend of their two styles in furnishings, bedding and cushions. Like the Lake house they also have magical beasts and vintage vehicles (a bus! a bus!) roaming the grounds. I very much like these two properties together.