Worth Every French Penny...Rural And Rustic

 Burlap Luxe French Home Cottage

"Everything you love can find a place."

~Dore Callaway

Burlap Luxe designer Dore,

took a vintage French ladder back and gave it a new old paint finish. 

 This vintage French chair did not look like this when it

found me, telling me just what it wanted to

become..

Harmony is attainable.

 French furniture is designed to play a part in a

country home.

French furniture is certainly decorative, and so easy to

live with.

 My before photo of a thrift shop French find.

 Dated, a bit drab, and in need of some purpose.

Deconstructing was the beginning.

A good strip down and this French Chair was loved all 

over again.

 

 NO!

Never, never.

Well, maybe at one time in the 80's

 

 Yes, yes!!

your seeing the Price!

$3.99

This French ladder back arm chair solid oak, sturdy, and so 

meant for me and my home.

 A little French love, and a weathered ageing of white.

Painted and upholstered 

~By Dore of Burlap Luxe 

I had the sand paper, plenty of it, paints in abundance, and

a perfect piece of French worn canvas that I am so glad I

did not cut it up for a project a week before.

Yes, I had

the vintage canvas on hand and a staple gun with 

plenty of power, so this chair cost me

no more then time, and $3.99

 Country rural furniture is defined by simple in style, 

and used for a purpose.

"Everything you love can find a place."

~Dore Callaway

French Inspired Home...French Wirework

Photos BurlapLuxe Home

I strive to design with forgotten pieces of salvage pale in color that echo the
grey skies, and the naturals of earthenware putty clay's.

This French dressing chest made its way to my sitting room after I stripped off it's
painted finish of bright apple green. To then restore it's Frenchness to a finish of desire,
aging it to feel like chalk to the touch.

I alway's look for pieces then paint them allowing them to give back
a harmonious, restful, calm, rustic in style.

I have been creating in some way my whole life. As for the paint finish,
"de la conception a la finition" The design finish, I make and create my own paints.
using old world techniques as is in most modern time chalk paints.

French in designs whites are sometimes creamy and often touched with grey's, using layers,
and wiped off aging. I am comfortable creating around weathered and beaten up pieces, it's
what inspires my soul in what I gather and create.

A weathered beaten down porch post, adds the right kind of rightness,
layered with French serving trays of old.

Iron, pewters, zincs, and galvanized scattered about my home.

It's not uncommon to find a bit of unusual,
like these rocks that look like wild bird eggs ready to hatch.
Found when my daughter was enjoying nature when she was age 4.
Her small hand offering me rocks saying don't they look like bird eggs mommy?
How could I dare toss them.

She is now 3rd year college.

200 year plus door I salvaged from my grandparents home when all there
was left but memories. The key in a box of old skeleton keys passed around for
the taking, and would you believe me, in the dividing up of old keys when I got home
I noticed that the one of a few keys I took home with me fit our family's home door un-locking
beautiful memories of the home that built us.

French wirework is a passion I have been bending and twisting for years.
I love that something common can be artistically re-created into artful play with a
story of it's own.

I love seeing the art of French wirework in an old rustic French villa or cottage.
It's here where I create just that. Wire bits are often found and snipped off pieces in the strangest
places. The open coiled craft of wirework was a technique popular during the first half of
the 19th century. Artisans crafted each piece of handwoven wires, and metals turned, and formed
into forms of French wire-craft. A fine art of today as well.

Here is a piece I have been creating for a performance in one of my crafted
French theatre's. I was inspired by this piece when we added a family member to our home
( Puppy) her name is Pia Bleu, and she is an Italian Greyhound, we adore her.
We sometimes call her dancing Pia!

Here you will see her long legs dancing about.

She wears a dog collar of grey tattered linen and a wire pendant.

Like all ballerina's she wears a wire bun wrapped in a wire crown I had to create for her.
I add something that has become a trademark to my art, a technique of crusty, white
touched with grey, adding that mystery of old.



My hand twisted, and bent wire crowns will soon be filling up my shop, and can
be found in my etsy.

www.etsy.com/shop/BurlapLuxe



Vintage sea pearls embellish with tagged Ocean, and Sea on the back side.
Royal crown is to the right.

Take note of the French wire Chandelier on the book jacket of French Home,
I am in love with this art.

Our Pia Bleu, now 5 months old who inspired my wirework art piece, The
Dancing Pia, wearing her grey tattered collar.

Altered Life

"Click on photo's to enlarge"
The decorating of a home becomes an imagination of our life and the life journey we are on. This antique desk is a piece that I acquired from a wonderful aged old rustic antique mall, with all the perfect charm of inspiring you to buy kind of place. The desk was so perfect in every way except for the dark wood stained finish with a gloss to it that spoke in volumes that it dated a look that made this a hard selling piece. With that being said I was able to talk the price down a bit with the dealer. This was my treasured find, and I was taking it on my special hands on journey. It was in much need of added euro flea market chic-ness, with a little work and no fear of making it my own, it became a piece to love.


As I embraced each step in making this desk over, it needed to reflect my passion for all things chippy along with personality that added to its age without to much added new-ness. I stripped off the old stained finish to then add the new old painted finish to it. Taking the steps of priming it, layering of paints, and special techniques that sanding adds to it, as well as aged effects giving the piece a voice, and a place of belonging. The desk had to have a look of a well worn piece that evolved over time, with the appearance of water stained marks, and bubbled areas of pealed off paint to it.


One may say in the design and illustrating of ones home that it is a reflection of our life, and the journey we are on. As a young girl with a clam spirit and a passion to create, there was not a thing that I did not look at differently then my family of close would see. I would alter everything I laid my hands to, and I was enamored with paper, paint, and a necessary art to translate from what it was, to what it had become. I cannot resist great bones in a piece, this desk being not quite junk not quite valued for some, I saw much more in it, I saw a piece I can sit and be inspired to create.

Pictured here is my works of art, altered original pieces leaving nothing undone to the altered pieces while adding new life to them. I have been collecting those old brass wall pieces from the 70's that made there ways into our homes for years. Those brass villages, and cafes along with musical planes, you will now find them popping up everywhere with out someone to love them. I will take and alter there history with vintage paper book ephemera, covering the pieces of them giving them a new story to tell, giving me an intimate connection to each piece I alter. The elements of art for me is a critical mesh, a balance of what I love and the findings of great junk to add to each piece.

Inspiring junk and altered art to find its way into our homes, giving the pieces a voice, and a place.

Let The Piece Find You

Love at first sight with rustic French flea market style. Timeless euro chic qualities are enhanced by the French tendency to collect and acquire furnishings over time rather than buy as sets inspiring a home with history other than trendy home accessories; resulting in perfectly imperfect. Sharing my passion for flea market brocante with my daughter Hannah has given her a creative balance with French flea market style that provokes love at first sight. The French chandelier was brought into our Burlap Luxe shop for sale by our dear friend Judy. I could see that Hannah was inspired by it's whimsey, as well as the paint finish in its peaceful tones that just spoke to you. The grayish white painted scrolling arms with cut glass was beckoning her that it was a special piece. This French Chandelier had found her heart with excitement, and she knew just where it wanted to be. We never go on the hunt for something to fill space in our home or force a design style, we just let the piece find us.

Pictured here are a few pieces that make me swoon over them. I have a fond passion for old pieces, chippy, and rusted with a hidden story to them. Some of my favorites are old doors, iron beds, and French chairs no matter what shape their in. A simple chandeliers with a bit of whimsey along with velvet feathered filled fringed pillows, and salvaged wood pieces all in which excite in how I will reuse or restyle there use in a renewed way.

European style is a design style of timeless desire. Its simple aged found object will add to a feel of history without the fuss of perfection. Treasures that find you make that special statement of not quite matching from groupings or collections, this gives a room a sense of being fashioned over time. Having an obsession with salvaging pieces have a way of making their way into our romantic homes, and decorating with what we love. I follow a rule of starting with one great piece for each room of a home. While letting salvaged pieces find you, the rest of the room will fall together inexpensively piece by piece.

Inspiring you to design rooms with great vibrations, using peaceful calming tones as I did with these pieces in my own home.

Weathered French Elegance

Another piece to adore, and it takes center stage in my kitchen. This is a piece that I happily imported from France; it came to me painted in a wonderful shade of French blue. I lived with it until it was time to give it the perfect makeover. Using my talents in the art of design, I took and dragged it out of my home to peel off it's old personality. Letting it take on it's natural European beauty, nothing in the house is too precious to touch.

I am not quite sure why I would purchase pieces, just to then turn around and change the color or tone. The only answer to reason is if it has great bones, and it beckons me. A little hard work will be well worth the time, and investment.

A Passion For All Things Aged With History

What a wonderful piece imported from France, it had layers of black paint on it. Although I loved it black with a chipped peeled age, it was just not quite right for my European chic home. I then stripped it down and water stained it using the tones of natural aged woods; it made for a much better blend with my winter whites in the room. The gold's and silver grays balance the room with the feeling of shopping in France at one of the best flea markets you could imagine. I love the height next to the winter white slip covered sofa, and the drama it adds to it. Approving voice's heard through the cracks of the piece fills the room with all things aged with history; and I love it.

So my inspiration to you is to not be afraid to peal away history and unearth the beauty you may desire to live with. I wanted to restore the piece to its aged likeness of the many European pieces that we find pictured in the French books we lose ourselves in. With that being said, and that oh so feeling of yes it belongs to me. I hope to inspire you all to let a piece tell you what it wants to be.