Valentine’s Day table settings for me by far are the prettiest to create. Soft and romantic, these tablescapes set with the airiest of bone china pieces is always the way to go for pure beauty. Today I’ve brought out all of my beautifully decorated French Haviland & Co Limoges pieces to share with you…
Statuary
For this table setting, I brought in my little resting angel to add to our decor. After a good bath and a little touch up paint he rests comfortably in the table’s middle. Along with a small bouquet of grocery store florals, the two create a nice low off-set centerpiece along the table.
I actually got the idea from an older post I did back at our Big House in California…
This was one of the first teas I photographed when my blog was still very new ~ a Peacock and Roses Tea. The script writing I loved to use now causes problems when reading the post so the text is wonky but the photos are still good. 😉
I had saved up these little notepads from Joann’s or Michael’s for a year until it was my time to host a tea, then I brought in our angel and strew peacock tail feathers along the table with him. I think these are Mary roses, an English rose I had growing out in the garden there.
Close close all night
By Elizabeth Bishop
Close close all night the lovers keep.
They turn together in their sleep,
Close as two papers in a book
that read each other in the dark.
Each knows all the other knows,
learnt by heart from head to toes.
Recently I found these creamware mugs (not sponsored) while looking for after-Christmas sales at At Home, a home goods retailer close by in Lewisville, Texas (just east of Denton). They are a nice addition to the other creamware pieces I’ve collected over the years from HomeGoods, Marshall’s and other shops.
How I set this table
I began setting this table with a snowflake patterned tablecloth I have had for years. I love its lacy texture and the way it drapes off the table ends is very pretty and ethereal. Over the years it has shrunk with washing and accidental drying (from when I first began having teas with friends) so now it is more of a runner.
This worked perfectly as I was able to use the fall placemats I shared in this fall tablescape just upside-down, which adds even more texture and pattern to our table setting!
Bring in the pink
My go-to color is always pink! I had fun with last month’s Blue and White in the Cupboard but pink and white is my absolute favorite combination for any tablescape. This time I’ve pulled out four now-vintage Shabby Chic napkins I’ve had since the early 2000’s when Target used to carry a lot of Rachel Ashwell Simply Shabby Chic table linens.
Paired with the new white-handled silverware I picked up at Judith Stringham’s Christmas sales event in December plus a sweet silk rose napkin ring, the Haviland china looks delicate and sweet. Bone china is pretty tough, actually. It’s stoneware that bangs and chips more readily, surprisingly!
Since we are still officially in winter ~ even if the plants outside say spring is coming soon! ~ I kept the pine and pinecone garland up on the chandelier and added a few more crystal and mercury glass ornaments to it for fun. Here is the other heart wreath I didn’t use in this month’s Pinterest Challenge wreath makeover.
Going home is always a little bittersweet, isn’t it… We love to revisit memories of family times together and places we have lived. We enjoy seeing how places have stayed the same and how they have been updated, how neighborhoods have changed. Coming home this time involved a lot of remembrances of times with my father-in-love, a whole bunch of cleaning and organizing, as well as trashing out things which needed to go.
One of my favorite things from this trip, after spending my first morning there sweeping cobwebs off the house and its eves ~ here in the Sacramento area ~ was playing with Great-Gramma Kate’s vintage tricycle…
Overblown lighting but still fun! Will have to pull into Lightroom and edit… 😉
Mr. Ethereal was busy cutting back several oleander bushes hanging over from the neighbors’ yard. Vintage wood ready for projects, cut out pattern pieces for a rocking horse and two donkey carts, antique woodworking tools and steamer trunks were part of the detritus dragged out from the large backyard shed. Many of the tools in that shed ~ the wood staves for shaving logs and different size hand-drills and planers ~ were over 100 years old and belonged originally to Raymond Fudge, Pete’s father-in-law.
The oleander cuttings had been dragged out onto the lawn to prep for the garden recycle bins and that’s where I found them…
And this amazing vintage tricycle was among those treasures
found near that big metal shed!
Thinking of other friends who have photographed bicycles
popped into my mind and the fun began!
I love the sweetness of this old tricycle and I remember Kate and how kind she was. She was a track runner in her high school days and the girls on her track team competed against other local school girls during a short season of track and field during the 1920’s. There were no state meets during those days.
Kate was a long-jumper and triple-jumper and I think she also played basketball. She had long legs and was tall at 5’10”. I am sorry I can’t download a photograph of Kate but my computer is being finicky.
Gramma Gini’s roses bloom in the background and the old cherry tree stands to the left.
I can imagine Kate tooling around town with this tricycle along Rancho Cordova’s city sidewalks heading to the library or the grocery store or out to rides with friends along the American River back in the 1980’s. Kate could get there by the old tressle bridge which spans the river in Fair Oaks, which she lived right near.
A favorite!
I think she would have enjoyed seeing her bicycle basket
filled with bright pink and white flowers!!!
A bit of silliness made all the cleaning worthwhile…
All edited… Hope this post was fun for you, too! 💝
Emporium 1905 is located down in the heart of Corsicana, Texas, in the revamped old-town district. It is a treasure trove of fun goods to wear and home decor goodies to add to your home. I will be heading down to Corsicana this weekend for an IOOF event and will definitely be stopping by! Let’s see what I found for you this past fall…
Emporium 1905 is fun vintage dress and housewares shop owned by two sisters who have went in business together after both retired from their previous lives. Finding themselves a little bored with retirement, they decided to open their shop five years ago to meet new people and do something fun. The name itself comes from the age of the building when it first opened.
🙂
Emporium 1905
323 N. Beaton Street
Corsicana, Texas 75110
903-602-5255
Located next to another favorite shop I found last time I was down in Corsicana ~ Victorian Sample Florist (and jeweler) ~ and also talked about in this other post ~ Tom’s Secret Garden. Emporium 1905 holds all kinds of vintage dresses, hats and shoes for anyone looking to dress up for a special occasion!
Of course there is a good selection of Texas goodies in amongst the mid-century canning jars, books, embroidered tea towels, bakeware and such. I love stores like this, don’t you? They are fascinating to browse and you just never know what will strike your fancy and have to “come home!”
Look at the chickens!!! I still love chickens ever since my grandmother Helen had so many lined up above her kitchen counters…
The two sisters also have a surprise Christmas room!
Christmas anytime of year? Yes, please!
I know many of us love vintage Christmas decor so this is a must-stop shop for you if you are ever down this way. I found those little cotton elves like my mother used to collect plus vintage Golden Books with Christmas themes for children (and adults!).
Just look at this sweet Santa! “Take me home!” I clearly heard him say…
On this day I found a 1950’s style hat for my friend Laura and a pressed metal scrolled vanity mirror to use in our bathroom.
If you are ever in the area, do stop by! These two ladies are a hoot and know much about the history of the area. They will also gladly tell you about the goods they pass onto you.
This month’s Pinterest Challenge is a fun mantelscape recreation. Hope you’ll stop by!
And here are this week’s wonderful features…
Last week I shared a number of wonderful gardens with you and somehow I totally missedJudith’s French Country garden home over at Botanic Bleu and her wonderful romantic peonies… I just had to go back and capture them for you. Definitely a special post to go back and sigh over…
🙂
Rita, who writes the fun blog Panopoly, shared some of her own
home decor pieces available for sale that she is letting go through the storefront she shares with her sisters. If you are looking for something that you’ve wanted for a long time but haven’t found… Check out her post as it just might be there!
🙂
Over at Fabby’s Living she shares a wonderful summer tablescape with her adorable fish plates and blue stoneware pieces underneath. I think we all enjoy setting our tables beautifully even when it’s just family for dinner. Show Fabby some love and stop by and leave her a comment or two, won’t you?
Debbie at Debbie-Dabble is back with a summertime patriotic lighthouse and she shares this delightful DIY ~ love its New England look!
Kelli at 3 Boys and a Dog brings us her recipe for making these fun rainbow soaps ~ super fun for kids in the tub!
Thank you to everyone who posts about Share Your Style on your blog ~ I do see it when I stop over and appreciate your support!
If you’ve been featured here at Share Your Style… Here is a button to share and copy to your site and your featured posts, thank you!
Royal Wedding week for HRH Prince Harry and his fiancée Ms. Meghan Markle and it wouldn’t be complete without a small discussion and a little history about “taking tea.” Warming us when it’s chilly outside and cooling us down when poured over ice cubes in the summer ~ tea is the perfect drink no matter what side of the Pond one lives on! 😉
courtesy of Yahoo.com images, saved to Period Dress on Pinterest
Excitement and guessing about what the bride’s dress will look like are all part of what is being shared this week surrounding the upcoming Saturday nuptials at St. George’s Cathedral, Windsor Castle, England of HRH Prince Harry of England and Ms. Meghan Markle ~ a fairy tale being played out much like one 62 years ago where another American actress Grace Kelly married Prince Rainier of Monaco in April of 1956.
Tea and Brits
Tea and the British go together like… well…
tea and biscuits…
This week I shared a post about porcelain fit for a king so today I thought I’d share a little about how tea time as we know it came to be.
Tea as a drink has its origins in China in the year 2737 BC when Emperor Shennong was away from home with his army. His servant was preparing hot water for him to drink and a leaf from the camellia sinensis bush blew into his cup. The leaf went undetected and Emperor Shennong drank from the cup and found the brewed tea to his liking.
In the 1500’s, Portuguese priests and merchants were offered tea to drink in China and they enjoyed it and brought tea leaves back to their part of the Western world. Tea became a popular drink in the United Kingdom during the next century.
The East India Tea Company brought tea production to India during this time in order to compete with China. Consumption of tea was mostly for the upper classes initially as tea was expensive but with England being able to produce its own tea, the drink was eventually cost-effective and made available to everyone.
Anna, the seventh Duchess of Bedford, started the tradition of afternoon tea back in 1840 by inviting in a few friends to share a light meal to stave off hunger between the noon meal and dinner
which then was served at 8:00p.m.
The idea took off as apparently everyone was hungry and
high tea became very fashionable.
What’s the difference between the different tea repasts
you ask?
According to a nice post by Tea Time magazine afternoon tea {also called a low tea} is a light afternoon snack where little finger or tea sandwiches, scones and cake is served. High tea is a little more substantial with savories and meats included with the tea and is more like what we would call supper. High tea is served at 5:00p.m.
Not really a tea but too beautiful not to share. 🙂
Here is a table set for a light dinner at the Biltmore Estate
that I shared in my Biltmore at Christmas post last December.
A cream tea is a tea that serves scones with clotted cream and a small pot of jam.
In the Victorian Tea Society when we had teas at each other’s
homes we really had an afternoon tea.
Once in a while if a friend just happened to stop by
then I might have a cream tea as a mid-morning snack
but actually a cream tea is a type of afternoon tea
in the United Kingdom.
Tea Accoutrements
Tea tins
Earlier this year I found this tea tin at HomeGoods and since it works with our British tea theme today plus it’s my favorite color… Just had to share here with you today! On the back of this sweet pink tin of black tea by the Keep Calm and Carry On Beverage company, Ltd. there is a summary of how the famous saying on WWII British posters came to be:
“On the eve of WWII the British Government printed 2.5 million Keep Calm and Carry On posters. The aim of the simple five word statement was to convey tot he country a message of reassurance for the troubled times that lay ahead.
“The posters went unused and subsequently destroyed at the end of the war. Some 55 years later a second hand book dealer in the North of England discovered a copy of the poster in a box of books bought for auction. That find marked the rebirth and launch of the Keep Calm and Carry On message into the 20th Century.”
Tea tins have been in production for over a century now but tea was first stored in small locked tea chests or boxes within the home {think the Boston Tea Party of Dec. 16, 1773}.
Tea bags
There are first cutting and second cuttings of tea with the first cut referred to as the best tea for that harvest from the camellia sinensis bushes at a tea plantation. Brewing a cup or pot of loose leaf tea is still the best tasting way to enjoy tea.
There are differing types of tea ~ white, black, oolong, rooibos, green tea and more.
There are also tisanes which are herbal blends and not really teas but most people call them tea anyway.
The invention of the tea bag is considered as 1908 with little hand-sewn bags of fabric, usually silk. Patents were applied for as early as 1903 with production beginning in 1904 and successful marketing of tea bags by 1908, hence the date.
Tea spoons
Spoons specifically for tea were originally called mote spoons and were created by Colonial pewter and silversmiths here in America.
These spoons were long-handled with slots in the spoon face itself for removing tea leaves from one’s cup and from the crevices of the tea pot’s spout.
Pretty interesting stuff, huh?
🙂
I hope you’ve enjoyed this little history of tea today and
please check some of my other posts featuring tea
by just searching “tea,” “teatime” and “table settings” in
the search bar along the top, I believe it is.
🙂
Set your recorder to record the royal wedding which will begin at 4am EST this coming Saturday morning on all the major news channels starting at various times.
Check there programming for the correct time for that station ~ especially if you aren’t planning to get up to watch it live
Today’s post then is sharing some beautiful china
fit for royalty!
This sweet Art Deco creamer with it’s zeppelin ridged style is lovely used as a flower vase.
Lovely Limoges
Porcelain tableware from the late 1800’s through the 1940’s from European countries such as Austria, Germany,
Selisia {modern day Poland} and especially France capture the heart
like no other ceramicware.
Beautiful, lightweight and durable with hand-painted gold details and decorated with roses and sweet garden flowers ~
Limoges and the ceramics from this time period are just as fashionable today as when these pieces
were first made.
Variety of uses
In today’s modern setting ~ vintage and antique Limoge can be used for their original purpose as placesettings for dining or just decoratively as I tend to use many of these pieces here.
Antique china tends to have small chips often along its edges called flea bites and small crazing all over if not down and out cracks and repaired breaks which someone lovingly repaired long ago. Other than drops, much of this is probably due to the stresses of weather and time as well as from being boxed away and stored when not in use or in fashion. 🙂
Here I’ve repurposed this antique Irish soup tureen to display a candle ~ lovely!
Tip
Even if a piece doesn’t have any cracks or crazing ~ hot foods can cause any lead to leak out becoming poisonous so only use antique and vintage tableware with cold foods or place a clear plate between any food and your beautiful piece.
This O and EG Royal Austria plate was manufactured somewhere between 1898 – 1918. I hadn’t realized it was that old!
Too beautifulto just throw away past owners kept these ethereal pieces until it was decided to let someone else
enjoy their beauty…
This cake plate (above photograph, lower left) is really a Victorian or Edwardian era soup dish with flatter sides as was popular for dinner parties at the turn of the last century. This porcelain soup bowl was made by a pottery manufacturing company called O and E. G. ~ then owned by brothers Oscar and Edgar Gutherz.
This little antique creamer with its zeppelin shape charmingly holds some posies.
According to a site called The Porcelain ZoneOscar Gutherz began the firm with Maximilan Marx decorating porcelain. Gutherz’ brother Edgar joined the firm after Edgar bought out Marx’s interest in the company. The company was commonly called Royal Austria Factory, according to the Porcelain Zone. From there, the brothers went on the produce porcelain themselves.
Here are the years of production to help date a piece of their tableware if you have or find some:
1876 – 1898: Marx and Gutherz
1898 – 1918: Oscar and Edgar Gutherz
1918 – 1920: OEPIAG – Österreichische Porzellan-Industrie AG
1920 – 1945: EPIAG – Erste Porzellan-Industrie AG / Karlsbad
1945 – 1958: EPIAG / Starorolsky Porcelán
This gilded Haviland deviled egg serving dish
has held berries on the table and does
double duty as a decorative soap holder
in our bathroom.
A collection of O and E G plates mixed with Haviland Limoges and other European tableware.
Practical uses
A practical way to use many of these pieces is by mixing them in with today’s modern tableware. My favorite thing to do is use reproduction cups and saucers that I know can be safely used for tea or coffee and the plates themselves can be used for cold foods like finger sandwiches, cold fruit and desserts.
If there is any doubt about using a dinner plate or salad plate for dining then a way to use them safely is by adding a clear glass or plastic plate over top to eat off of instead while enjoying the beautiful plate below.
My friend Gloria would do this whenever she used her antique carnival glass for our tea luncheons ~ although it may have been safe to use “as is” since it’s glass. The extra glass plate on top doesn’t detract from the look of the table either as it is almost invisible to the eye.
Another tip
The acid in citrus fruits can also pull lead out of pieces of porcelain.
Place a paper doily under your fruit salad when serving
oranges and mixed fruit salads.
Little bits of love in a stamp…
The history of Limoges
Often we call all of these pretty porcelain pieces Limoges
but that would be a misnomer. Limoges is a city in France where the base clay called kaoline used in this very
white porcelain was found.
David Havilandalready had a thriving china shop in New York when in 1840 he went to France to find a manufacturer out of the
many in the area who would create pieces of porcelain that he could then sell to the American public.
Haviland eventually moved to the city of Limoges so he could oversee production of his tableware.
The city’s name became synonymous with Haviland’s china
production and hence the name Limoges stuck.
These pieceswere always hand-gilded and sometimes sold as blanks to be hand-painted by women in cottage industries. This was particularly popular at the beginning of the 20th century with American women.
Manufacturer’s used a newly invented process of transferring a lithograph onto a piece when decorating a plate or china piece in house ~ a process of placing a pre-inked tissue stamped by copper plates which was then “transferred” by hand by a worker onto each china blank. The pieces were then fired at a low temperature to fuse the beautiful prints into the clay.
An interesting book published by the Haviland Collectors International Foundation (HCIF) called
Celebrating 150 Years of Haviland China: 1842-1992
catalogues the history of the Haviland family and an amazing amount of tableware pieces.
A couple of years ago I shared my story of meeting Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York and I thought I had shared about Royal Winton potteries as I have a book in storage about their manufacturing facilities and their process but perhaps not.
This book shares many photographs of the artists and young women at work applying transfers to pieces of china and hand painting ~ really interesting if you like studying this sort of thing!
Sets of china
Monogrammed china available as souvenirs is always created for royal newlyweds and though the new Duke and Duchess won’t have their official new titles bestowed upon them until
after the wedding ceremony you can bet their actual family china will be spectacular.
For other wonderful royalty posts check out my friend Laura Ingalls Gunn’s wedding week posts on her blog Decor to Adore. She shares many posts on tiaras and all things royal. 🙂
A favorite photograph from this year’s Valentine’s post.
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Tuesday Cup of Tea ~ Antiques and Teacups
Tea in the Garden ~ Bernadine’s
If you’ve enjoyed this post here are several others
Apparentlythey were invented to keep critters from
wandering into Dutch homes and kitchens since screen doors
weren’t yet invented and though they were created in Holland
they were really a bit hit here in America.
Here’s a neat article on Dutch doors for you to check out.
Solvang is a great little town that after you’ve parked
you can pretty much walk everywhere to dine and shop.
Here Kathy is leading us on a quick tour around to see
a few other shops.
Oh, and there are a number bed’n’breakfast
places and hotels in Solvang to stay at, too.
From here we drove back to Kathy’s lovely home but
before we go here are a few last photos of Solvang and one
on the way driving through an ethereal allée of trees!!!
***
Our headline photograph from above, again ~ here you can see the lovely ethereal blouses and some of their beautiful white on white antiques and vintage goods displayed
The next day afters spending the late afternoon having
tea and cherry scones for a snack instead of dinner
{We were still full from lunch, really.} and then talking until
late in the evening about decorating and all the
things Kathy and her husband Ken have been updating
For me it was chandelier heaven!Each was unique and
other than this next really large one ($995 on sale) and
another really beautiful French chandelier
most were in the range of $120 – $350 or so.
Colorful candles, mugs, pretty jewelry, curated clothing and unique chandeliers all for sale along with spoon rings ~ Posies has something for everyone who comes through their doors for a visit.
The gilded swags and bows circling around the lid and
the base and its royal depiction of
Elizabeth in her coronation dress and sash
when she ascended the throne as queen
at the age of 27 in 1953 ~ is
perfectly in line with my love
of all things royal!
I tried to turn the box’s top around for you to hide the seam line of the box
to the back as it’s a bit unsightly but it wouldn’t budge ~
so there we have it.
😉
These candy boxes don’t come along that often
so if you find one be sure to
purchase it while you can.
They are wonderful for repurposing to hold
anything small ~ beads, jewelry, sewing supplies
{like I’ve used the one here}
or even to hold potpourri while leaving the lid open.
At $8.00 the Queen Elizabeth candy box
was a good buy.
Now I have a mini collection of two of these
vintage candy boxes!
I thought I wrote a little about finding the first
English candy box in an earlier post but I guess
I didn’t as I cannot find it.*
*I did finally find it ~ over on an Instagram post. 🙂
More things royal: I’ve mentioned meeting Sarah, the Duchess of York, before. If you’d like to read about my meeting her and about this lovely Sarah’s Garden china set, please click HERE.
The square box on the left, above, I bought in England
while visiting my brother and his family
back during the spring of 2005.
I use it to hold small sewing supplies ~ it contains
a few loose buttons for those times
when one loses a pants or shirt button
a blue cloth measuring tape
some safety pins and extra
sewing machine needles.
This is how I have always used metal candy boxes
ever since I was a young girl.
My mother had a large black chocolate tin
when I was young that my father had given her
for Valentine’s Day back in the mid-1960’s.
At some point I asked if I could have it for my
growing collection of sewing supplies.
My craft room at our last house as we had the house on the market. The little square candy box can be seen on the sewing table. I hoped the black tin might be in this photograph but it wasn’t out. Usually that large round tin sat on the back shelving just to the right of this photograph where I could grab it easily when something inside was needed.
Sorry! Blurry photo of the craft room closet with loads of supplies.
Happily, my mother said yes! and that nice round candy box
with sprays of roses and other flowers painted on its lid
has held ribbons, seam rippers,
zippers, buttons, and an old 1960’s-era
button card of snaps for baby clothes in it ever since.
My mother used those little snaps when making me and
my brother Frank cute corduroy overalls
back when we were toddlers.
Charles, Earl Spencer, came to Design Bloggers Conference 2017 and spoke about his family home, Althorp House, and a new furnishings line by Theodore Alexander based upon many pieces of family furniture.
These two gilded boxes ~ one which held
sweet confectioneries and the other which
held tiny chocolates ~ will be moving about
our home in little vignettes as the
lovely 60-plus year old stars
that they are!
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