Making a mantle scarf in the Aesthetic Movement Moorish style

Of course like many we are adjusting to the new normal. While our showroom remains closed we have expanded our in line sales at our Ebay store gallery1884 . That has given me some much needed time on my hands to do some projects for the residence upstairs and one of those has been to do all the textile projects upstairs in our Persian Parlor. I will be detailing some of those projects over the next week or so.

The goal was to do a period style mantle scarf for  our slate mantle upstairs all the while keeping with the very "Aesthetic Movement" nature of the Persian Parlor our large formal parlor. Given the room was painted in 1885 we are not changing anything so we are working with a mostly blue color pallet. We needed to create something that looked authentic and will relate to the formal draperies so we wool the basic design of the valance and adapted it to the mantle scarf.

We used  a combination of materials including a blue damask on top of the shelf. The Moorish Style Jacquard blue and gold fabric, the 5 inch long gold tassel gimp, a smaller 1 1/2 inch tassel gimp and last but not least the burgundy velvet which is one of the accent colors for accessories in the room. All in all I think it works well and looks period. 

The Tour: Off to Morocco in our Victorian Aesthetic Movement Parlor

Some spaces you just have to think about. In this case a small room off the"Garland Parlor".  This room probably functioned as an upstairs office for Mr Burgman and as the family grew it became a bed room. By the time we came along it was painted white and totally devoid of personality.

It  also had some design challenges. The door was to one side which made the room look totally unbalanced and it walled in a very small space in way that made it appear even smaller/ Our solution was to close in the doorway and instead move the doorway to a new centered to the room opening  Originally a single door with transom. in its new configuration at 5 ft wide with Victorian fretwork. Portier rod below with exotic vintage fringed tapestry and curtains, it takes the entrance to a new level and welcomes your entrance to a unique space.

On the wall opposite the fainting sofa we hung a large antique tapestry on the wall which was done in a Terra Cotta color  and brushed and color washed to give it a slightly aged look.

Below that we stretched some old green fabric on a wooden stretcher and sat it on the floor to add another visual layer and placed a vintage ebonized and gilt table topped with a brass Turkish Tea Pot

The window was also an issue as it was not centered. We decided to false drape part of the wall to make it look like one double window with the drape pulled back.

Peacock feathers and a Urn with peacock complete a theme and fill a corner

This Moroccan lantern light adds visual interest in the other corner.

The settee is an aesthetic movement piece. that just happened to work with wall colors perfectly.

 The stained glass window  started out at a regular "farmhouse window" that we replaced with stained glass in colors to match the light fixture stained glass.

The Moorish chandelier and medallion complete the look. We still plan on covering the ceiling with a Turkish style ceiling tile we have on order.

So we went from white box to Moroccan Dream in less than one week