subject: Wicker Furniture: A Cottage Style Dining Room [print this page] Quite some time ago some very good friends of mine decided that now their children had flown the coup it was time that they left the house they had lived in for so many years. As with the rest of us they would leave so many memories there, some funny, some sad, but on the whole, life had been good to them and they could look back on many happy times.
It is a sad time for a mother when she realizes that she is no longer the lynch pin of her family and only she, along with millions of other Moms, knows that empty feeling inside when the door closes after the last child leaves to begin his or her own journey down life's path.
However being a resilient person my friend Jean settled into the task of getting her house ready for sale and must have done a very good job as it sold in no time.
Eventually they decided to buy a beautiful thatched cottage in a very quaint English village, complete with a village green where the stocks still stood. These were used mainly in the middle ages for the public humiliation of wrong doers. The victims were immobilized and anyone could assault them by spitting at them, kicking etc; anything and everything was allowed.
Jean's last house had been quite large to accommodate her family and their friends who always seemed to be 'staying over' at weekends or sometimes just forgot to go away. Perhaps the extensive library was the attraction, or even the pool, no one ever knew but I think it was the welcome.
Everyone felt so at home; in the winter there was always a pot of soup sitting on the Aga and in the summer a jug of homemade lemonade in the fridge; visitors were never asked 'when will you be leaving?'.
Cottages in England do not have big rooms but little by little my friends got their new home into shape, all except for the dining room which became their greatest problem. In their other home they had had a beautiful walnut refectory table which in no way fitted any room in the new house, so sadly the table and chairs had to go.
It was then that Jean had a flash of inspiration. She was walking in her garden admiring all the very old strains of roses when one took her eye. It was a pale salmon shading to a deeper tone towards the top of the petals, she still has no idea what it is called but she calls it 'Inspiration' because once she saw it, she knew exactly what they needed to do with their dining room.
They picked the rose and took it to a fabric shop in the next town where much to her surprise they found a beautiful fabric for drapes, it had roses in that exact color with soft green leaves on an off white background, then they were off to the paint store to buy white eggshell for the woodwork which included a chair rail around the room, deep salmon satin finish paint for below and paler for up above. A new wood floor was laid and a beautiful rug of cream, salmon and copper somehow emphasized the warmth of the wood. The light came from wall lights and one of their old bedroom chandeliers hung center ceiling. They hung the drapes; time now for the furniture.
It was at this point that I was invited for my first real visit. The table and chairs were a vintage white as was the slim, elegant buffet / hutch. The table was round and best of all the chairs had arms and wide spacious, padded seats, which seemed to invite you to sit down. A large green plant in a wide wicker basket filled one corner and an elegant white magazine rack with a lamp on filled another.
The windowsills had shining sets of copper jugs and an arrangement of 'Inspiration' roses filled the table. It was beautiful. Warm and hospitable yet the white wicker furniture made it cool and inviting. We talked and talked, just catching up as old friends do and after many hours we were still there, still as comfortable as when we started and thinking 'Thank goodness for wicker'.
