When your favourite client of all time calls and says she’s just purchased a new Lake House and would like your help with a bit of decorating, the qualifying questions to get to “yes” are few and far between. Add to that a beautiful post-and-beam structure as the starting point, and you can understand why it’s not too much of a burden.

One of the first rooms we will be addressing is the kitchen. I’ve recommended that the clients paint out the wood cabinets to provide some relief and contrast to the wood ceilings, log walls and post-and-beam structure of the cottage. It’s always a tough one for people to consider as we’re all a bit precious about wood, aren’t we? I understand that, but I really do think this seemingly courageous move will help to define the kitchen area and break up the visual monotony of all that wood. 
That said, there are other changes we will be making to transform the space either way. We will be installing a rustic splitface slate grey backsplash to tie in with the granite countertops and the floors; the cabinetry hardware will be replaced with something with greater contrast; the super-high raised breakfast bar {it’s almost chin height when you stand in front of it} will be coming down; and the lighting will definitely be addressed as well.

The previous owners had a serious love for all things green, but green is not my client’s favourite colour. Gratefully, the floors and granite counters in the kitchen are a more neutral palette, and in almost all of the rooms of this beautiful property we can remove the green accents without great effort and take things in a much more modern direction, befitting of my very sophisticated clients.

{All “before” cottage images via Royal LePage}

I actually love all of the grey and sandy tones in the natural slate floors, so we will be using that as our jumping off point for the colour palette for the soft furnishings, starting with a custom rug.

In fact, we’ve already got our strikes back! Strikes are samples that are made up before finalizing the order for a custom rug. Allan has taken very good care of us as usual. We fell in love with a more contemporary feeling Ikat pattern and customized the palette on site at the Lake House using wool and silk poms to reference the colours in the floor. We chose to have two strikes made up – one a combination of wool and silk, and the second 100% pure bamboo silk.

You can definitely see the dark and the light side of the bamboo silk rug more clearly than with the wool and silk in this case. The image above shows the light side of the bamboo silk, and the image below shows the dark side.
Here are the initial fabrics we are working with…

…which led us to the obvious winner: the 100% bamboo silk. The client and I both prefer the lighter side of the rug, so it will be installed such that it is what you see when facing the focal point of the stone fireplace. We love the airbrushed, softened effect of the striation the weavers used on the silk piece. It is still modern but bridges the masculine and the feminine very well. I can’t WAIT to see it in place!

In the meantime, the furniture is on order, including some custom designed pieces that will suit the rustic and organic vibe of this cottage while elevating it with more of a modern aesthetic. I’m so looking forward to updating you on our progress in the weeks to come!

xo
s.