What a difference a week makes! We were busy little beavers at Chez Walker, especially over the weekend as we worked to move our lovely backyard makeover along. We stained the cedar beams and painted the Toja Grid components with Fusion Mineral Paint. The Fusion products were SO easy to work with, and they easily transformed the Toja components into something completely different. The finished product is exactly as I’d hoped – clean and visually calm in its simplicity.

We actually got the overhead sails installed right before leaving for San Diego as well, but I didn’t manage to capture that as we were rolling down the driveway – haha! I’ll have to show you that piece next week. The overhead sails are black, but a transparent black if you will, so they have a softer appearance than you might imagine. Once we hang some globe lights, I think the whole thing will come together and look maybe even the slightest bit magical. Here’s hoping! And here’s a shot of it pre-overhead-sails so you can get an idea of how things are coming together:

As it turns out, it’s rather difficult to take a photo of a 20′ long dining pergola and not have it look weird – ha! I’m definitely looking forward to shooting this properly in a couple of weeks so I can share it with you properly!

Shooting that pergola may be difficult, but what wasn’t difficult was deciding on what outdoor fabrics to use for this project. There was really only one choice in my mind: Sunbrella. Outdoor fabrics take a beating, so it’s non-negotiable to have textiles that are water resistant, mold and mildew resistant, fade resistant and durable. You can even clean Sunbrella with bleach it’s so tough, so I know it can hold up to our outdoor celebrations with family and friends. Not to mention, Sunbrella is the biggest, longest-standing manufacturer of outdoor fabrics for luxury textile houses like Kravet and Holly Hunt. They basically created the category of outdoor fabrics and have partnered with incredible textile companies to take the performance textiles game to an entirely new level. What that means is that you don’t have to settle for underwhelming just because your fabrics are totally user friendly. Outdoor spaces can now reflect the taste we express in our interiors, and fabrics that are made for the outdoors are now being used indoors because of their incredible performance and design. It’s all a win-win.

I couldn’t be more excited about the direction this outdoor space is heading. As a reminder, here are the fabrics we’ve chosen:

And here is the inspiration for the style of new cushions we decided on for the sectional. I’m crazy about the soft French-tufted mattress style for the seating, aren’t you? It feels both effortless and refined. Stylish and timeless. I can’t wait to see how my lovely friends at Deka Home & Patio make this vision a reality!

To add to the luxe feel of this outdoor space, Ashli and her team from Deka will be using Stamina Fibre in all of the back and toss cushions. This cool Canadian product bridges the comfort gab between natural and synthetic fibres, meaning you can have outdoor cushions that sit more like indoor cushions without worrying about maintenance.

With all of these gorgeous Sunbrella fabrics setting the stage for a luxury outdoor living and dining space, I knew the tables had to be somewhat magical. Well, magical they shall be.

Enter my lovely friends from Polycor and their beautiful White Cherokee marble. For those of you who aren’t familiar with Polycor, they are actually the world’s largest natural stone quarrier. Their stone has been used for both interior and exterior projects on buildings and monuments, in homes and in hotels, for decades. Not only has it stood the test of time, but they are a truly sustainable option for North American designers. White Cherokee, for example, is quarried in Georgia, and their North American marbles have a denser structure than European marbles. Polycor has several different varieties of white marble with grey veining as well as some GORGeous black veined granite that looks like marble AND some stunning, classic soapstone in their collection, and that’s just to name a few of the options.

But back to the White Cherokee and our plans for this North American beauty:

The 10 foot long dining table will feature a quarter-matched or double book-matched top with 3 box-style base pieces, all wrapped in the stone. The brilliant team at Dinuovo (the fabricator behind that stunning OVO store at Yorkdale, PS) will be making this dream a reality, along with a gorgeous coffee table in the same stone to tie the two spaces together. Here’s the concept board for the coffee table:

When faced with the decision on which dining chairs would finish this dining space perfectly, I had several factors to consider. Firstly design: they had to be subtle but stylish enough to hold their own with the gorgeous textiles and marble we had selected. Secondly function: they had to be super deluxe low maintenance (we just aren’t the high maintenance types). That means easily wipeable and also stackable for easy winter storage. Gratefully, partner Structube‘s Masters Chair checks all of those boxes and is a super affordable option for any of you looking for a chair that can easily transition from the outdoors in. Not only will they be perfect for our backyard dining, but they will also effortlessly help us extend our indoor seating options for large parties during the winter months.

And that, my friends, is the Week One update on our (not so) little backyard makeover! There are still lots of juicy details to share with you, but for now our family is on a little workation (hubby works while we chill) in San Diego. Be sure to follow me on Instagram (especially stories) for a little behind-the-scenes on our trip, and check back next weekend or early the following week for my next update on our progress!