Inspiration Week: Al Fresco in the Garden

Hello my lovely-jubblies,

Welcome back to Inspiration Week at Modern Country Style.

I'm so looking forward to the Inspiration Journey Linky Party here on Friday! I can't wait to see the gorgeousness that I've been hearing all about from lots of you.

Well, yesterday I promised you a garden trip and here we are! Thanks so much for coming out into the garden with me for a bit of fresh air.

Garden heaven, here we come. ;-)

Today I'm thinking about al fresco dining in my garden.

Yeah, thinking, *not* doing. It's sunny today but still a bit too cold to think about eating outside by choice.

We currently have a circular paved area, just beyond where this path leads in the photo of our garden below. Plus a covered terrace outside our back door. And a patio right at the back of the garden.

So I'm on the prowl for ideas for how to use them more than we do now. I'd love to create more space for easy entertaining outside like these dreamy images.

A beautiful veranda in place of the structure we have at the moment would be perfect. With a glass roof to let the light into the house.

In a muted green-grey.

{This next one is my favourite. Yum.}

That would be for spontaneous tea-times in the garden as a family.

Or casual suppers with friends in the summer.

Then further up I would like a gorgeous table and chairs for casual coffees with my girlfriends.

Yes, that's you.

And right at the back of the garden, we'd love to put in some kind of summerhouse/den/playroom/haven't-really-decided kind of room.

That's the long-term plan.

Those are the images that are helping me along on my Inspiration Journey. I could very happily sit and stare at them all day long.

That's the short term plan. ;-)

{Yup, hilarious is my middle name.}

Today is Pancake Day in the UK so I'm scurrying around preparing for some flipping-action this evening. Mmmmm, I love me some pancakes.

So then, this week we've had gorgeous crafty inspiration and al fresco dining loveliness, which leads me onto sharing my very favourite Modern Country Interiors.

I'm thinking Belgian: my new Style Crush.

Very exciting indeedy.

Images via: Unknown, unknown, Homes & Gardens, Breckonridge Conservatories, Our Garden, Unknown, Unknown, Breckonridge Conservatories, Giner Ella, Unknown, Shed Chic, Birmingham Mail, Shed Chic

I'm linking to my favourite parties in my sidebar.

Enter your email address:

to subscribe to Modern Country Style

Modern Country Craft Inspiration: Book Art

 Hey peeps.

Welcome to Inspiration Week!

This week, I'll be showing you some of my favourite inspiration images, ending with a partaaaay on Friday.

Yup, the Inspiration Journey Linky Party will be here on Friday 11th March. Will you come and show us what inspires YOU?

I'm hoping you know that Modern Country Style has three elements:

• Renovation: charting the complete renovation of our home and garden.
• Creation: crafting gorgeousness.
• Inspiration: sharing what gives me Eureka! moments along the way.

Most linky parties only let you link up home make-overs and craft projects, which I've found frustrating when I've put together an inspiration post I've been really pleased with so I thought I'd start my very own link party that let's you link up what inspires you.

This Friday's Inspiration Journey party is a trial run for what I hope will become a regular feature here so if you like the idea then I'd love you to join in. ;-)

Here's the button. Will you grab my button by copying the html to your sidebar? Will you? Will you?

<a href="http://moderncountrystyle.blogspot.com" target="_blank"><img alt="Modern Country Style" src="http://i1219.photobucket.com/albums/dd436/Sarplowman/Inspire20me.jpg"/></a>

Today, I wanted to show you what's been inspiring me craft-wise lately.

I love ancient crafts that have been bought right up to the minute. Modern Country Crafts, I like to say (but, of course!).

Book Art.

Not Art Books. But Book Art.

Art using books and the written word.

I'm not certain yet how I'm going to take these ideas forward but that's why I wanted to call the party Inspiration JOURNEY.

What I often do when I spot an awesome image somewhere is to search around for more ideas around the same theme.

And then gradually ideas form in my head about how I'm going to interpret it for myself.

I might attempt a few of those ideas from my head until I'm left with one I love for me.

That's what I mean by my Inspiration Journey.

I first spotted a Book Art picture over at Michele's Hello Lovely Inc. blog, which is jam-packed full of awesome inspiration. Plus her writing style is fantastic. This was the image she shared, that started this whole process for me:

Absolutely stunning, eh?

Some of these works of art are made out of one book, seeing the book as a carving medium, and using scalpels and tweezers to dissect the pages.

Others use books as a vehicle to ground their art. Bringing the book to life.

Each post this week, I'll be showing you inspiration from a different area of my blog.

Today is craftilicious.

Come again and I'll be the garden.

Care to join me?

 

Images via: K. Stillman, Sue Blackwell, BibliOdyssey, Sarah Bodman, Nicholas Galanin, unknown, Yvette Hawkins, Brian Dettmer, Brian Dettmer, Sue Blackwell, Brian Dettmer, Brian Dettmer, Liz Hamman, Isaac Salazar, Brian Dettmer, Sue Blackwell

Enter your email address:

to subscribe to Modern Country Style

Modern Country Kitchen Colour Scheme

We chose Farrow & Ball Blue Gray as the main colour for our Modern Country Kitchen colour scheme but knew that, although it was the perfect colour for the room, there just wasn't enough natural light coming in to stop the room looking gloomy if we used that colour alone.

I wanted a paler colour too.

{Mr Modern Country laughed at me choosing between Cream or Ivory or Off White or Alabaster or Chalk or Almond or ..or...a million others.

What a cheek that man has.}

This is what I chose.

Details to follow soon....

Here's a reminder of how oppressive the colour was before.

It makes such an enormous difference using the paler paint as well as the Gray Blue. It gives the impression of a much lighter, airier room.

The remaining pictures were the images that I used to help me narrow down my final colour choice for our kitchen. I think the creamy-white works so beautifully with the gentle sea tones of the soft greys.

Looking at them now, you'd definitely be excused for thinking that these images were all from one kitchen.

But no.

I just scour and search and look and read and devour and scratch about and hunt and rummage and seek out until I see exactly what I love.

I'm completely obsessed with narrowing down what I want to nth degree. I think it's one of the best way of being sure about what you want to achieve in a room.

Some days, ideas come to me out of nowhere. But on the days when they seem to have dried up a bit, returning to pictures that inspire me really helps get me back on track.

I'm betting that you have some pictures that you return to again and again for finding your va-va-voom again.

{Have a lovely Friday.}

Images: Decodir, Our Kitchen, Our Kitche, Our old kitchen, Our Kitchen, Period House, Kitchen-Paint, Cheverellwood Kitchens

I'm linking to my favourite parties in my sidebar.

Enter your email address:

to subscribe to Modern Country Style

Dark and Sultry in the Kitchen plus Linky Party Idea...

Before I completely write off the idea of a darker look in *my* kitchen, I wanted to show you that, providing you have masses of natural light pouring into your room, dark and sultry really can work in the kitchen.

What I love about Modern Country Interiors is that there's such an eclectic mix of opportunity. 

A Modern Country kitchen is *not* a look that's has to be fiercely prescriptive. There's plenty of room for you to make it your own.

{And if that means a dark and sultry then this post is for you, baby cheeks.}

Ooooh, news flash, news flash....

I met up with Laura from Happy Homemaker UK yesterday. This is she:

Grab a cup of tea and join me in my journey as an American expat mom living near London. I'm passionate about my family, eclectic vintage design, and a good story. But not much of a speller-er.

I can't even begin to tell you how nervous I was beforehand. Well, alright, I can. Very, very, very, extremely, humungously. Soooooo nervous.

We had lunch together at a funny little cafe halfway between where we both live. We sat and chatted and nattered and chattered so easily. Just like I'd love to do with so many of you. I could hardly believe we hadn't met before.

She's gorgeously lovely and I'm guesting over at her blog today.

Go on, have a peek.

Now then, I have an idea to put to you.

Modern Country Style is all about Inspiration, Creation and Renovation, right?

 See up there on my blog header?

One of the frustrations that I've had with link parties is that, although there are loads of parties for crafts and house makeovers, there are none, as far as I know, for linking up fantastic Inspiration posts.

There are sooooo many amazing blogs out there that post awesomely inspiring images, and I don't think they get the exposure they deserve.

So, here at Modern Country Style, I was thinking I'd like to begin an Inspiration Linky Party.

Starting next week. For a trial run.

Are you in?

{Hint: Feedback encouraged. ;-) }

Images: Living etc, Living etc, Jessica Helgerson, 25 Beautiful Homes, Thirty Duo, Modern Kitchen Interior Designs, Country Homes and Interiors, Modern Country Style, Hashai, Living etc

Enter your email address:

to subscribe to Modern Country Style