How To Display

Many of our customers are other vendors and even if they aren't, they want their homes to look interesting too.  People always comment on how nice the shop looks so I decided to start sharing some of the "tricks of the trade".  I love wandering around antique malls and shops but sometimes it's just plain painful to look at so here are three simple rules to follow:

1. Decorate with groupings of uneven numbers.  In the photo below we grouped the focal furniture in a set of three...the settee, the chair, and the coffee table.  Then grouped the settee with another group of three...the cat, the pillow, and the saxophone.  Even the table top is in a group of three...the coral, the cloche, and a glass inkwell (not very visible in the pix, but it is there).  Even when you dissect the display further, the chair has it's own grouping...the chair, the ottoman and the sax. 
2. Use small, medium and large or short, tall and something in between.  Don't have everything the same size or shape.  When I hang pictures I try to have a long picture, a large picture and a small picture together.  You are decorating a home not a museum, so make it  cozy, warm and inviting.
3. Group things with color.  The colors are white,  French grey, and tan in my example.  I run around the shop saying to myself, "white, French grey, tan" and look for anything in those colors.  Sometimes I even enlist the customers in the search.  It's like a scavenger hunt.  The display would look gross if I threw some red in there.