Friends, once again I’m excited to share the newest layer of English country house style in our home, and I hope it inspires you! As many of you know, blue & white transferware is a favorite around here, and the collection has slowly grown over the years. Recently, I was re-listening to a favorite podcast where Marian Parsons (aka Miss Mustard Seed) was talking about her ironstone collection. Her point wasn’t a new one – that collections have more impact when grouped. This got me thinking about these lovely platters I had scattered about the house. While I did enjoy them in many rooms, I wondered what they would look like all together…
Enter one of my favorite inspiration images. This photograph from the book entitled: The Country Decorator by Miranda Innes has captured my admiration time and again.
This little corner of a kitchen has loads of rustic old world charm, higgledy-piggledy quirk, and refined elegance at the same time. The blue & white gets me, of course. This was also my first introduction to the antique meat drainer platters. They are the platters in the picture that appear flat and have perforations. Long ago these strainers would be placed in the bottom of a pan under the meat to allow the fat to drain. Such cool history! I began hunting one of these beauties…
Just for fun, here is a “before” of our kitchen wall before we fully remodeled.
Here is a look at the next phase where we painted the cabinetry.
And here’s how it looks today! Matt helped me hang my platter collection one evening after dinner. My goal was to have some semblance of order since it was a statement design, but not to be too rigid as the quirk is part of the charm. We began with the largest, most eye-catching platter in the center and an equally large one centered just beneath. Then we just built out from there.
As you can see I did find one of those cool old meat strainer platters! They are harder to find than the regular octagonal platters. There are a few gaps in the collection but that is great with me. I can take my time finding just the perfect pieces to fill in. I hope you’ve enjoyed this post and are inspired as I was to gather a favorite collection and display it as a group.
Until next time,
Take care,
Rachel
