designing your baby's nursery

Decorating a space in shabby chic style is an engaging lesson in learning how to reuse and repurpose items from the past. One of the distinct advantages of this decor style is the opportunity to stretch and bend the limits of your creativity. And one of the most delightful areas to try your hand at this endeavor is in your home's windows. Shabby chic window treatments utilize out-of-the-box items that are taboo in other styles of decorating: old linens, canning jars, artful glass, pressed flowers, vintage kitchen utensils, and crochet are among just a few of the estate-sale findings that look lovely gracing cottage windows. The next time you're thinking of ways to soften up existing window treatments and give them a shabby chic appeal, give these techniques a try. 

Craft an Eye-Catching Valance

A valance stretches across the top of your window from end to end, but there's no law stating that your valance must be crafted of fabric. The shabby chic decorator knows that fine wire and favorite collectibles make the best window dressings. Use the following items to replace the window valance for your favorite room:

• Dried slices of lemons, oranges, and limes
• Vintage kitchen utensils
• Raffia
• Seashells
• Twigs

Wire your collections together and drape them over a decorative rod, or use the wire to suspend them from the rod in groupings or rows. 

Add Interest to Your Drapes

Rooms that require heavy drapes for light management or privacy can still get a shabby chic makeover with the addition of unusual tiebacks and swags:

• Bend or twist vintage pieces of silver flatware and mount them to the wall as tiebacks.
• Add a swag of dried flowers, pinecones, or herbs bundled into bunches.
• Add coffee stain to vintage lace panels, and hang them on a second rod beneath your drapes.

Beautify Your Blinds

If you're strictly a lover of window blinds because of their ease and durability, there's no reason you can't incorporate them into your vintage decorating theme:

• Add borders of vintage wallpaper and tassels from years gone by to the edges of roller blinds.
• Lay Venetian blinds flat, close them, and lightly stencil them in soft colors and patterns to match your room. 
• Add a sepia window film beneath blinds to give filtered light a soft, golden glow. 

Windows present perfect opportunities to work a little shabby chic magic. Let your imagination shine through in inventive and out-of-the-box window treatments for every room. 

For more information, contact Interiors By Diane DeCero And Ann Art Faux Finishes or a similar company.