We’ll be featuring gift guides over the next few weeks for all the special people in your lives. First up, and just in time for Thanksgiving gatherings, The Host.
Whether you’re Team Real or Team Faux, putting up a tree is often the signal to family, friends (to yourself, even!)…it’s time. It’s the holiday season…cue Mariah.
For those of you who opt for real trees, you may be cutting that beauty down soon, or at the very least, making a stop at your favorite local tree supplier. The rest of us are digging through a year’s worth of storage to locate our fine, faux varietal. If you haven’t checked out faux trees lately, you are missing out. Many look strikingly real, and with the cost of cut trees skyrocketing, a faux tree will justify its price tag in only a few years. Many come pre-lit, too, which also saves the age-old headache of National Lampoon’s style light-wrangling.
Then it’s time for the fun part. At Collected, we were downright giddy over curating a selection of tree-trimmers to make any holiday heart happy. Mix and match plaid with mercury glass, add a touch of wood beaded garland, and maybe a spray of holly. Get whimsical with little bears or snowmen. If you stick with one color palette, it doesn’t have to be perfect. Make sure to place those larger ornaments first…they work well to fill in any bare spots on your tree, and if you nestle them on the inside, they give depth to the whole arrangement. Then gild the lily: switch out plain twine hangers for velvet ribbon. Add pine cones. Bells. Feathers. Let your inner maximalist stretch a bit.
Don’t forget under the tree! A fur tree skirt immediately brings all the cozy feels. Add some rattan trees nearby. A few reindeer. A basket of blankets. No reason to wait for Christmas Eve for under the tree goodies.
Get to it! Happy holidays!
It’s only about a week until Thanksgiving, and that means it’s time to get our holiday decorating plans together. It feels like kismet that this topic was on the blog schedule for today, because here in the Midwest…it’s snowing. Kind of a lot. Is there anything better than snow to put you in the mood for holiday decorating??
We are particularly excited about holiday decorating this year, because we’ve carefully chosen all of our holiday favorites to share at Collected — in person, and online — and believe us when we say, these are all the trappings of the holidays that we use in our own homes, too. Today we’ll cover overall decorating, but stay tuned for holiday tables and tree decorating, as well!
The Park & Oak Collected team but together some tips for creating just the right holiday mood.
- Choose a colorway: are you going old school, with bright reds and kelly greens? Or traditional, with deep greens, plaids and faux fur? Glam, with lots of silver and gold? Work primarly with just one style — bring in just touches of the others — for a cohesive look that reads collected instead of cluttered. We’ve got plenty for you to choose from:
- Bring in the greenery: whether live or faux, wreaths, garland and spray bring life to holiday decorating. Don’t be afraid to mix and match here. If you have a fir tree, go for a magnolia or cedar wreath. When decorating with garland, think in layers. Start with a full pine swag, then layer a drapey cedar on top. Add velvet ribbon, pine cones or berries. Voilà!
- Gild the lily: the details make the difference. Vintage bells, jute reindeer, mercury glass trees… these all add texture and make pretty accompaniments to mantle swags, coffee tables or any little corner that could use some holiday magic. And as always, don’t be afraid to mix those metals! At the holiday season, a little extra shine never hurts.
Are you ready? Go ahead…spin some holiday tunes, make a cup of tea (or a bourbon — you do you!), and settle in for a long winter’s night…of decorating.
This new feature is such fun. As with last month, we picked out a few of your questions from IG stories to answer here on the blog, and we’ll add some to Instagram as well — stay tuned for more “Ask the Designer” next month!
Sure! Ceiling heights and scale of the light will come into play. It’s best to have any lighting that someone will walk underneath a minimum of 7’ above the floor (there are some additional rules for very height ceilings). Some of our favorites pictured below!
-Vanessa
You can definitely add darker pieces to an already airy space. We always like a pop of darkness in a room to offer contrast and a place for your eye to go. Creamy white walls, light drapery, and layering in texture and pattern through with colors will help balance the palette and create an inviting space.
-Erica
For narrow staircases, avoid artwork that could get bumped and fall. Play up the texture and subtle details and incorporate wall moulding details, like a chair rail with wainscoting and an integrated handrail. Add a wool stair runner to wood stairs. You can also add shallow depth sconces (4” to 6″ overall projection) at the base and the top of the staircase to create more interest and drama.
– Joanna
YES!!! Velvet—love. Brown—love!
-Vanessa
Some quick fixes to warm up the cool tones of a home would be to swap out light fixtures to a warm brass metal. Incorporate some warm wood furniture pieces and create softness by layering accessories such as vintage rugs, textured and warm toned pillows, throws and artwork. Bring in more ambient lighting with table and floor lamps and change bulbs to 2700k for a warmer glow. (Learn more about color temps in our recent post on the topic.)
-Joanna
We love the use of frame TVs! This allows for the space to become very versatile. It looks beautiful when not in use and becomes a finished piece. If space allows, we will also add a picture light to give the look of real artwork. Frame TVs also offer the ability to display your own family photos, which is such a treat!
-Emma
We think it makes such an impact to do so.
-Vanessa
Mix! Representing a variety of eras can work beautifully as long as you consider the overall effect as you add color, texture and pattern.
-Joanna
There are many combinations to consider from a variety of patterns, scale, color and texture. If all the rugs are patterned, it can be overwhelming. Try incorporating a vintage patterned rug with a coordinating textural/solid rug, like a sisal or a wool loop pile with a subtle pattern. A traditional rug can balance nicely with something abstract. A rug with a large scale pattern can work well with a small scale, or subtle pattern. It’s all about finding the right mix to create interest and balance!
-Joanna
We love to combine a mixture of patterns when it comes to pillows, bedding, and other aspects of the home.
Try to offer a variety in the space. You can start with a small pattern, a large scale pattern, and a solid texture in between to break it up. Keep a color theme in mind.
Here is an example of a navy theme pillow scheme. A small scale patterened lumbar pillow, a dark solid euro pillow behind, and large scale stripe bedding.
-Susie
At Park & Oak, our goal in designing homes is to create a warm and inviting atmosphere, where the details tell a story. And, there is perhaps no better holiday to embody this ethos than Thanksgiving. Christmas and other winter holidays are typically full of hustle and bustle, parties, presents, tree-decorating, outings, Santa…often we are too busy to really soak in the intricacies of the holiday scenes that surround us. But Thanksgiving? Typically, that is really the time we can sit back, reflect, get cozy and count our blessings.
With Collected open for business, we can finally offer access to the pieces we love that can help you tell your story. In service of that, we’ve put together some different ideas for Thanksgiving tablescapes, and hopefully one will strike a chord, whether you want to lean into the romantic, the dramatic, or the classic.
Here are some key things to remember when setting a table for the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday.
- Layer, layer, layer: Think about color, texture, height. Try to have a mix of each. Combine a small, delicate cup and saucer with a tall wine goblet. Rather than purchasing a set that includes all the same tablecloth or runner, placements and napkins, mix and match a patterned runner with a solid napkin. Use a charger, dinner plate and salad plate. Layer in the napkin. Maybe add a napkin ring. Have a lot of brass on the table? Bring in some black or leather to balance out all that shine.
- Incorporate multiple points of interest: Your table will, of course, have a placesetting for every guest, but beyond that is where you can really bring some magic. First, we start with florals: botanicals take a Thanksgiving table from good to great. In fact, we think this is the most important element after the placesetting. And…we often go faux. Here’s why. There is enough to prepare before a dinner party, and clean up after. And in the fall and winter seasons, the options for cut flowers can be limited. A well-made faux botanical can last a lifetime, and do double-duty once it’s time to turn our attention to holiday tables. At Collected, we carry a huge assortment of these beauties, for every style. Add a beautiful wine chiller and assorted candlesticks for additional points of interest.
- Mix styles for maximum effect: Too much of one style can feel a little sterile, or even overdone. If you are using a masculine, leather charger, add a pretty fluted plate on top. Similarly, a frilly, scalloped charger might benefit from a dark-tone plate or napkin. Mix your metals! One of our signature styles — in home design and in table styling — is a combination of metals. If all your metal is brass (or silver, or black), you are missing an opportunity to add interest and different places for the eye to rest. Do not be afraid!
Scroll for ideas of how to incorporate these tips at your own table. Happy Thanksgiving!
The Traditionalist
The Free Spirit
The Drama Queen (or King)
The Romantic
The years are really flying by now. Owning a business feels in many ways like raising kids. Those early years…oh boy. A million small problems. Learning on the fly. No one sleeps. You eventually start to feel like you have a handle on things, but of course, that’s temporary. Growing comes with new challenges. Bigger problems. Sweeter rewards. Still very little sleep.
Astute followers of the Park & Oak blog know that something exciting has been afoot at Park & Oak over the last year. Some growing, indeed. A few months ago, after years of preparation, hard work, and yes, sleepless nights, we quietly launched one of our dream projects: Park & Oak Collected.
Collected is a brick and mortar and e-commerce manifestation of our goal in designing homes: to create a warm and inviting atmosphere, where the details tell a story. We believe everyone deserves to feel happy and comfortable in their homes, and with Collected, we can finally offer access to the pieces we’ve been carefully curating over many years to help you achieve that goal.
Phase one of the brick and mortar store is open for business in Glen Ellyn, with a large selection of home and kitchen decor, barware, dinnerware, small furnishings, curated gifts and lots of our favorite vintage finds, including many one-of-a-kind vintage rugs. Phase two, opening in 2023, will bring with it some exciting additions: a cocktail bar (as you know, we love a cocktail room), display kitchen cabinetry to help visualize your new kitchen, larger furnishings, and specialized services. Come visit us at 499 Pennsylvania Avenue to see what we’ve been up to.
The online store mirrors the brick and mortar, though many of our smaller curated vintage finds and gifts are only available in person. Online, you’ll find an expanded selection of lighting, mirrors, high-quality rugs and other larger items. We’ve done our best to make the online shopping experience pleasant and seamless, and feel as much like being in the store as possible.
We are, of course, also still busy with our first love, building and designing homes that provide a respite for busy lives. We’ve included a gallery below of the work we’ve done this past year. We are so proud of these projects, and feel very honored to have been trusted by these clients to bring their dreams of home to life.
As always, we remain extremely grateful to our team, our families and friends, and all of you for joining us on the journey to make Park & Oak a success. We really, truly could not do it without you. Here’s to year seven!
Cheers,
Chris & Renee
Enjoy a few photos from the community preview opening of Collected!
Projects from Year Six
Carmel-by-the-Sea
Glen Ellyn Kitchen
Glen Ellyn Study Refresh
Hinsdale Outdoor Oasis
Hinsdale Refresh
Historic LaGrange Reno, Part II
Historic Oak Park Reno
Leland Lakefront
Western Springs Refresh
Our team is not messing around when it comes to sourcing pillows.
Tiffany, our purchasing lead, makes a yearly summer sojourn to coastal New England. Is she just relaxing in the summer breeze while she is there? Nope. Last summer, she stumbled across one of our new favorite partners for pillows, a small company producing truly unique pieces, made from hand-blocked and mud printed textiles. Their fabrics carry all those coastal summer vibes, but because they produce them in year-round colorways, they are still look just at home during the fall and winter months. And, Collected is the only place in the Midwest you can find these!
We carry these hand-blocked prints with a whole array of new solid pillows in a variety of textures, like velvets, boucles, linens. We love mixing textures, which is just as important as having a variety of colors and patterns. Varied textures bring interest and a cozy, collected feel to a space. For example, using a larger linen or boucle pillow as the base on a bed or sofa, then layering in smaller pillows with pattern is a foolproof layering strategy. Velvet works too! And we are fans of mixing patterns as well, but when we do, we always incorporate either two different patterns (i.e., a stripe and a floral) or those with different pattern scales, for example, a larger floral print paired with a smaller, quieter pattern.
Hope these tips from our pillow experts are helpful as we enter the season of frequent decor changes!
Shop the Look
Inspiration
“Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.”
Pablo Picasso
Art is such an important element in helping a house become a home. At Park & Oak, we appreciate art in all its forms, but there is one type of wall art in particular that we turn to over and over: vintage art.
What qualifies as vintage? Firstly, it must be an original piece of art. The second qualifier — age — is a little more fluid. Some define vintage as over 20 years old, though others consider 50 years to be the right marker. We think anything in this range fits the bill. What is the difference between vintage and antique? Antique has a more rigid definition — must be over 100 years old!
When searching for vintage art for your own home, we have some tips for what to consider:
- First and foremost, buy art that speaks to you. Sometimes, that’s as simple as the visual interest you have in a piece. But we also recommend looking for an artist’s signature, so you can do a little research on the artist, as well. Do they have a gallery? Or news stories written about them? Maybe a biography? Sometimes the life and body of work of an artist will resonate with you based on your own life experiences. If you have a personal connection to your art, it will hold a more meaningful place in your home.
- Check to be sure you are buying an original piece and not a print. Reputable sellers will clearly distinguish prints from originals.
- Physically, the frame is just as important as the art itself. If you are new to vintage hunting, you may be picturing only ornate, gilded frames, but vintage art comes in all different frame types to fit all different tastes (much like the art inside it!) Sometimes, we will even buy a piece for the frame alone and switch out the artwork.
- Make sure the piece you choose fits into the scheme of your home. In a gallery wall, use similar colorways, or try to focus on one form: for example, a collection of nude sketches, in different mediums like watercolor, charcoal, etc.
- Consider the age/condition of the painting. We love when a painting shows its age through cracklature and don’t mind discoloration in spots, but if you see a rip/tear or other markings, you may want to consider if the art can be salvaged or would work in your space.
However you approach it, vintage art brings soul to the wall and to extension, your home.
Inspiration
We love cruising our neighborhoods and seeing all the fall porch scenes coming together. The retailers may be busy reminding us that Christmas is coming, but we are going to take a minute to revel in autumn first.
It can be tempting to make the leap straight from summer to holiday, but then you’re missing out on one of the easiest, coziest outdoor updates. With a few pumpkins, some mums, and fall colors in your pillows and blankets – rust, evergreen, mulberry – a fall porch scene can come together quickly. There are so many beautiful October days left to be outdoors…grab your coffee, a blanket, and a book and soak it in.
Check out how we pulled this fall porch together:
Inspiration
Ah, the age old question: what size rug do I need for my bedroom/dining room/living room/kitchen/etc.?We know that this can be a pickle. Too big or too small both have the potential to feel unbalanced.
Below, we’ve provided some illustrations for common rug arrangements found in different types of rooms. What works in a family room may not necessarily be right in a bedroom. And what to do in entries and kitchens? We’ve got you. Read on.
Family Room & Cocktail Room
Dining Room
Entry
Bedroom
Kitchen
