#ThanksgivingColors | Valentina Expressions

My Thanksgiving Table is Ready

23 Nov 2022 10 Comments

by Valentina in The Good Life Tags: #BaroqueThanksgiving, #HolidayDecorating, #InteriorDesign, #ThanksgivingColors, #ThanksgivingTable, SilverandGoldColors

Visiting stores in the month of November feels a little bit like taking a ride on the carousel. Stores are filled with an exceptional amount of merchandise, all very shiny and glittery. All decorating styles are there for all tastes and pockets, Sottish, English, American Country, Urban, Modern, Abstract, French, Evocative of the past, and so on.
I limit the amount of time I want to spend in stores at this time, otherwise I will be dumbfounded in a few hours. Luckily for me, I shop with my eyes. If I don’t see immediately the item I am looking for, or that special something that catches my eyes, it means it’s not there and leave.
(Click on each picture to view it larger)

This year for Thanksgiving I am leaning towards a bit of Baroque style. As a table runner, I will use an Indian shantung fabric remanence from a jacket I made. It’s multicolors, shining with gold filaments. The tablecloth is a damask from Venice, Italy and the napkins is a fabric printed with paisleys.

I have always been attracted by gold and silver together, like the sun and the moon sometimes shine together in the sky. The energy they bring together is fantastic.

The chargers are not plates but mats heavily beaded and the napkin holders are made by me. My table décor often doesn’t match on purpose as I generally don’t match things in my daily life, except the shoes, I do match those. I love the intricate ideas that come in my mind when I decorate and find many ways to surprise people.

The two reindeers were too cute to pass up. They look almost like a McKenzie Childs’s design but they are not. Now, I need food, people and bubbles.

This is a day to really be thankful for our blessings. I wish all of you a great Thanksgiving. Ciao,
Valentina

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Copyright © 2022 Valentina Cirasola, All Rights Reserved

Valentina Cirasola is an interior-fashion consultant, author of 6 published books, a storyteller, and a blogger of many years. Her books are non-fictional practical ideas to apply in the home, fashion, cooking and travel.
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Thanksgiving Thoughts

24 Nov 2021 2 Comments

by Valentina in The Good Life Tags: #ThanksgivingColors, #ThanksgivingFood, #ThanksgivingTable, #ThanksgivingWishes

We are just about at the end of this year and tomorrow will be Thanksgiving Day.
At this point, I would have to use a French expression “Les jeux sont fait, rien ne va plus” meaning “the games are done, nothing else will go”. No, I say no to this, the games are not over yet. Maybe some people have not produced or achieved what they had in mind for this year, and if that’s the case, I would have to say it was not important for this year.

The games are not over yet refers to the challenging games that will start next year. It will be the year of Venus. The planet Venus will dominate the Universe, it will fight the influence of Mars until it gets defeated. Venus, being a female planet, will fight all negative influences by bringing beauty and love. Next year women will do exceptional things, the truth about what is happening in the world will be revealed and we will start living in harmony. It’s not going to be an easy year, beauty and love will be our ammunition.

Calling all Women….! Starting this Thanksgiving, prepare a beautiful Thanksgiving table if you celebrate this holiday, if not, prepare a nice dining table every time you eat from now on. Get dressed as beautifully as you can every day, leave the exercise clothes at the gym and wear clothes that will highlight your beauty, personality or quirkiness. Raise your emotional vibration, raise your feminine conscious, let the world know the wind of femininity is coming.

Women are mothers, they represent the earth, they are grounded. A woman giving birth under a bombshell, knows she is still living a beautiful moment in a brutal reality and knows people will help her in that act of giving her baby to the light. Woman are the beginning and the completion of everything.

With our Venus power, next year we will get rid of the dark and ugly only with beauty. As I have said many times, beauty will multiply when you show what is it to those who live in the dark.

Many people did not make it this year, I am thankful I am still alive and kicking, I am thankful I have the power to think, read, write and create beauty. Happy Thanksgiving everyone. Ciao,
Valentina
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Copyright © 2021 Valentina Cirasola, All Rights Reserved

Valentina Cirasola is an art lover, author, and a lifetime designer. Often people describe her as “the colorist” as she loves to color her clients’ world and loves to create the unusual. Currently, she consults on colors that will enhance clients’ personalities and are in tune with their lifestyles. To add harmony and peace to the homes, Valentina creates atmospheres using proper lighting and creating fantasy rooms instead of typical rooms looking like furniture showrooms. She is the author of six published books, two of which are on design subjects and colors. Amazon and Barnes&Noble

Dining In Colors | Valentina Cirasola | Interior Designer

16 Nov 2017 6 Comments

by Valentina in Home Designs Master Tags: #ArtOfDining, #BohemianColors, #ColorfulDining, #ColorfulHolidayDiningTable, #TableDesign, #ThanksgivingColors, Tablescape

Eating is a story, not just a moment to fulfill a necessity. Every nation has special holiday dining customs and rituals. In the western world, we sit at a well decorated table and give our guests something stunning to look at while they gather to enjoy dinner. Your dining table should be colorful, inviting, extravagant (why not?) and especially filled with good food.

It is easy to set up a table with traditional dishware, crystal glasses and silver flatware, nothing to it. The challenge comes when you want to do something out of the ordinary, colorful and follow your instinct instead of rules. How a table that responds to these characteristics would look like?

First, create a color scheme, let’s say blue. It doesn’t mean everything on the table must be blue, you need to create a rhythm with complement or analog colors.
Vincent Van Gogh said: “There is no blue without yellow and without orange”. Right there is the answer. With a blue tablecloth, yellow and orange tableware will be perfect. Blue is a cold color, yellow and orange are warm colors. You have created a color temperature.

Start with choosing a theme for your table: Bohemian, bucolic, country and so on.
Then select dark, medium and light values of the color you plan on using.
Find some complement or analogue colors to mix in and to add rhythm to the table setting.
Mix and match the tableware as you like.

(Click on each photo to view it larger).

For this first tablescape the theme is Bohemian. I chose a white tablecloth as the base for layering all the colors. Two different colors tea tablecloth covered opposite corners of the table, one black with bird motifs and the other one in golden tones with classical motifs.
Playing with geometry and mixing round with square plates from various dish sets is fun. Mix vintage and modern plates, mix colors and shapes, no rules and surprise yourself.
I made the napkins from leftover material of various projects and closed them in brass napkin rings. Tea light holders made of rusted metal go well with brushed bronze flatware.
Glassware don’t match on purpose, but the greenish tone is their common denominator to other items on the table.
Prosecco bottle has an interesting Venetian embellishment. She is the autumn leaves lady that sometimes is on a wine bottle and sometimes is on a mirror somewhere else in the house. Her purpose is to embellish.

For the second Bohemian table, I have used a floral tablecloth, made of silk fabric in silver tone, as the base, then I cover it half way with a red voiles shawl. Each set of glassware is made of three different styles glasses and each set is made of the same three pieces. Even though, I chose a continuity in the glassware, I wanted my plate sets to be extravagant in style and colors. The silver flatware is a contrast to the gold wine glassware. I scattered some acrylic diamonds on the cloth to pick up light from candles and lamps outside the table. The table is set for two, it would be just the same for 4-6 or more people.

A dinner table is for food and conversation, decorations should be kept minimal and low to allow guests to see each other and talk across the table.

This will be the topic of my next TV Show: “Dinner At 7:00” produced under my label Valentina Design Universe.
I hope you have a splendid Thanksgiving. Ciao,
Valentina
http://www.valentinadesigns.com

Valentina Cirasola transforms and creates spaces realizing people’s dreams in homes, offices, interiors and exteriors. She infuses your everyday living with a certain luxury without taking away a comfortable living. Valentina is well-known for bringing originality on any project and for thinking outside the box. Her interiors are not made with cookie cutters, only follow client’s inspiration, lifestyle and personality. She offers on-line design consultations through Skype and the traditional in-house consultations, helping people with their design challenge anywhere in the world. She is the author of three books, all-available on
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Setting Stage For Thanksgiving | Valentina Cirasola | Interior Designer

11 Nov 2015 Leave a comment

by Valentina in Home Designs Master Tags: #NaturalMaterialCenterPiece, #NaturalTableSetMaterial, #ThanksgivingColors, #ThanksgivingStage, #ThanksgivingTable, #ThanksgivingTableSetting, #ValentinaInteriorsDesigns

I have been thinking of a new style table setting for my Thanksgiving dinner. Last year it was Bohemian, two years ago it was all about nature, this year the décor of my table is still in roaming in my thoughts and I better hurry.

Flemish and Dutch paintings, lithograph and prints of course, are under scrutiny at this time for a project I am doing, people want their home to look properly attired for the holidays and I feel inclined to reproduce one of those food still life on my table.
The question is only one. This kind of setting almost requires a formal dining with crisp tablecloths, well polished silverware, sparkled crystals, a menu suitable for all needs and impeccably prepared by a personal chef, all the guests selected carefully to be congenial with one another and the house in order with elegant decorations.

I can see myself stepping in a 1500s dinner set, but most of my Californian friends would rather eat informally, roaming in my kitchen while different dishes are being prepared, pouring glasses of wine to each other and some of them would feel even more adventurous and will want to help out with the preparation of the food. Among all the Flemish paintings I have seen, I am considering reproducing one of these as my table settings, fruit in the bowl is simple and easy to do.

(Painting – Flemish Splendor – Carol Lee Thompson)

(Jacob van Hulsdonck – Flemish Still Life with Lemons, Oranges and a Pomegranate)

I am attracted also to natural materials, acorn, colorful corn, pomegranate, persimmons, fruit and sprig of autumn spices.

AEGEAN HURRICANES – Pottery Barns

I can take it even further and use some driftwood with natural plant inserts and plants in glass baubles,

(Valentina Cirasola’s photos above)

although the animal print tablecloth is very tempting…….

(High Street Market)

Which is it going to be? In two weeks you will soon find out. Meanwhile, have you thought of how you are going to set the stage for your Thanksgiving? Create a story first, then build on it. Surprise yourself with originality! Ciao,
Valentina
http://www.valentinadesigns.com

Valentina Cirasola is an Italian Interior and Fashion Designer, working in the USA and Europe. She blends fashion and interior well in any of her design work. She loves to remodel homes and loves to create the unusual. She needs your story to design your dream. Check out her books on
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Thanksgiving In Cognac | Valentina Cirasola | Interior Designer

10 Nov 2014 Leave a comment

by Valentina in Home Designs Master Tags: #Cognac, #CognacColor, #HolidaysDecorations, #Pantone2014FallColors, #PantoneColors, #RedVoyageIntoColors, #ThanksgivingColors

I have gone around various stores to get ideas for the next holidays colors, but except for the usual traditional gold, red, silver, white and an occasional blue I have not seen anything exciting in terms of color for table décor.

If we look at the colors of Thanksgiving’s food we will find the warmest jewel tone colors ever and those are the colors we should decorate the table this year to complement our food. Think of the golden color of a well-roasted turkey or potatoes, the ruby red of cranberries and the slightly purplish red of a sangria wine, the dark and light green of all vegetables, the brown of mushrooms or the warm auburn color of cognac. Ah, cognac a drink for thinkers!

Taking in consideration the Pantone color scheme for Fall-Winter 2014, here are is my thought on how I see this year Thanksgiving’s table in cognac color with all the links to help you find some of these items.
The colors I selected for the tableware are: Cognac, Misted Yellow and Aluminun; Sangria for the flowers and various decorations around the room.

Cognac tablecloth – http://www.tablelinendirect.com/10rosasetaco2.html

Silver or colored napkins – http://www.houzz.com/photos/1203846/Libeco-Home-Frascati-Linen-Napkin-traditional-napkins-boston

Grey napkins – https://www.etsy.com/listing/182733122/light-gray-linen-napkins-hemstitch-for?ref=market

Brown plates – http://chinasearch.co.uk/buy/hornsea/heirloom—brown/149873/dinner-plate

Yellow bird plates – http://www.houzz.com/photos/177999/Yellow-Bird-Plate-eclectic-plates

Yellow wine glasses – http://www.amazon.com/Le-Cadeaux-Fleur-Yellow-Glass/dp/B002AHOLI8/ref=pd_sim_sbs_k_2?ie=UTF8&refRID=0N2N1ZHBXH9HM5SZ08JW

Water glasses – http://www.monstermarketplace.com/unique-wine-accessories/wildlife-wine-glasses-set-of-four

Flatware – http://www.stylehive.com/bookmark/rustic-adirondack-bronze-twig-flatware-and-twig-serving-set-in-bronze-by-vance-kitira-481160

Before and after Thanksgiving dinner, you might want to serve some bubbles, either Champagne or Prosecco, like diamonds, they are high class and put people in the right mood to celebrate exciting life moments.

Cognac is the after dinner drink for fine palates, getting a hangover from it will lower that person a few steps.

Life is for living, not for deprivations, indulge and have a splendid Thanksgiving. Ciao,

Valentina
http://www.valentinadesigns.com

Valentina Cirasola is an Italian Interior Designer working in the USA and Europe since 1990, specializing in kitchen, bath, wine cellar, and outdoor kitchen designs. Often people describe her as “the colorist” as she loves to color her clients’ world and loves to create the unusual. “Vogue” magazine and many prominent publications in California featured Valentina’s work. She also has made four appearances on T.V. Comcast Channel 15. Author of three published books, the latest ©RED – A Voyage Into Colors is on the subject of colors.
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