It Will Be Here

As I write this blog on April 4th, it has been snowing, hailing, raining, and believe it or not, thunder and lightning. I know we are all wondering if Spring will ever arrive, and it’s even harder to wrap our heads around the prospect of Summer, but it will be here before you know it (and just in case let's all say that three times aloud: it will be here, It Will Be Here, IT WILL BE HERE).

So with memories of shoveling still fresh in our heads, let’s make a collective agreement to be ready to enjoy and appreciate every second of outdoor living this year. While the rain splashes down, and the sleet knocks against the window let's take a little escape, take a visual ride with me, as we envision cocktails on the deck, parties by the poolside, grilling with our family and just relaxing in the shade with a glass of iced tea and a good book.

Paul Rich has “the goods” to make your outdoor spaces beautiful and comfortable, and don’t we all deserve that? Check out the latest styles from Brown Jordan, Woodard, Barlow Tyrie, and Lane Venture, plus umbrellas, accent pillows and accessories to complete the look. Order now through May 15th and save up to 45%! Make the best of this coming season, take a leap of faith and stop in soon to check out the 2011 collection of summer furniture. If you believe, it will happen!

Tales from the Inside: "A Rug Revelation"

I don’t claim to be an interior designer, but having worked behind the scenes in the home furnishings industry for close to twenty years I’ve picked up a few tricks and I’ve seen enough furniture to know what I like and what works for my lifestyle (three boys, lots of moving balls and large cereal bowls full of milk). We moved into our home over fifteen years ago, and have slowly been renovating and decorating rooms. I’ve mostly made good design decisions with the exceptions of a few missteps like the apricot colored walls in my living room, (ouch) and a series of reds on accent walls, (dark times, and lots of primer) but no permanent damage was done. I’m often asked if I use the design services at the store, and I can say that I’ve enjoyed punishing myself and muddling through on my own. It wasn’t until my “rug crisis” that I realized the importance of using a design professional.

Seven years ago we took on a large renovation, adding a badly needed entrance and a sitting room that serves as a lovely relaxing and reading area for the whole family. Furnishing the room was relatively easy, walls and fabrics mostly in neutral tones. It wasn’t until I began looking for a rug that my problems started. I felt confident that I knew what I was doing, I watched HGTV and I knew my stuff. I gravitated towards monochromatic rugs in an attempt to keep the room quiet, but what I learned, after spending years, and I mean YEARS, hauling rugs on approval and spending money on an array of bad accent pillows, was that I needed the help of a real designer to help me pull it all together. I turned to my friends and coworkers, the design staff at Paul Rich. With their expert guidance I quickly learned that the room was screaming for a rug with some personality, color and an interesting design. My fear of going bold was so wrong, and on their advice, I gathered all of my fabrics, natural muslin, chocolate mohair, brown leather and sea green chenille plus the drapery fabric, a red toned paisley and headed back to the store.

The rest of my house had Oushak rugs, which have an older feel, well suited to an old farmhouse. I went directly to that pile, and in my habitual way started looking at the patterns that had underwhelmed me in the past. I took a leap of faith and had them pull a rug of their choice one that I might add would have never been a contender. It seemed too loud and conspicuous, but I was desperate, and had been wrong so many times, that I decided to go with it. I placed the sea of neutrals on the rug, and it all made sense. Who knew? Excited about the prospect of finally having a rug in my room I took it home, “on approval,” and it was fantastic. The moral of the story is that a beautiful rug can make the room, and sometimes it takes the help of a talented designer to help you find it!

Stop by the Oriental Rug Sale March 24-27th to find your perfect rug (bring your fabrics and an open mind).

Pam Rich is the Marketing and Advertising Director at Paul Rich & Sons. She is the wife of owner, Tom Rich and mother to 3 beautful boys. She lives in a 1890's farmhouse in Pittsfield.

Through a Winter’s Window

It's a scientific fact that heat is attracted to cold. If so, I should be a magnet for every radiator I walk past, a bulls-eye for every sunbeam that breaks through the heavy white clouds, and warm fires would leap from their cages just to toast my cold toes. I am cold all winter long. Unfortunately I am oblivious to any heat that my frozen core might naturally attract. I spend the fall preparing for an onslaught I know I can not escape, and I spend the winter clutched in an embrace I neither care for nor enjoy.

Fortunately I am well suited for hibernation. My home is my sanctum. I look forward to the days where the snow comes down with such haste and fury that work is called off, and we are forced to stay home and settle in. There is always a new page to turn as I recline on my Stressless recliner, or a new ball yarn for me to knit propped up on my Lee Sofa. Hours pass easily with warm casseroles in the oven and savory soup on the stove.

Once in my home I am reminded of the cruel fates of winter only when I pause near the window to watch the cardinals fetch their meager rations from the feeder stationed on my back porch. A cold draft seeps in. No matter how new your windows, how high your R value, Drafts Happen.
Without energy-efficient window treatments, as much as 50% of a home's heating and cooling energy can be lost through its windows.

So back to the sofa I go, but this time armed with my Hunter and Douglas Catalog, and a book fabric swatches in hand. It’s a new year, I need a new perspective, a new view, or maybe just a new set of window treatments from my designer at Paul Rich and Sons.


Here’s how window treatments can help save energy in your home:

Insulation: Many window treatments can significantly increase your R value, measure of a product's ability to resist heat flow—helping reduce energy consumption.

Solar Heat Control: The warmth provided by the sun may be desirable during the winter to help heat your home, yet it can make a room overly hot and uncomfortable while driving up air conditioning costs in the summer.

Daylighting: Daylighting is the practice of lighting rooms with natural light rather than generating illumination from electricity. Sheers and other styles diffuse light as it enters and help to draw it deeper into the room. You can also direct incoming light where it's needed most by titling the louvers, slats, vanes, blinds and panels.

Entertaining for the Holidays

Entertaining & Decoration Tips from our Designers

Center Yourself
A great table starts with a great center. But it’s easy to overwhelm your space with an over sized piece. When choosing a centerpiece, keep in mind the function of the table. Be sure not to block conversations and leave room for guests to set down their plates and drinks.

The four people to be seated here will have a hard
time talking to the guests seated across from them

Create Comfort
Mentally walk through your home before the party. Plan out where people are most likely to gather and make sure there is enough space for chatting and traffic. To create extra space turn an out of the way area of your house into a destination, entice people down the hall with lighting, music or scents.

Keep it Together
Get a tailored and finished touch by limiting your palette. Choose one or two complementary colors for the majority of your linens, candles, decorations and set them off with a few bold accent pieces

Our designers loved what Katrina Giles did with this table.
The white and blue plates pop against the shimmery black place mats.

Avail Yourself
Believe it or not the most important person at the party is you! You are the one who knows everyone, knows where everything is, and has a plan for how the night should go. Make sure you’re available to entertain your guests. Hire a helping hand to clean up dishes and set up dessert. A neighborhood teen is always looking for a few extra dollars and it’s a quick and easy job.

Choosing a Rug by Marlena Leonard

Marlena Leonard has been and Interior Design at Paul Rich in Sons since 1999. Her education is in Architectural and Interior Design. She is also an accomplished painter and artist.


When it comes to bringing richness to a room – adding an area rug is a quick and easy solution. However, purchasing an oriental is very subjective, since it will be a long term commitment – buying what is in vogue at the moment will not work in the long run. It has to express the owner’s individuality and style.

A hand-woven rug will enhance the interior in many ways

• It brings focus to the room


• In an open space lay out it plays the role of room divider


• It adds richness of color and pattern to neutral furniture
  

By selecting the right size it will visually enlarge a small space or bring focus to a large room with high ceilings. It simply brings beauty to any space and enjoyment to a customer that will last for years

As a designer I will assist you with your choices making sure the colors and patterns flow and the end result will be an original rug that will and define your taste and bring style and elegance to your home for years to come.

The picture above picture illustrates how an intricate pattern on a traditional style rug compliments the contemporary sofa and neutral color scheme.

Here we have a more eclectic theme in the living room. The traditional style of the furniture is contrasted by an antique kilim rug with a simple geometric pattern.

Changing Seasons: A Storage Saga

I hear faint rustle. There's a breeze. My nose twitches at fresh crisp air. My senses flood my brain with warnings. Flashing yellow lights, lights the color of falling leaves. Red sirens, sirens that sound like ripe apples falling from trees. Warning: Fall is moving in.

What was just warm, humid and still, is now cool, dry, on the move. Like the changing landscape outside, life in our homes begin to move too. Children pack off to school, sweaters come out of closets, boots march towards the front door. It seems as though the house shrinks during theses changes. The sudden influx of extra layers crowd our shelves as we try to keep the shorts and tees on for one more day. Hot tea warms on the stove dirtying another dish after a long summer of paper plates and dinner cooked on the grill.

So what to do with all this stuff, how do we make the best out of a season between seasons.


1. Easy on Easy Off.
A chest at the end of the bed is an easy access way to store extra blankets or sweaters. You won't have to dig for items you want to pull out quick when your cold and bleary eyed mid way through the night or you decide to grab an extra layer after being confronted at the door by a blast of cold morning air.


2. The 3 B's,
Boxes, Bags and Baskets are smart functional and chic ways to organize and store clutter. Finding a style that matches your personality and is sized right for the item is key to making it work. Even in your junk drawer you can reinstate order by using old coin purses to corral stray batteries, a worn clutch works great as a pencil case. Decorative boxes pull double duty as table accents with the benefit of hiding the coasters and a deck of cards for a rainy day game of canasta.

3. Saying Goodbye
Of course there are always some things that now matter how many times you click you heels you just can't seem to make them go away. These are things you probably moved more than once in your life, maybe it started as your favorite shirt then it slid to the back of the closet, then got pushed around to a few other hiding spots. These things may even have been packed up brought to a new home and never made it back out of the box to see the light of day. It's time to say good bye. Cleaning up and organizing your garage is a great job for an early fall day. But before summer goods are packed off for 2 seasons of cold storage check the corners and closets and pull out the things you never touched this summer. The old shepard's hook with the broken wind chime, the cracked cherub statue, the stack of t-shirts that all seemed to have collected a spot of bleach, paint, or raspberry cobbler. Bag it, Tag it, and move it off your floor.


Remember cleaning out the old means making way for new.
Warning: Happy Shopping days ahead...

Uncovering a new love

Let them talk. I don't care. Let them see. Let them leer. I won't notice their eyes upon me or the hushed comments as I stroll past. I am in Love. The veil has been lifted, and a whole new world has been uncovered.

Who is he you ask? What has has put me in such a giddy and excited state? His name is Lee. He's from North Carolina. He's an adventurous soul, rugged and well built, but with a soft side. We met in the store, he had just trucked in from the south. I heard of his upbringing and days spent at the family cabin, soaking in the sun and spending days on end in the cool water of the lake. I imagined myself in his solid arms leaning back gazing up to the stars. Did I mention Lee is a Chair? But, but, but wait, before you roll your eyes and click away, you have to understand, he's not like all those other chairs. He's different. He's Special.

Lee Industries has uncovered the truth about what outdoor furniture can be. They have brought the living room out to play. With the style and grace of their finest upholstery classics and the hearts and frames of outdoor luxury they have created Uncovered the Upholstered Garden collection.

As design moves forward we talk about creating outdoor rooms, we set the stage with plants and lanterns. No longer content to just have a grassy knoll with a folding chair we've created whole new homes out of our outdoor spaces, A hammock under the Catalpa tree acts as a bedroom, walled gardens transform to enchanted dining rooms, a brick terrace that grows into an al fresco kitchen.

The upholstered garden combines sophistication and style built to withstand the natural elements. The simple lines of uncovered are understated and well thought out adding style and grace in ways that complement the hardscape and landscape working well within the environment.

Come meet Lee at Paul Rich & Sons. He's been uncovered and he wants to go home.