The other day, I showed y’all which fabric samples I had ordered for my desk chair in the studio. Most of them arrived yesterday. I think I started with about 10, and narrowed them down to five right away. The others were just too dull, too dark, too bright, etc.
So after that quick elimination round, I was left with these five fabrics…
As you can see, I really had green in mind, so most of them are green. Even the ones I eliminated were green. But there is one oddball there among the greens — that amazing velvet striped fabric that I just had to see in person.
Well, it’s as amazing in person as I had hoped it would be. But that just makes my decision even harder. I was almost certain that the chair would be green, but now there’s this new possibility that takes things in a whole different direction.
Here’s a really close up view of the fabric. I mean, doesn’t that look like it was custom made to go with my cabinets?! I chose kind of a strange pink for my cabinets, so the fact that this fabric looks so good with that slightly “off” pink cabinet color just seems like the choice has been made for me.
But if I choose that one, my color plan for my pendant light will have to change. There’s no way that the velvet striped chair can sit under a gradient rainbow pendant light made of 1200 spoons painted in this gradient of colors on the bottom row in this photo.
Those two things, that close together, just don’t complement each other at all.
So if I go with that fabric, I’d change my plan for the light and just use one color in an ombre style, starting with dark teal at the top, and gradually getting lighter in color towards the bottom rings. I would probably choose a color like Thai Teal, which is one of the paint color swatches on my paint swatch cabinet.
I think that those would look very nice together next to/above a white desk.
The thought of doing a teal ombre pendant light out of tiny tasting spoon bowls kind of makes me laugh because while the rainbow gradient pendant light was going to be inspired by my favorite piece of art I’ve ever made…
…a teal ombre pendant light would be a throw back to one of my oldest and most popular DIY projects ever. I mean, this goes way back to our condo days, and it’s the viral project that put my blog on the internet map. It’s my original chrysanthemum mirror made out of plastic spoons.
So that’s the direction I’m leaning towards, but I’m not 100% sure as of right now. My mom still prefers the idea of a green chair and the original rainbow gradient pendant light idea. I know that green makes more sense in the room. I really do. After all, look at all this green already in the room…
So yes, green completely makes sense. But…BUT…there’s also teal in the wallpaper mural and the floral fabric, and I don’t have any other teal in the room right now. And since teal is my absolute favorite color, doesn’t it make sense that teal needs to have a more prominent appearance in my studio somewhere other than just a random flower in a wall mural and fabric?
Okay, so moving on. If I go with the green, unfortunately, I don’t think that my favorite green fabric will work. It’s a very thin fabric, and it’s not velvet, and I don’t think it will stand a chance against my cat Felicity. So, sadly, I have to rule this one out.
I’m also ruling out this green and white stripe. I love stripes, but this particular one doesn’t do anything for me. I’d love it on a much bigger piece of furniture, like a big upholstered ottoman or even a sofa. But it seems wrong for a desk chair.
So that narrows it down to two green velvets. Do you remember the one green velvet that was that was $159 a yard, and I couldn’t figure out why it was so expensive? Well, now I know. Here it is. I don’t know if you can see how plush this velvet is, but I’ve never seen anything like it. It’s so think and plush that it feels like you could use it to dry off after a shower. 😀 But don’t. That would be an incredibly expensive towel.
And then here is the much more reasonably priced apple green velvet that I thought might be my favorite.
So let me show you a close up view of the difference between these two velvets. Here’s the apple green velvet, which is much closer to what I’m used to, although this one is a bit thinner than what I had hoped.
But it’s still a fairly nice velvet at $25.99 per yard.
Now check out this expensive velvet. You can see how much more plush this fabric is…
And just take a look at this pile. It’s like carpet! 😀 Never in my life have I seen a velvet like this! It’s polyester, which is my second favorite velvet, second only to silk. (I do not like cotton velvet.) I mean, I just can’t stop touching this stuff. I now completely understand why it’s $159 per yard.
So if I go with green, I’m still undecided on which green velvet I’ll choose. Maybe one of these to, or maybe I’ll order more samples. The apple green is a bit thin, and the other one is way more than what I had hoped to spend on fabric.
But what I can’t seem to decide on now is if I should go with the stripe that I love and change up my plan for the pendant light (it’s not to late to do that), or if I should stick with a green chair and the original plan for the pendant light.
Striped velvet fabric with a teal ombre pendant light reminiscent of my original chrysanthemum mirror?
Or a solid green chair with the rainbow gradient pendant light inspired by my rainbow pinwheel art?
Addicted 2 Decorating is where I share my DIY and decorating journey as I remodel and decorate the 1948 fixer upper that my husband, Matt, and I bought in 2013. Matt has M.S. and is unable to do physical work, so I do the majority of the work on the house by myself. You can learn more about me here.
