Summer Interior Design Tweaks: My beach house dining room gets a jolt of freshness with a brand, new handwoven rug

While vacationing with my family each summer, 

I tackle a small design project at our beach cottage 

Since we built our cedar shingle home in Springs, East Hampton in 1999, bit by bit, we refurbished, renovated and decorated our weekend get-away.  Originally built with only the basics, we have added little renovations and changed along the way.  Because we have been on a tight budget, we added these upgrades over time.  Last summer we made over our kitchen, and hired a professional painter to sand, refinish and paint our kitchen cabinets.  We also added brushed aluminum pulls and knobs to complete the look.  The summer before we painted the guest bedroom and before that a teen bedroom makeover, and a year before that we built a  pretty white pergola over our back brick patio.  

When painting our kitchen, I used a good quality paint, and it paid off, and in a matte white finish from Fine Paints of Europe in the color Spinnaker, my kitchen looks fantastic.

The adjoining, vaulted ceiling dining room needed some upgrades to go along well with our new kitchen.  We sanded and re-stained our espresso colored wide plank floors, painted the walls "Gull" grey by Pratt & Lambert, and added a frame of bead board wainscotting in a chair rail height up the walls. 

This beautiful area rug adds the finishing touches to the room's design:  

Thanks to a brand new handwoven rug (compliments of Medallion Rug Gallery) my dining room and kitchen gets a fresh look!  The dining room adjoins the kitchen, making it perfect for entertaining.  This new rug replaces the 13 year-old dhurrie rug we chugged along with over the years.  Adding this rug put the finishing touches on a new, invigorated room, and just in time for fall entertaining.  The rug is surprisingly soft and plush, and has an elegant patina and the faded, antique look works well in my farm house-style home.  Additionally, the colors compliment the room's color palette: 

grey, yellow, ombre, white, caramel & blue. 

The rug is a genuine hand woven wool pile Pakistan Tabriz rug No. 20397 Let me tell you about the other elements of the room's design...After twelve years with the old upholstery, we added new seat slipcovers for the dining chairs and cushions for the adjoining bench.   

Years ago I found this spindle bed and converted it to a bench, then upholstered the bench with a combination of fabrics from Travers, Brunschwig & Fils, Osborne & Little, Scalamandre and Donghia in burnt red, ombre, tan, yellow, green with touches of blue.  Since the walls are painted grey and the kitchen all white subway tile and painted cabinets, the other colors compliment the dark floors and white bead board.  The bench provides extra seating for our dining table when needed, as well as a cozy spot to overlook the screened in porch.  Another little renovation we completed this summer was to paint the floor of the screened in porch a fresh, pale blue.  I also added this little garden bench as a cocktail table alongside the bench.

To keep with the less formal approach of our sea-side cottage I added simple valances using Travers fabric (and trim from Houles) in the dining room and kitchen. Under the valances I added white rattan roll down shades to diffuse light when needed.  I flanked the valance with a pair of shell encrusted mirrors in the same color combinations in the room.  

I bought a set of 10 Italian fruitwood chairs at an antique auction.  They have pretty scroll inlaid marquetry, and I slipcovered the seats in a striped cotton with Velcro attachments for easy washing.  

We positioned the new, pretty, faded area rug underneath the farmhouse dining table we custom designed years back from salvaged antique barn wood.  The rug fits well under my 8 foot table in the 8' X 10' size. 

 How fortuitous when  Medallion Rug reached out and generously offered me a rug.  This rug adds an old world charm to my relatively new country home, which I have put effort into looking a little bit older.  Medallion Rugs are regular fans of my blog, and asked me to review their product to witness first-hand the impeccable quality.  The website has many sizes and styles, and they generously gave me the option to pick from their large assortment of rugs to find the one that works best in my home.  After perusing their website and narrowing down options, this is the rug I chose for my dining room.  Many Turkish-style rugs are richly colored with complex designs, and although I love that aesthetic, the colors and patterns can be a tad too strong for my beach house decor.  After researching the website, I narrowed down between four different prospects, but this particular one won me over, mainly because of the pretty, almost modern shapes in the design and the  worn feel.  Judging from the online photograph it would blend well in my home.

The rug was a better fit than I had anticipated and the colors, shape and design could not have been more perfectly suited for my home. Even our poodle Bridget loves the rug, and her favorite spot to nap is under our dining table.

Happy Nesting 

XO Tamara