Holiday Decorating and Entertaining with Your Antiques and Collectibles
by Kelly Keating on 12/14/10
The approaching holidays are a wonderful opportunity to use your antiques and collectibles to both decorate your home and elegantly entertain your friends and family. Recently, I had several friends over for coffee and dessert after we all went to see the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree and the holiday windows along 5th Avenue in New York City. When I invite friends or family over for dinner or just dessert (and not just for the holidays), I always try to make it a stylish affair by using my antique silver and china. Don't be afraid to use your antique and vintage pieces to entertain; your guests will always appreciate it. Even a simple dessert on a beautiful antique porcelain plate with a sterling or plate fork makes for a charming experience for those friends and family attending.
For this recent dessert party where I served a simple apple tart with fresh whipped cream, I used a set of Minton porcelain dessert plates circa 1913 featuring urns, swags and scrolls in greens, blues, pinks and a touch of yellow with gold rims.
To complement the Minton plates, I set out English silverplate pastry forks circa 1920-1930 in the traditional and classic Kings pattern with its shell motif.
To serve the coffee, I used a beautiful and intricate repousse English silverplate coffeepot about 1880 by Martin Hall & Company, Sheffield. The four light candelabra is also English silverplate engraved on the bottom 1884 and made by Horace Woodward and Company, Birmingham. Completing the table holloware is an English silverplate biscuit barrel about 1880-1890 by James Deakin & Sons, Sheffield that I filled with shortbread biscuits.
The table was simply decorated with a old silver foil tree decorated with vintage gold mini glass ornaments. Along with the tree, a pair of English sterling bud vases hallmarked William Comyns, London, 1902 were filled with fresh white roses. The foil tree complemented the bud vases and the other silver holloware on the table and the whole table setting was set off strikingly against the vintage white damask cloth used to cover the table.
Above the table hanging from the bookcase was a new wreath adorned with vintage green and gold glass ornaments, silver glitter birds and hung with a silver ribbon edged in gold.
At this time of year, it is quite easy to find old glass ornaments at antique shops and flea markets. They usually have a lovely, slightly worn patina which will give a warm look and feel to your holiday decorating. And don't be afraid to combine vintage holiday ornaments with new ones as I did; they work quite well together.
Furthermore, Christmas decorations do not have to be limited to a red and green color scheme. Choose colors that work well with your particular room setting. Instead of a traditional Christmas red use a deep, rich burgundy if that works well with your decor or perhaps a raspberry or plum color best fits your surroundings. And of course there are a myriad of shades of green from which to choose. Remember that any decor color scheme from traditional to modern can be wonderfully decorated with metallics such as my use of silver and gold (with the additon of white) because they are in fact neutrals and will work with all colors. Even bronze and copper can work in a variety of room settings.
I continued my holiday color palette of gold, silver and white in the living room area of my apartment. I decorated the sideboard with a green velvet and gold runner on which I placed a large Petrus Regout chinoiserie bowl circa 1930 filled with vintage silver glass ornaments.
On the gilt wood shelves on either side of the large gold frame above the sideboard, I placed a pair of aesthetic silverplate goblets circa 1880 by the Meriden Silver Plate Company. The goblets were topped with a vintage glitter silver berry ring and filled with white alstromeria. (These goblets are for sale. Go to the For Sale page for details.)
The coffee table had a creamy white pointsettia in a circa 1900 footed nut bowl by the Rockford Silverplate Company and some faux pine branches filled a turn of the century English transferware vase in a chinoiserie pattern. Behind the chaise, a mixed bouquet of faux cedar, long needle pine, weeping pine and creamy white roses in a modern Chinese vase completed the look and provided a dramatic focal point for the room.
If you have antique or vintage silver flatware and holloware as well as china, use it for your holiday entertaining and throughout the year; I guarantee that your guests will enjoy it and appreciate being served on fine and interesting pieces with the patina of age and history. Take antique items and use them for a new purpose as I did turning a pair of goblets into a vases.
Add vintage Christmas items such as aged, glass ornaments, decorative foil trees and even vintage holiday figures such as Santas and snowmen to your usual decorating. Adding such items will give your Christmas decorations a more collected, interesting and unique look, full of history, and will enhance the antiques in your setting if you have them. For example, her is a picture of a client's kitchen hutch filled with a collection of Pink Tower transferware by Spode circa 1900-1920.
Set amongst the pottery are vintage Christmas items- bottle brush trees laden with snow, Christmas elves and snowmen with pinecone bodies, decorated cardboard houses and a vintage plastic Santa in a sleigh pulled by celluloid reindeer. The Pink Tower collection and the vintage holiday pieces enhance each other through age and color, creating a whimsical and charming holiday antique vignette.
Contact me at [email protected] if you are looking for a particular antique or vintage item for yourself, for a gift or to enhance your Christmas decorating or perhaps a special new piece for entertaining.
Happy Holidays! Happy New Year!
Kelly T Keating
