Swanky Soiree had the pleasure of working with the wonderful Alisa Sue Photography today for her Fall Mini’s.  The shabby chic set up turned out so beautiful. We love doing set design for photographers like Alisa. She is always a pleasure to work with and has a great sense of style, trends and what her clients are looking for. Alisa gave us a idea of what she wanted and I knew exactly where she was going. We created a vision board of our ideas for  her clients, then raided some local salvage yards and our Swanky Soiree prop room.

So what is shabby chic and how do you create the look.

Shabby chic (pronounced: “sheek”) is a form of interior design where furniture and furnishings are either chosen for their appearance of age and signs of wear and tear or where new items are distressed to achieve the appearance of an antique. At the same time, a soft, opulent, yet cottage-style decor, often with an affected feel is emphasized to differentiate it from genuine period decor.

Doors- these were plain brown doors that I painted with numerous layers of  different color paint. Then sanded with steel wool.

Lace Shutters- These where vintage windows from a old building. We blew out the glass and replaced with a  soft lace. It is a great contrast to the hard dark doors.

Chandelier-Choose a Rococo style light fixture. Their style was ornate and used light colours, asymmetrical designs, curves, and gold. I really wanted to lighten it so I used a white light. It popped off of the door perfectly. 

Chaise Lounge- We used this cottage style chaise lounge. In addition to a Rococo style you can use

  • Cottage chic

  • Beach cottage chic

  • French country

  • Gustavian (Swedish)

Side Table- this is a true antique piece with many ornate features.

All other props we used were holiday inspired. I try to provide my clients with many options as they can always edit as they see fit when clients are on set.

 

*Information on this topic was retrieved from wikipedia