Freudian Slips

Everywhere you turn these days there are beautiful slipcovers.  This isn't a new concept, my great aunt had beautiful slipcovers 50 years ago and so did my grandparents.  But for a period of time, slipcovers fell out of fashion and the only ones available were less than fashionable.  In the last few years, they've gone from being ill fitted, one size fits all, ugly hunks of fabrics in three or four blah colors, to having cute ruffled skirts, contrast welting, and gorgeous prints in every color imaginable that fit like a glove.

Instead of just trying to cover up that ugly couch your husband brought with him into the marriage from his bachelor days, slipcovers have become a design statement in and of themselves, and I'm getting ready to hop on the bandwagon!  I'm a bit of a slipcover purist, I'm always drawn to the white or off white linen slips and I'd love a cute short ruffle like on the chair pictured below from Wisteria, but that's about as frou frou as I care to go.  I just like the clean crisp lines of a white cotton or linen duck cloth, it screams beachy and that's the look I'm after.  I do toy with a light seafoam green or a very pale blue with a hint of green, but so far white always seems to creep back into my psyche as the perfect look. 

Photo:  Wisteria

So how lucky am I that while out shopping last year before Christmas I was told I just had to go see this amazing house that was on the local Healthshare House Tour, and it turns out that the owner does fabulous slipcovers!  The house truly was amazing (look for a post on it very soon) and I recognized the homeowner, Sheryl, right away as one of the wonderful girls from The Vintage Source which I wrote about last month and you can read more about by clicking Here.

Sheryl is a little dynamo who seems to be able to do 15 things at once while still maintaining a house worthy of a magazine spread.  She manages to work at the store, design and sew beautiful slipcovers through her business called Slipcover Cottage, all while taking care of her family who are her number one priority.

Since that day when we met at her open house, I've been lucky enough to get to know Sheryl and have been patiently waiting for our house remodel to wrap up so that we could get her to make slipcovers for our furniture in the living room.  She's been busy with her own house remodeling, and she even came by to see what we had done and ended up using our same wonderful contractor, Richard.

So when I started the blog, I knew I wanted to show you all some of her great work, and I hoped she would let me feature her home, which she has agreed to do!  Wait until you see it, it's full of vintage furniture that she's gathered from flea markets, Ebay, and Craigslist, and it all looks fabulous!

I love this slipcovered wing chair in Sheryl's house and see those beautiful curtains peeking through at the top of the picture and that awesome matching lampshade?   She made those too!

Here is a better view of her door panels and another set of lampshades which she embellished with coordinating ribbon to give them a custom look.

I love this cute little blue checked chair she reupholstered and the matching blue pillow trimmed out to pick up one of the colors in the chair fabric!

And what about this very cool tufted ottoman, don't you love the rich mocha fabric she chose for it?

When I asked Sheryl for pictures of her work she said "Oh, I really need to take more pictures, I always forget and the ones I have are in my garage which isn't very pretty."  I assured her that we would all overlook the garage backdrop for the chance to see more of her wonderful work!

 

Love the white and the feminine lines of this wing chair!

Here is a picture of a client's home where Sheryl did everything from the curtains, to the furniture, to the pillows.  I love how she used the plaid fabric to create a contrasting welt against the beachy blue fabric.

The gorgeous detailed fabric on this ottoman and it's full skirt remind me of a lady's ball gown!

I love these slipcovered dining chairs.  The little pillows on the wooden windsors and the matching table runner give this dining area a custom look.

And look at this wonderful slipcovered couch with those beautiful floral pillows!  Now that's what I envision for my living room, casual elegance!

Sheryl doesn't have a website but you can contact her by emailing her at either slipcovercottage@gmail.com or homespun@md.metrocast.net.  Or, by phoning her at 301-904-2801.  Tell her Kat from Low Tide High Style sent you!