Our 3 day monthly Tag Sale at Chartreuse&co is less than a week away. As usual, there is still a long list of "to do's" before we are ready. Sometimes I wonder how we manage to get it all done, yet we always do. Saule and I were down at the barn today ticketing, rearranging, fussing, etc.

We also met the guys from Mata Hari to receive our antique Victorian sofa (newly upholstered in a sand velvet) and a very cool ottoman, upholstered in a black & cream Ikat inspired fabric. So modern yet so timeless. See for yourself below and I've included a few more pictures of what's new this month.

Spent the day getting grubby, searching for great finds at an estate sale today and I feel just great about it! The 1st part of the morning I was ping-ponging myself between two auctioneers, afraid I was going to miss some of the items I was stalking. I managed to get all I had set out to, with the exception of a few great pieces that far exceeded my price expectations. Saule the Savior showed up just in time to help haul it all home. A few of the items (a super-cool picnic table/benches from a Munich Beer Garden—I just LOVE it—it's orange painted wood & has collapsible metal legs) will go into storage until maybe May & some items are part of our stash for the Lucketts Annual Fair and a truckload went down to the barn today.

After we finished loading & unloading from the estate sale & then from storage, we headed down to the barn to start the visual transformation for the February 2010 Tag Sale. After a brief, muddy,4-wheel-drive not working, stuck-in-the-mud experience, we got even dirtier tearing our space apart and drilling holes in the old barn ceiling. I'm really excited about how fresh the floor will look this month: many new vintage items, a slew of new custom throw pillows all coordinated with a Modern Global aesthetic which is very hot right now in the decorating world. We're pulling this look off with our usual assortment of great vintage/antique finds in rich woods and adding in crisp white painted furniture. Our new pillows have some really cool graphics (black & white Buddha, rice bag graphics, blue & orange elephants to list a few) and we're having some custom made in a black & white Ikat fabric that adds a modern yet global graphic to ground some of the fabulous, saturated color.

Some lovely accessories to round out our visuals came from the estate sale today: a set of Indonesian brass bowls (so pretty) and an antique wall hanging from an Ivory Coast African tribe. We still have many hours of work to do to turn our visuals into reality but we're off to a good start. Yes, today we spent many hours on our feet, getting dirty and lifting furniture but all in all I would say it was a rather satisfying day.

xo,

Saule & Angelique