vintage home

i have been extra aware of home design lately. searching for inspiration and creating new spaces in my home has always been one of my favorite hobbies, but lately it's been one of the top five things i think about every day. my interest was first stoked by this post, then reignited by francesca's post today and the impending arrival of a house guest, which always makes me want to make my apartment look the best that it can.
of course, i love me some vintage home decor, and most of our furniture and art and tchotchkes are of the second-hand persuasion. i've tried to create some little vintage-only vignettes, but eventually i want the whole house to look like an antique store!

-- i've started a colored glass collection (probably because my mom is a glass collector and it reminds me of home), which i'm using to stash the knitting and art supplies.
-- my little plant stand came from a garage sale. i love it so! the little cutouts are actually little hearts! and i consider that plant vintage because, for some reason, that is the plant i picture in apartments that belonged to college girls in the seventies.
-- only that little corner is very vintage-y in my kitchen. we use the club pot as a bread box. i stole the glass containers from my mommy (who hopefully won't make me give them back once she reads this). and boyfriend installed little hooks to display my vintage coffee cup collection - no two are the same and yet they all go together!
-- the rest of those pictures are from the bathroom - the one room in the house that is the most vintage, but then gets marred by ugly modern toilets and such! that floral crewelwork is probably my favorite wall hanging. someday i hope to have a hallway lined with such lovelies. this club pot used to be a planter until i killed the plant, so now it holds our extra change. the telephone conductors are another tribute to my mom's style. she used to have a much larger collection with all shapes and sizes.

my ultimate inspiration for whole-house-beautiness is the lovely miss francesca. since i've been reading her blog, the snapshots from her rooms have just floored me with their perfection. every little bit of her space is a step back in time and exudes her delicate style. go here to see the cutest video tour of her lovely home. see if you don't want to just move right in, or at least chuck everything you own and start over.
i've never been a fan of collections - i am generally of the belief that they are a waste of space and money - but i think i may have changed my mind without meaning to. i've just realized that i have four or five mini collections displayed in this very post (not to mention the 'collection' of clothes and shoes strewn all about the room i am sitting in). actually, i think the things i like the most from all these photos are the collections. they are little bits that tell a little more about the person that chose them, be they glass pieces, or barcello pillows (like the awesome ones below), or old photographs.
well, i've rambled on long enough...look at the pretty pictures!

left: old domino article spotted on the english muse. right: found here on flickr