What do you call a style that combines bold floral cottage prints with natural finishes? French Bohemian, of course! After posting some pictures of my new collection of chairs, a fan coined that term for me and I absolutely love it…it’s perfect for this collection, so thank you!

How the creative process works is very interesting to me. I knew I loved these florals that were painted by artist Carrie Schmitt and planned to use them in my Spring Collection of chairs, but I had no idea exactly how they would end up looking or what finishes I would even choose until I started on them. (I wrote a previous post on our collaboration.)

And that’s the key…I had to start not even knowing where the path would lead. And I’m so glad I did. I played around mixing and matching some with solid velvets, using linens instead of velvets, and even going with white finishes on some, which I definitely loved and the chairs took on a more cottage feel to them.

But when I dared to try it with some natural finishes, my heart really sang. You know how you feel when you get something right and it completely surprises you? That’s how I felt.

I spent a Sunday stripping my 1960s dining room French table with a friend (yes, that’s what I do for fun!) and got it stripped down to it’s natural finish. Then, I spent another day painting my dining room so that it could be the perfect backdrop for these bold chairs. I didn’t want anything else in the room to compete with them because I was going to use all different floral prints together.

Paintings were moved to new spots. And boy, do I love the result! Here’s Frida’s new spot!

French Bohemian for sure! The room is so joyful and I feel so happy eating in there—we eat dinner in the dining room every evening and always have.

Sometimes life is about taking the little risks, and seeing where the path leads you. Quite often, the end result is a nice surprise!

What little risks have you taken and what were the result? What did you learn from the process? I would love to hear in the comments!