An Ocean Tablescape for Summer

I used some of the items on this tablescape on a Summer tablescape that I did several years ago before I started blogging but I made some changes for this one. You can’t really tell but this tablecloth has an ombre design, the color is graduated in tone as it moves down the table. The tablecloth was made by Ambesonne and I bought it online a few years ago at Walmart. The pattern is called Deep Maldives Ocean.

These small appetizer or tidbit plates were made by 222 Fifth, PTS International, and the pattern was called Coastal Life. I have had them for several years, they probably came from HomeGoods or Ebay. There were four different plate designs in the set. Ebay still has them and other dishes from that collection for sale from time to time.

I really like this simple small white salad plate. It is bone china and quite thin. It was made by Gibson and the label on the back says Elite. I probably bought them at HomeGoods several years ago.

These melamine blue dinner plates came from HomeGoods a few years ago. They are labeled Artisan de Luxe Home. I really like the lip design on these plates, it is very different. I like plates with an unusual lip design, it adds interest to the plate stack.

I have a few different white chargers but this is the one I seem to use the most on my tablescapes. The beaded rim design always adds an additional bit of interest to the plate stack. This white beaded charger came from Williams Sonoma and it is called Antique Beaded. It was one of the first chargers that I bought years ago when I started tablescaping. A basic white charger is always a good purchase when you are starting a tablescaping collection.

I have had this frosted blue flatware set for a few years. It is labeled D & D Inox in Italy. It was made by Vietri and the pattern is Aladdin Brilliant in light blue. (Don’t mix it up with Aladdin Antique, that stainless set has a darker matte finish on the stainless.) I bought this set at Neiman Marcus or Bloomingdales during a major sale a few years ago. There are similar frosted patterns available for sale online now . I have other frosted flatware sets from different companies and I use them often.

I have had these plastic turquoise napkin rings for several years. They probably came from Ebay or Etsy. I bought the napkins at our Pier 1 store before it closed. I love the multi-colored design because I seem to have many different shades of turquoise, teal, and blue dishes and these napkins match many of them.

The shell place card holders were made by Andrea by Sadek. I can’t remember where I bought them but it might have been Ebay.

I think these blue glass goblets came from Pier 1 several years ago. I have very very tall white goblets but I had been looking for shorter ones for a long time. I finally found these white goblets at Walmart a few years ago. They were made by Artland and the pattern is called Veranda.

I found this large white shell bowl at HomeGoods several years ago. It usually sits on a shelf in the family room. HomeGoods often has large objects that make perfect centerpieces. I put a small towel in the bottom for filler and then covered it with blue flat marbles that I bought on Amazon.

These glass pillar candle holders probably came from Pottery Barn or Crate and Barrel. When I started tablescaping several years ago some of the first things I bought were various sizes and shapes of candle holders. HomeGoods and Dollar stores are good sources for candle holders of all kinds and candles as well.

Almost time for some beach fun!

To see 200+ other tablescapes that I have created please click here. If you are on Facebook, join my Tablescape Ideas group! Just click on the Facebook Search box at the top of the page and type in Tablescape Ideas. Don’t miss my Tablescaping How-To section at the top of this blog post for more tablescaping tips and tricks.

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Watering Cans on a Spring Tablescape

I love watering cans although I don’t use them to water my garden. I have a few in different colors and sizes. This red gingham tablecloth came from Sur La Table several years ago. It is heavy cotton and easy care, well made and great quality. I’ve used it before at Christmas time and on Summer tablescapes.

I wanted a salad plate with a watering can on it and I finally found these plates on Etsy. I bought them from three different sellers to get six. There are four different designs on the plates. They were designed by Debbie Mumm in 1999 and they were made by Sakura. The pattern was called Garden Vignette.

I love gardening and these plates show perfect images of a gardener’s world, at least my gardening world!

This dinner plate was made by Fiesta and the color is Sunflower. I bought them at Macy’s several years ago when I started tablescaping.

If you read my blog you have read about my Mikasa Color Spectrum chargers before. I have them in several colors, this one is Hunter Green. They are some of my favorite chargers. I really love the size, design and shape. They were all discontinued but I bought them on Ebay a few at a time over several years.

This Milano Red flatware is made by Ginkgo International Le Prix. I have had this set for years but it is still for sale. I can’t remember where I bought it.

I had someone on Etsy make these napkins for me, she has made several sets for me. I tell her what I want on the napkins and she searches for different fabrics for me to choose from. I really wanted green watering cans and she found gardening fabric with them. The watering can napkin rings came from Hobby Lobby last year. They were a tin color and Hubby painted them for me.

I saw these small plastic watering can party favors on Etsy a couple weeks ago and I knew I could use them as place card holders. They were baby blue but Hubby painted them for me. When I buy place card holders sometimes they come with place cards. I was looking through my place cards and I found these green ones with red flowers, perfect for this table.

If you read my blog you have seen these red Waterford Marquis Brookside goblets on my tablescapes several times. I love these red goblets! The green plastic goblet came from Pier 1 several years ago. I use these green goblets often on my Spring and Fall tablescapes.

I saw this large green metal watering can on another blog a few years ago and I knew I had to have it. I used it as a centerpiece last summer on my Sunflower tablescape. It was made by MacKenzie-Childs and I bought it on their web site. Someone on another blog mentioned how lifelike these red poppy faux flowers were and I bought them on Amazon this month to match the red flowers on the napkins.

I found this watering can salt and pepper set on Amazon last week. I can see why some people collect salt and pepper sets, I have found some cute ones!

I love Mosser Glass and I bought this red Mosser Glass salt and pepper set online at The Vermont Country Store a few weeks ago. I have Mosser Glass goblets and plates too. Mosser Glass is a family owned company that was started in 1971 in Cambridge, Ohio. This handcrafted glassware is heavy and excellent quality.

Time for some Spring gardening!

To see 100+ other tablescapes that I have created please click here. If you are on Facebook, join my Tablescape Ideas group! Just click on the Facebook Search box at the top of the page and type in Tablescape Ideas. Don’t miss my Tablescaping How-To section at the top of this blog post for more tablescaping tips and tricks.

I put a new tablescape on my blog every week so please check back!

Butterflies on a Spring Tablescape

Finally pulled together a butterfly themed tablescape for Spring. I looked for a while before I could find a butterfly tablecloth that I liked, this one came from Ebay. It was new and it was made by Positively Pique. The name of the pattern was Flights of Fancy. I really can’t recommend it because the material is odd. It is labeled 100% cotton but it feels somewhat like thick paper, very strange. I do like the design however, it works for this tablescape.

I almost gave up on this theme because I was having so much trouble trying to find butterfly designs that I liked. I wanted a salad plate that had a butterfly design that covered the entire plate and I finally settled on this set that I found on Ebay. They are Ironstone and they were sold by Pier 1 some years ago. The pattern was called Botanica.

This square dinner plate was made by Fiesta and the color is Tangerine. It matches the orange in the tablecloth as well as the orange on the salad plates. I bought them last year online at Fiesta for a Halloween tablescape. I only have a few square dinner plates, most of mine are round.

This is one of my favorite blue chargers. It is heavy glass and I love the color and the tweed like design in the glass. They are made by Villeroy and Boch and the pattern is Verona. Not sure where I found them. I have had them for several years. If you read my blog you saw them in January on my Snowmen tablescape and last July on my Crab Bisque tablescape.

This flatware is called Madeline Green and I bought it at World Market several years ago. If you google frosted flatware and add the color you are looking for you will find similar sets. I use this flatware often in the Spring and Fall. You may have seen it on my Bunnies and Chicks Easter tablescape this month.

I have had these napkins for several years, I’m not sure where I bought them. They were made by Pfaltzgraff and the pattern was Summer Breeze. The colors were a good match for this tablescape. I used them last month on my Yellow Chicks Easter tablescape. I found these DII metal butterfly napkin rings on Amazon. They were black and Hubby painted them green for me. I love this shade of green.

I found these metal butterflies on Ebay last month. They are not really place card holders but they have wires on the back that I bent into a stand for them. I knew the place card would slide in front of the antennae. There were nine different designs and I love the color combinations!

Looking at this photo I just realized that the blue flowers on the napkin are a pretty good match for the blue flowers on the salad plate!

The acrylic cobalt blue goblets came from Pier 1 several years ago. The acrylic green goblets came from our Pier 1 store before it closed early last year.

I kept googling large butterfly looking for something to use as a centerpiece for this tablescape and finally found this one on Etsy. It was made in 1971 by Homco and it is made of some kind of plastic. It was peach colored but Hubby painted it green for me. I really like the design of this butterfly, all the different curves and lines. It is sitting on a fake rock that we bought for my husband decades ago as a joke. We found the rock in a mall and my daughter was a baby and in a stroller. She wanted to hold it and we got lots of strange looks because everyone thought it was a real heavy rock!

I love butterflies in my garden, I’ve been wanting to do this tablescape for some time.

To see 100+ other tablescapes that I have created please click here. If you are on Facebook, join my Tablescape Ideas group! Just click on the Facebook Search box at the top of the page and type in Tablescape Ideas. Don’t miss my Tablescaping How-To section at the top of this blog post for more tablescaping tips and tricks.

I put a new tablescape on my blog every week so please check back!

Tablescaping DIY, Part 4, Choosing What Plates to Buy, Salad Plates

This is Part 4 in an ongoing series about how to create your tablescapes. You can read Part 1 about developing a theme for your table here , Part 2 about Choosing what Plates to Buy, Chargers, here and Part 3 about Choosing What Plates to Buy, Dinner Plates, here. There are some similarities when choosing different kinds of plates so there will be some repetition in this blog post with the other how-to posts. The salad plate is the most important plate on the table from a design standpoint. It is the plate that is seen all around the table with a repeated exact or similar design and this helps define and illustrate the theme of your tablescape.

There are five things to think about when buying salad plates; size, color, shape, material, and price. Salad plates can be anywhere from 6 inches to 9 inches in diameter. You want a salad plate about that size so that a larger dinner plate will show below that plate with the charger plate below that. This provides a nice balance for the plate stack. When I am looking for salad plates I try to keep in mind the charger plates and dinner plates that I already have so that whatever I buy will match something I already own. I also buy plates thinking about the tablescape themes I am working on and how the plate design could add to the theme. Salad plates are sometimes called luncheon plates when they are a larger size.

This salad plate is just the right size. The dinner plate border shows below it and the charger plate below that. These salad plates are very difficult to find. I found a few on Ebay and a few on Etsy and a few at Replacements, Ltd.. I was lucky to find eight. The back says “International Tableworks, from a genuine hand engraving Bob Timberlake”. They were made in England and the pattern is Timberlake Camp 166.

You can’t go wrong choosing a salad plate in a solid primary or secondary color. You will use them over and over again. They were some of the first plates I bought when I started tablescaping. This is a salad plate made by Fiesta and the color is Sunflower. (The dinner plate below the salad plate is Fiesta as well, in Shamrock.)

My salad plates are pottery, ceramic, melamine and glass like this square glass black salad plate. It really doesn’t matter what the plate is made of and I am amazed at how many wonderful melamine salad plate designs are available now. When I started tablescaping I bought round plates but after a few years I started adding some square plates to my dish collection. We found these black glass plates somewhere in Virginia while we were visiting our son and his family a few years ago. They were made by Luminarc France.

Sometimes a salad plate will be sold as a set of three or four with different designs on each plate. These different designs can add additional interest and fun to the tablescape. I bought these small Halloween plates several years ago, I can’t remember where but it may have been Ebay. They were made by Omniware and there were four different designs in the set. I have always liked them because they have such a classic Halloween style.

I bought these green melamine salad plates online several years ago. I can’t remember where. They were made by Baci Milano and the pattern was called Baroque & Rock. I have them in red also, I like the ruffle design on the lip and rim. On this particular tablescape I added another blue salad plate that was just a bit larger under this green salad plate because I wanted to separate some colors in the plate stack and add a bit more blue to the tablescape. HomeGoods and Dollar stores are great sources for inexpensive salad plates. If you live in an area that has thrift stores and garage and estate sales, they can also be great sources for inexpensive plates too. Salad plates can be expensive, especially the ceramic and china ones. Over the years, when I found an expensive one that I really liked, I bought one or two a month until I had the number I needed. I have read about tablescapers who buy glass plates at a Dollar store and then draw on them or add fabric to them to create a new design. Check on Pinterest for information about how to do this, I am not crafty and I have never done it but they look great!

These melamine strawberry salad plates came from Sur La Table online a few years ago. Online stores often have cute salad plates and I wait until the end of season sales and buy them then.

Depending on the theme of your table it is fun to find salad plates with an unusual shape. I often find them by googling whatever it is that I am looking for, something often pops up. I really love this Santa face salad plate. This plate was part of Fitz and Floyd’s Peppermint Santa tableware series several years ago. I have several pieces of this series that I collected over the years online from different retail sites. It is really the cutest Santa face that I have seen so far on a plate. When I have a special detailed plate like this one I remove them from the table before we start eating. They are mostly for show. I have other salad plates waiting that can be eaten on.

I have had these Fitz and Floyd salad plates for several years. I bought them a few at a time over a few years on Ebay. The pattern was called Autumn Bounty and they were made between 1996 and 1999. I love all the detail, the fruit, the vegetables, the flowers and the wicker design in the center.

For this tablescape I used what is called a tidbit or appetizer plate on top of the salad plate. These plates are usually about 4 inches to 6 inches in diameter. When you are buying salad plates online be sure to read what size the plate is so you know exactly what you are getting. This melamine snowflake plate is sitting on a simple white salad plate. This plate stack was one of my favorites as was the tablescape itself. I found these blue and white small snowflake plates on Ebay several years ago. They were made by Nicole Miller. I really love the shape of these plates and the design as well.

I never buy sets of dishes because I wouldn’t use all the dishes on my tablescapes and it would be a waste of money. But over the years when I found a plate design that I really loved (after I made sure it was all available) I slowly bought matching chargers, dinner plates and salad plates until I had the number of place settings that I wanted. Sometimes this took me a few years to accomplish depending on the availability of the plates. I often bought plates a few at a time on Ebay as they came up for sale. Some I am still looking for! These blue seashell plates were some of the first plates that I bought when I started tablescaping and they are still some of my favorite plates. I just love all the starfish and shell details in the raised design. They were made by Bordallo Pinheiro in Portugal and I bought them a few plates at a time on Ebay. I still see them there from time to time. I love the scallop shell surrounded by a rope in the center of this salad plate. Some of their salad plates have a starfish in the center of the plate.

I love the design of these flag plates, it is a simple but strong design. They are melamine and I bought them at Pier 1 a several years ago before they closed their stores. As soon as I saw them I knew I wanted both the salad and the matching dinner plates.

I love red and my kitchen is white with red accents so when I saw these plates I knew I had to have them. The top plate is tidbit size, then a salad plate, then a larger dinner plate that can be used as a charger as well. The plates were made by At Home with Marieke and the pattern was called Sarah. This pattern has been discontinued. I can’t remember where I bought them but it was online.

If you are lucky, you may have inherited a set of china from a relative. This was my Nana’s Haviland passed down to me from my mother. I cherish it and try to use it on a tablescape a few times a year at least.

To see over 260 different tablescapes that I have created please click here. If you are on Facebook, join my new Tablescape and Table Settings Ideas Facebook group for lots of tablescaping inspiration! Just click on the Facebook Search box at the top of the page and type in Tablescape and Table Settings Ideas or click here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/2553689988183392

If you live in Southern California join our Facebook tablescaping group Southern California Tablescapers BTS Group. https://www.facebook.com/groups/440356398581157 We are planning a gathering for tablescapers in January in the Los Angeles area..

Don’t miss the Tablescape How-To tab at the top of my blog for DIY tips and tricks.

I put a new tablescape on my blog every week, please check back!