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 Antiques maven Carol Burks has a penchant for romance, especially as it translates to the home. A visit to her house won’t, however, turn up clever vignettes frozen in time. Carol’s too mercurial for that. In fact, half the pleasure of creating a romantic environment, says Carol, is being able to change it.Take, for example, her former home in Multnomah, Oregon. In that grand 1920s Dutch Colonial (that she and her husband, Mike, updated from a 1950s “remuddle” that featured gold shag carpet and blue, green and orange walls), Carol turned a  downstairs guest bedroom into an artist’s haven. Using her trademark 1930s vintage floral fabrics, she created curtains, pillows and even a cover for her painted blue wicker loveseat. A green-and-white coverlet turned an overstuffed chair into a cozy corner retreat.Carol has always mixed her love for Victoriana—especially boxes, picture frames and objets d’art made from seashells—with pansy prints and other vintage touches. And that wasn’t about to stop when she moved. In fact, it is this very look that dominates her new, one-room cottage. The day Carol spotted the cottage overlooking a sun-dappled pond in Salem, Oregon, she says, time seemed to stop. “It literally made my heart stop beating,” recalls Carol. “When I saw the ‘For Sale’ sign, I knew I was home.” Luckily, the one-room cottage also had a small 1940s house nestled above it, its “apartment white” paint and gray, wall-to-wall carpeting like fingernails on a blackboard to Carol and her penchant for soft, romantic decor. So it was that Carol had two big decorating challenges awaiting her when she and Mike relocated to Salem. Once there, Carol focused her creativity towards transforming the one-room cottage into “Caroline’s Cottage.” The pieces for the cottage, she decided, would be simpler than those in their Multnomah home. At the core of her design was an old iron bed she found at an estate sale. Dressed with a fluffy white comforter and bolder, more sophisticated swatches of vintage fabric, the old bed marries perfectly with a pair of new white wingback chairs wrapped in the same vintage fabric. “Using larger pieces in a small space helps keep down the clutter,” says Carol. |
A seating area by the window is equally simple—a favorite iron table and matching chair, a pair of pink painted shutters, a birdcage, an antique vase and gauzy window coverings complete the space. The larger house took a great deal more thought. Essentially nothing more than a large rectangular box with little architectural appeal, the home cried out  for Carol’s love of the outdoors. After all, the setting was what had originally attracted Carol and Mike to the property, so why not bring the serenity of the pond, the rolling lawns and the lofty pines indoors?After stripping out the wall-to-wall carpeting and painting the walls a “candlelight cream,” Carol began slowly bringing the outdoors in. Since flowers are never far from Carol’s decor, it is no surprise to find many vintage floral paintings gracing her walls. In winter, the main house may sport darker colors, but the floral influence is always present. For autumn, Carol turns a corner of the master bedroom into a warm-toned oasis, replete with an antique wicker chaise lounge draped with vintage lace and a panoply of pillows. A grouping of antique masculine leather luggage grounds the decidedly feminine chaise, while nature is ever present with a shadowbox that features birds, a pansy painting and a charming floral screen. Carol has also succeeded in downplaying the master bedroom’s tiny windows by softening them with antique fabric, tied at the unseen top of the window with starfish—a nod to her unending love for the sea.  As an antiques dealer (she recently opened a custom furniture store in Salem called Castellano, which features create-your-own sofas, seating, artwork and a smattering of her antiques), Carol never loses her love for the hunt. But just as something romantic will never cease to catch her eye, so too will her desire for change never wane. Buying and selling antiques enables her to move on to new looks, new colors, new horizons. “If you love to collect antiques,” says Carol, “you know that you rarely go out looking for a piece. Antiques are spontaneous. You discover something and either you purchase it right away or you make a quick decision to return, hoping it won’t be the one that got away.”Editor’s Note: For more information contact Castellano at 503-763-0929. |
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