DINING WITH FLAIR FABULOUS DESIGNS WILL FEED YOUR APPETITE FOR BEAUTY.Byline: Barbara De Witt De Witt, uninc. town (1990 pop. 8,244), Onondaga co., central N.Y., a residential suburb of Syracuse. Staff Writer Elegant, exotic and extravagant. That's what you get when you ask 40 of the country's top designers to set the table for dinner. At this year's Dining by Design event sponsored by Elle Decor magazine and held at Barker Hangar in Santa Monica, 500 guests sat at tables with themes varying from English tea parties to foreign fantasies and helped raise $350,000 for the Design Industries Foundation Fighting AIDS. For your dining pleasure during the upcoming holidays, we picked a few of the new looks in tabletops and got the details on how you can create each look for less in your dining room. DESIGNER: Rachel Ashwell, interior designer, author, owner of Shabby Chic boutiques in Santa Monica and Malibu. THE LOOK: ``Table of Romance'' DETAILS: Inspired by a flamenco dancer's skirt, Ashwell covered the table with a cream-colored linen tablecloth trimmed with rows of lace ruffles For the plural of ruffle, see . Ruffles is the name of a brand of ruffled potato chips produced by Frito-Lay. Its current official product slogan is "R-R-R-Ruffles Have Ridges!".There is a lot of different kinds of chips. . She topped it with flea-market finds and a crystal chandelier, then added frivolous, romantic accents such as antique brooches pinned to the linen napkins and, on each seat, rhinestone-trimmed fairy wands and feathered halos, which guests wore during dinner. The color scheme included pale pink, green and blue with touches of gold reflected in the trim on the glasses, napkin rings and chandelier. FREE ADVICE: ``Don't worry about matching your china or glassware, as part of the beauty of the Shabby Chic style is mixing and matching. Choose items that are similar in shape or color for continuity, and think of conversational items such as the brooches which I used as napkin rings.'' SHOPPING LIST: Chandelier, gold-rimmed glassware, and vintage plates and linens from Shabby Chic. The cups and saucers Cups and Saucers is a one-act "satirical musical sketch" written and composed by George Grossmith. It was first produced in 1876 on tour as a vehicle for Grossmith and Florence Marryat, as part of Entre Nous, their series of piano sketches. , flatware, cranberry-colored glasses and blue sherbet sher·bet n. 1. also sher·bert A frozen dessert made primarily of fruit juice, sugar, and water, and also containing milk, egg white, or gelatin. 2. Chiefly British A beverage made of sweetened diluted fruit juice. glasses from Agoura Antique Mart in Agoura Hills. DESIGNER: Elle Decor magazine editor in chief Margaret Russell. THE LOOK: ``Passage to India'' DINING DETAILS: To create a fantasy experience glittering with jewels, Russell built a white pavilion that echoed Indian architecture with mirrored discs. She covered the table with a heavily embroidered em·broi·der v. em·broi·dered, em·broi·der·ing, em·broi·ders v.tr. 1. To ornament with needlework: embroider a pillow cover. 2. silk cloth with a sheer embroidered over-cloth in shades of blue and gold, adding cotton-lined silk napkins (the cotton keeps the napkin from slipping off your lap) in jewel tones of ruby, amber and sapphire, and then sprinkled faux jewels across the table. To continue the jewel theme, she used a variety of colors in the stemware stem·ware n. Glassware mounted on a stem with a broad base. , votive candles and tall hurricane lamps. Instead of a large floral display, she stuffed roses and tulips into small brass tumblers For other meanings, see Tumbler. Tumblers were proposed by Ted Nelson in "Literary Machines" as a means to address every bit ever written, or a particular span of bits in any text ever written. A tumbler is a unique numerical address of an interesting artifact. . FREE ADVICE: ``Push your imagination and boundaries a little bit for a special party and guests will appreciate your extra effort. And don't feel you have to buy the finest china or stemware. You can get a similar look by layering the table with inexpensive Indian shawls (the rayon type shot with ``gold'' threads), then adding gold-toned chargers, colored glass dinner plates and gold-trimmed white porcelain desert plates from stores such as Pier 1 Imports Pier 1 Imports Inc. (NYSE: PIR) is a Fort Worth, Texas-based retailer specializing in imported home furnishings and decor, particularly furniture, table-top items, decorative accessories and seasonal decor. and Bed, Bath and Beyond. And try a craft store for plastic jewels to complete the theme.'' SHOPPING LIST: Linens from the Silk Trading Co. in Los Angeles; gold chargers and porcelain by Bernardaud; crystal stemware in Vega pattern by Baccarat baccarat (bä`kərä', băk`–, Fr. bäkärä`), French card game formerly widely played in European casinos but now supplanted in popularity by chemin de fer. , flatware by Christofle, hurricane lamps by Ralph Lauren Home and brass tumblers from Bed, Bath and Beyond. DESIGNER: Hutton Wilkinson, the event chairman and owner of Tony Duquette Fine Jewelry in L.A. THE LOOK: ``Song of India'' DETAILS: Maharaja style, created with a carved wood pavilion and painted backdrop to represent the facade of the Amber Palace in Jaipur, India. Instead of a large flower centerpiece, Wilkinson used a variety of carved angels and musicians on the table to reflect the music theme. To carry out the coral, orange and emerald color scheme, he used copper plates topped with orange napkins. FREE ADVICE: ``You don't have to have everything be from the same country to create an exotic theme, as long as it's got an ethnic look. I take anything I can lay my hands on and make it work, whether it's from India, Africa or Mexico. For centerpieces, I like to use objects instead of flowers.'' SHOPPING LIST: It's all from his personal collection, but Wilkinson says his secret and reasonably priced resource is Singh Imports in Culver City. Other places to shop include Pier 1 Imports and Cost Plus Imports. The copper plates are from Morocco, but he says you can find similar styles by Mexican artists in Los Angeles or Tijuana, Mexico. DESIGNER: Frank Pennino, L.A. interior designer. THE LOOK: ``Art Deco Dining'' DETAILS: A lavishly decorated dining room of the '30s from the late art-deco period when there was a great interest in Egyptian architecture. The room features an Egyptian revival chandelier and four modernist statues representing the four seasons. The table setting uses favorite colors of the period - gold, topaz and crimson - enhanced by colors of the fall season with an artistic assortment of tabletop items, ranging from gold- edged scalloped scal·lop also scol·lop or es·cal·lop n. 1. a. Any of various free-swimming marine mollusks of the family Pectinidae, having fan-shaped bivalve shells with a radiating fluted pattern. b. dinner plates to bronze napkin rings designed like Egyptian dogs to the handmade sterling candelabrum candelabrum (kăn'dəlä`brəm), primarily a support for candles, designed in the form of a turned baluster or a tapered column, also a branched candlestick or a lampstand. tucked into a wreath of dried manzanita manzanita: see bearberry. leaves. FREE ADVICE: ``To achieve the same mood, hunt antique shops - I like the ones along La Brea Avenue La Brea Avenue is a prominent north/south thoroughfare in Los Angeles. After Hawthorne Boulevard intersects with Century Boulevard in Inglewood, La Brea Avenue is formed. La Brea passes north through Windsor Hills, Baldwin Hills, and Ladera Heights. - for modernist furniture. Also, some furniture from the '50s has the same feeling and design elements but is less expensive. To create the look of lavish table linens, go to a yardage yard·age 1 n. 1. An amount or length measured in yards. 2. Cloth sold by the yard. Noun 1. store to make your own taffeta taffeta, cloth, originally silk but now also made of synthetic fibers, supposed to have originated in Persia. The name, derived from Persian, means "twisted woven." Taffeta is in the same class and demand as satin made of silk. tablecloth, and then buy decorative ribbon or strips of black-and-gold lace to crisscross over the table, and for a silver candelabrum I'd suggest Bombay Co. or Z Gallerie.'' SHOPPING LIST: Linens by Frank Pennino; china designed by Frank Pennino and made by Roy Hamilton; chandelier and napkin rings from Paul Ferrante; art-deco figures from Quatrain quat·rain n. A stanza or poem of four lines. [French, from Old French, from quatre, four, from Latin quattuor; see kwetwer- in Indo-European roots. , all in Los Angeles. Crystal, flatware and gift boxes filled with chocolate truffles from Neiman Marcus, Beverly Hills. Candelabrum by Swedish artist Boris Seipac. CAPTION(S): 8 photos, box Photo: (1 -- cover -- color) ON THE COVER: Stemware sparkles like jewels on tabletop design by Margaret Russell of Elle Decor. (2 -- 3 -- color) no caption (Art Deco Dining) (4 -- 5 -- color) no caption (Song of India) Andy Holzman/Sstaff Photographer (6 -- color) no caption (Passage to India) (7 -- 8 -- color) no caption (Table of Romance) Cathy Blaivas/ Special to the Daily News Box: Tabletop Tricks |
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