The Hallway: Part IX

DRUMROLL: We finally picked a colour for the hallway! It was between the Spice Bounty, a greenish brown, and Silver Sage, a greyish green. The winner is Silver Sage! All of the trim will be painted a bright white.

Now, I’ve been asked to come up with a decorating scheme for the hallway. As you can see in the pictures, there’s currently a large trophy case, two potted corn plants, two benches, an Adirondacks bench and a large radiator. In addition, there are four doors, a staircase and a hallway to the kitchen wing.My thinking is to get rid of almost everything and replace the tall trophy case with a low credenza for holding brochures, annual reports, and other materials. I will get rid of the Adirondacks bench, and the quilts hanging on the walls can go into the dining room. The flag painting might be hung just inside the front door.

I’d like to keep the bench next to the front door, but maybe have it painted black lacquer. I’d also like to put the other bench, again painted black, along the back wall. We frequently need a place for the social workers who visit to sit and chat with the children in our care.

The stairs will be painted, and the balusters will be either painted black or white. The handrail will be stripped and refinished. These are the stairs in the two houses we visited this weekend:

Unfortunately, we don’t have any of that wonderful paneling on our stairs, and we’re worried that if we paint the trim and balusters white, they will get kicked and get dirty quickly.

For the walls, I am thinking of hanging identically framed images from Woodbourne’s history. I found a cache of photographs from the 1930’s and scanned them. I think a narrow black frame with a wide white mat with black and white pictures will be a classic look.

The downside is that this all has to be done by our board meeting the first week in December. Thoughts???