Well, to be honest I'm having a hard time visualizing the sofa-with-floral-slipcover, the chair-with-paisley-cushions, the patterned rug, and the patterned curtains, but I just wanted to throw in my .02 about JCP -- we were looking for a settee for our bedroom, also not heirloom quality but good enough for our dogs to sleep on as well as look nice in our room. I paid around $350 for a leather loveseat, and it is really pretty darn nice for the price! So there's my plug for JCP furniture.

Believe it or not, the mixed patterns look surprisingly good, probably because some combination of the same colors is in everything. The couch's slipcover may be replaced at some point with something that fits better (I HATE having to keep fiddling with it) but it'll do for a while.

The REAL question, though, is more about the settee working, sorry if I wasn't clear about that!

I certainly think the (adorable) settee's lines converge nicely with the rounded lines of the sofa. The chair, I'm not certain about--although it might add just the right amount of quirkyness to liven up the traditional lines of the other two pieces. As for the patterns: I'm all for mixing up patterns (the fact that I don't do it in my own house is just a sign of cowardice, simply put). The drapes are very cool. The only thing I'm not sure about is the rug. IMO, I think less pattern in the rug would be better, and perhaps more muted colors (although I certainly understand the need for pattern in the LR rug when there is a canine member of the household). :)

I like the settee, and I think it would mesh right in with your pretty antiques ;) For $400 to get you through a few years, I'd say go for it. If it's a hard space to fit something in, you might well end up driving yourself insane on CL (as has oft happened to me when looking for a specific type of item). I also really like the window covering fabric!

Can you show us the gold-plum paisely and the green floral you've picked out for the couch? The drapes are seriously showing up blue-purple on my monitor and I'm not picking that up in the rug, but I'll take your word for it that in real life they harmonize.

I really like the settee, wish I could get a pair for our teeny, tiny LR and ditch the hand me down couch and loveseat, but oh well. At least *someone* is going to have a nice looking piece to sit on. :^)

"Have not nailed down a paint color yet and probably won't for a while."
What, no Wet Cement? (Which I could see with the drapes)

I think the settee works with the couch as long as it doesn't sit super high compared to the seating level of the couch. The rug is great, the slipcover for the couch sounds okay, I reserve judgement on that with the paisley, tho. Confused by the blue curtains?

The only thing I don't see is the chair. It feels too rigid and bulky, too rectangular, for the wonderful curves of the other pieces in the room - including 'MY" end table. ;^)

My personal opinion is that you're venturing into the "I'm using what I have" level of interior design. And there's nothing wrong with that! (unless your going to shell out the shekels to achieve it).

BUT, if you're trying to achieve a level of cohesiveness... I think you're on the wrong tack, personally.

I'm not good at coordinating styles and patterns but wanted to say that I really do like that settee and think the price is a bargain!

I want to tell you that velvet is actually extremely durable, you will be surprised at how well it will hold up. That settee is a very pretty piece. I have an armoire with tin panels from JCP, it's not heirloom quality, but I have received compliments on it, and it is good quality.

I see a solid color drapery fabric, and a different sofa, in your room. Does the rug fit the room well? That would be where to pull the wall/drapery colors from.

Did you see this?

Here is a link that might be useful: JCP Chris Madden Thistle Hill Sofa

Sorry but I have to chime in here. I bought four dining room chairs and two wing chairs from JC Penney this past fall. I knew I wasn't investing in anything for long term but I must say the furniture is just awful. The dining room chairs have developed cracks in the wood at the back. The wing chairs are so uncomfortable and crooked, I just don't know what to say. I will tell you though, I learned my lesson. No more cheezy, cheap furniture. I'm in the market for a new bed and am checking out American made furniture at this point. The JC Penney stuff was shipped from China.

My advice, save your money, do some research and buy something from a good furniture maker. Sorry to the people on here who like JC Penney furniture but that's my .02 cents.

redsox~Did you try resolving the issue with JCP? I bought some shelves from a very reputable catalog (SBY) once, and they were junk! I was refunded the catalog price PLUS shipping charges when I complained.

The armoire I got from JCP is not solid wood, the back is particle board. As I said, not heirloom quality. But a good value for the price, until I can find/afford the real thing.

It is hard to find good, clean used upholstered pieces, as johnmari has found. I would think JCP has a pretty good return policy, if the settee turns out to be a dud. And for the price of one really great piece, she could have two decent ones for a few years.

I like all the furniture youve shown (where did you get that great little Morris chair have you always had it??) I could see it all working together. The settee is pretty - did you get a chance to sit in it?

The rug is pretty it is patterned but its subtle I think.

In general, I love a mix of patterns/fabrics (Im working on several different ones in my own home and have a lot of great inspiration pix that show this). But without seeing pics of them all together, its hard for me to comment. Like the others have said, the only thing of what youve shown so far that doesnt seem to jive as well is the drapery fabric maybe its the monitor though. It seems too dark for the rug, and maybe too shimmery. But I will admit, Im not a good visualizer.

I also thought velvet was durable I just got a chair upholstered in green velvet.

As you explain, your biggest constraint is the size of the area where you need a settee, you really need seating there now rather than later, and you say you've had difficulty finding anything else that would work. Thus I'd go with the settee pictured above and tweak the other items around it. The other items are all very attractive individually, but as the others have concluded, it's hard to visualize them together. The Morris chair is really great, and I'd be interested in seeing the fabric you plan for that chair. Is the slipcover choice for the other couch a final decision or can that be changed at this point? I'd be tempted to find another slipcover in a velvet or velveteen, not necessarily in the same color as the settee, to bring a little cohesiveness to them via texture.

I think the pieces are all fine together, actually, and I do like the settee. I think sometimes if you look at individual pieces, well, individually, they may not look as though they'll work together, but when you put them in a room, they do. (Did that make sense??) If I lined up my living room furniture, I am sure no one would say that they'd work well together in one space -- but they do. So in my opinion, there's no real problem with these individual pieces working together. As I said, my concern is with all the various patterns -- but that wasn't your question so I won't say another word about it ;)

Yes -- hard to say without seeing the finished cushions on the chairs BUT -- I do love all the colors -- just not sure about the curtains BUT very very willing to be wrong (which is the usual result of MY personal mixing-and-matching skills ..... LOL!)

Jan

I really think that rug is very pretty. I like the colors. I also like the drapes you've chosen. I think the settee is also lovely (especially for that price!). I can't envision the sofa and the chair- only because I can't envision the fabric.

I certainly do understand the need to buy furniture even though it might not be heirloom quality. I've been scouring CL for several months and there has been NOTHING remotely useful or interesting. I'm in a similar situation where I would like to have certain pieces of furniture but don't have the budget for heirloom quality.

If you do end up getting the JCP settee be sure to let us know how it really looks and holds up for you. My local JCP also doesn't carry furniture.

What are your thoughts on wall colors?
Astrid

I don't have the ability to envision the fabrics together, so no comment to give there. I agree with Les about the chair being the odd man out.

I thought velvet was supposed to be very durable. They use it on theater seats, don't they?

And I have to chuckle at Chelone's take on this. Whether she is right or wrong, I don't know, but I have seen myself go down that path more than once.

I think the three pieces do work together, especially considering the vintage of your home. The sofa feels fairly neutral to me (although it's curves remind me a bit of the 30's overstuff style I remember from older relatives homes), the settee (which I really love) feels a wee bit late victorian with the turned legs, and the side chair is of course more arts/crafts. So you've got a collection that all falls within a 30 year or so range--which used to be the norm for furnishings people had in their homes!

This is the way I approach many decorating decisions--how much did I spend overall on the room? If it wasn't much, then I can affort to take a bit of a risk on a new piece. And what then really mitigates even that risk is if I could use that new piece somewhere else in the future. I would say you couldn't go wrong with a settee of that style and color. It would look great in a dining room or area, or even in a study or bedroom.

I know you're not looking for opinions on the fabric choices, but is there any way you could post them? Might help people to understand what you have in mind for pulling everything together.

I clarified in my first follow-up that I wanted to discuss the SETTEE, not the fabrics or rug - those were just posted for reference and I guess I was stupid to do so because everyone's getting totally sidetracked by that! I can't get any decent pictures of the fabrics today because of lack of light due to snowstorm and poor interior lighting (more lamps are on the shopping list), but the paisley is VERY muted: a dullish golden brown, brown, and dark purple which is maybe 10% of the total. Quiet and warm and rather sedate. I had picked out another fabric for the chair, purchasing that one for pillows, but DH pounced on it and said he wanted THAT one. Since it's his chair, he gets what he wants! The slipcover is an olive and sageish monochromatic rose-print damask and has to do for now, blowing another hundred bucks for a decent slipcover just isn't in the cards right now.

The faux-silk curtains are NOT blue, they are a warm eggplant color. I guess the catalog photo is not showing well on anyone's monitor. When I photograph them the background color looks black!

I have no idea what the wall color is going to be and I'm not going to worry about it for a while. This year's to-do list is long enough that I would be completely shocked if we got to painting before next year anyway.

Yeah, it would be really nice to be able to buy something from a "good furniture maker", but it's just not feasible unless someone else wants to buy it for me. :-) (Ben Stein voice: "Anyone? Anyone?" LOL) The house needs both a lot of work and a lot of stuff - even though it's a third smaller, the layout is so very different from our previous house that the furniture that came with us is nowhere near enough. Call me snobby but I refuse to seat my friends on plastic lawn furniture, I want them to be comfortable in my home! I should be able to get the remaining furniture I need from Craigslist or eBay, thank heavens, but I've been beating my head against a brick wall with this one spot.

organic, as I said the rug is a LOT more muted than it is in person. Quirky is a MAJOR necessity AFAIC, especially since DH and I ARE quirky! (Although we'd just say "weird"! LOL) Plus this house is a bit odd in and of itself.

littledog, there is no purple in the rug, but the curtains' embroidery is olive, gold and rose, which are also in the rug. Everything except for the solid brown settee has either olive, gold, purple or rose in it, and the settee would have new pillows on it. DH has nixed the Wet Concrete color for this room, and since this is his house too and the decor does matter to him (especially color, he's extremely picky about color) I refuse to steamroller him on that. It will probably show up in the the weird little bedroom we're going to use as a library.

les, are we seeing the same chair? The arms are rounded-over, the side spindles are turned, the paw feet are curvy - where are you seeing rigid and rectangular? I'm not snarking, I'm honestly puzzled. Maybe it's because I'm used to Mission being my definition of "rigid and rectangular" and that's about as far from Mission as a Morris chair gets - it's one of the reasons we bought it. :-) I can't remember, which is "your" end table - the little round quartersawn-oak one with the little pyramidy things on the top where the legs stick through or the big Mission tea table we were using as an end table in the other house?

jenny, the Morris chair was a Craigslist purchase. It's beat to crap but we really like it, it's different from the usual Mission style Morris chair which we specifically did NOT want, we have a couple of Mission tables and those few are enough. This house can't really carry a lot of Mission furniture. I'd like to find another kooky late-Victorian Morris chair to put on the other side of the room.

teeda, I think you "get" me! One of my favorite looks is a home where everything in it was accumulated over the course of many years, or evoking that image anyway. It tells a story, even if it's only one you imagine in your head. This odd little house straddles late Victorian and Arts & Crafts, which is also my favorite decor period; the layout and total structure are very much vernacular Victorian, but the majority of the interior trimwork and the porch design are very A&C. So that's mostly the mix of furniture I'm aiming for, although I much prefer the English Arts & Crafts to the Mission subtype.

Get the settee before it's gone! I'm not good with decorating terminology, so I'll just say that it looks like it *belongs* with your other furniture.

Does the free shipping code cover the extra freight charge for furniture? If so, that is a really great deal.

Yes I think the settee would work. I'll echo the comments about it working well with your sofa. The chair is Arts & Crafts/Mission, though. It mimght look good and it might not. It's hard to say without seeing it all together.

Drat. None of my coupons are working so I will need to call tomorrow. Wasn't 100% sure about the free shipping, sometimes they work on the large items and sometimes they don't, but I also had a 15% off one that would have balanced out a good chunk of the shipping if the free shipping didn't work and that's not working either. I'm not going to panic, Penneys has a sale about every other week.

Oceanna, just to clear up a misperception, my Morris chair is NOT Mission by a longshot. Mission is a subset or substyle of the overall Arts & Crafts style, the two are not equivalent. It's like saying all Country is Primitive because Primitive falls under the umbrella of Country. :-) These chairs shown below are perfect examples of a Mission style Morris chair, so you can see the pretty significant differences from mine. The first two are Gustav Stickley, the last is L. & J.G. Stickley, all from the turn of the last century. Those big ole lion's paw feet would give old Gus a heart attack! :-) My Morris chair is more late Victorian in design than even A & C; mahogany, factory-made and on the lower end of the quality scale but still remarkably sturdy despite its surface dings and chips. Morris chairs were first appearing on the market in the late 1860s, and so a great many of them were the floridly-carved monstrosities (love 'em!) most of us associate with "Victorian" furniture. They were very popular during the "Golden Oak" era in the 1880s-1890s, during which the stores were crammed with gaudy mass-produced oak furniture in a characteristic shiny yellow-gold finish... the irony is that the darn chair was named for William Morris, a social activist who railed against, among other things, factory production of home furnishings! Chairs similar to mine are readily available and relatively inexpensive, since the demand is greater for the Mission ones - that is what most people think of when one says "Morris chair".

johnmari: Love the settee. I also have some JC Penny furniture I bought about 6 months ago--a bedroom set and kitchen table, and so far they are holding up well. The only problem I have is with the leaf with the kitchen table. Something is off and we have a heck of a time getting it to go in all the way; but for our needs and having three kids, overall I'm happy with my purchases. I agree I'm not so sure about the combo of the drapes and rug, but it sounds like you are still considering that. Since I myself am not overly confident of my decorating abilities and am on a budget, I'm trying to take it slowly and add one piece at a time. I think you gave some excellent advice recently which struck home to me about listening to your house and it will tell you what it needs. Take your own advice and you won't go wrong.

It's all feeling a bit pattern-y busy to me, and although the Victorian era was very aesthetically busy, a lot of that was trims not just patterns. I'd be wanting to shove some tassels or pom pom trim or fringed bullion into the mix somewhere.

What happened to your old lr?

Welll, I'm having trouble envisioning them all together, as I don't see a repetition going on with the pieces. I do also think the rug and drape patterns are too similar in scale -- the drapes also seem to read blue and white, so I wonder if the thread detail with the gold and green is actually going to be apparent unless one is close up. They're both very pretty, and I loooove that rug! but the drapes don't seem to relate, imo. They may be a bit dressy too.

:( Sorry, just my measley $.02. I'm a virtual girl.

johnmarie, to me, the settee and sofa look like they would work well together. The arms are the same shape, the backs are curvy...

I am with you about preferring pieces to be acquired over a long time, and consequently mismatched, as opposed to the "I went to the furniture store and bought matching everything in one day" kind of look. Perhaps it's just rationalizing the fact that I could never afford to buy a roomful of furniture all at once! :)

Didn't realize it was only the settee you were checking :) To me the settee reads contemporary. Here's the group together -- impressionistic, that is :)

HTH!

Read the whole thing now! I see the chair as rectangular and rigid also, lol. Interrresting! It's somewhat in the shadows though, so maybe some of its curves are obscured.

Squirrel, nice job putting it together. I can't find Mari's exact description of the color just now, but I'm seeing the couch as more of a toned down olive rather than minty fresh. ;^) I'm also guessing the rug would look darker in an actual room as opposed to the well lit, straight on shot for a catalog.

Okay, Marie. Guess I should have said "reminiscent of." My bad.

Yes, when I did that I hadn't gone through the whoooole thread :) More for looking at the pieces than fabrics. It does need more olive on the sofa, mostly gold for the chair, and the rug is toned down but maybe not enough. It went dingy on me. The curtain pic didn't mesh so I just left it out and now see it is more of an eggplant than the blue it reads.

I don't have time to read all the responses but I love this last picture very much...as one who has paisley, plaid and toile fabrics along with a sage green couch in my living room, I'm a huge fan of an artful mix of fabrics. Can't wait to see the final results!

I love the settee, it's so pretty...I think it goes well with both the sofa style and the chair. I would buy the settee put it in the room with the rug then pick the fabric for the sofa and drapes. I love the mix of browns, tans and beige. Maybe you could do the sofa in a light tan, rather than green.
I like the idea of a plum fabric for the chair, maybe a fabric with some plum in it for the sofa as well.
The drapes are not right, (the color and the print) they're more suitable for a bedroom or a fussier Living room.
Joann

I'm with Les, I see rigid and rectangular in that chair, too. It doesn't look comfy at all. It's the straight wood sides and the back is angular and very stiff looking.

Love the Thistle Hill set Prairiegirl linked to! It's made in the US w/hardwood construction. For $150 more, I'd go with that *if* it coordinated at all with what you have going on. I think it would go with the rug, but doubt it would go with the rest from what I'm seeing.

Hmmm, I think you need something to pull everything together other than the fabrics. While I like the settee, it does not blend well to me with the chair and the sofa. And I think the whole mission/arts and crafts/Morris thing is a bit semantics :)
Sorry, but it does, at a glance, read rigid and ...mission.
But it doesn't go any less than the settee. I would look for something that coordinates really well with either the sofa or the chair and that way you'll have more cohesion.
Do you not have the Bradington Young sofa anymore?

I can see the chair and settee working due to the strong lines. Or I'd create a stronger connection between a settee and the sofa, with the chair being on the more eclectic side.

Also, maybe, connecting the sofa and settee more on color might make it feel more cohesive -- not matching, just relating more. Such as a dark brown cover and maybe a blanket/quilt over the back of the sofa to modify the shape a bit.

So, when's delivery, lol :)

I did not buy the settee at this time. None of my coupons were working and the chickie on the order line was being difficult about it, so I gave up because the price difference would pay for a set of wood blinds. Maybe next time it goes on sale they'll work, or it'll be on a better sale.

Windypoint, I adore all the Victorian trims, although I do have to exercise some self-restraint to avoid overwhelming my DH. He is extremely tolerant but he does still have his limits! The chair cushions are getting a nice deep-eggplant piping to match the same color in the (very very subtle) paisley, I have some lovely big olive-colored tassels for curtain tiebacks, and pillows will be generously trimmed out as well. I use few pillows (too many and they end up thrown on the floor) so they have to have "oomph" visually. Can't hack the pompoms though. :-)

Hoosiergirl, the Morris chair is actually very comfortable! Appearances can be very deceiving. DH is picky about where he plants his butt and he claimed it as soon as it was brought home. It fits him perfectly. I've already said it's getting new, thicker cushions, the existing cushions do suck big time.

Squirrel, thank you for eventually actually reading what I wrote. :-) I'm getting kind of frustrated with that in general, I end up wondering why I even bother writing/explaining anything at all if all people are going to do is look at the pictures? I've definitely learned my lesson though, I'll only post the barest minimum of pictures, if any, from now on. Thank you for the mockups, but I had to crack up at how the fabric you put on the Morris chair is showing on my monitor, as a very bright lime-tinged olive green with gaudy bright purple splotches. *chuckle* I'm also giggling at your very carefully working around organic_smallhome's end tables - I've been trying to weasel those out of her for ages so her old couch wouldn't get lonely for them! LOL I'm so bad! I have my eye on a couple of end tables in a couple of antique shops here that I am certain pretty much everyone here would absolutely detest but I really like. As for what happened to my old living room.... uh, I moved? ;-) ;-) ;-)

The leather couch has been moved to what used to be the dining room - it was too large, squat and heavy for the living room, but the dining room is open to the kitchen and so the leather couch isn't as much of a hulk in there because the total space is greater. The upholstered bench is also in there because it, too, is too big for the living room. Dark wicker chair is in the guest room because a [expletive deleted] mover cracked one of the legs, and the leather chair and ottoman are in the bizarre little bedroom we use as a library because it is SO huge it doesn't fit anywhere - it's the only piece of furniture besides the bookshelves in the library! The camelback couch is smaller and less massive-feeling, much better-suited to the smaller living room. NO way am I buying a new couch for the living room. Good grief, I can't even imagine throwing away a good quality, extremely comfortable couch that I already have, that's just crazy talk!

It's probably going to be some years before I can afford to have the couch reupholstered. A deep eggplant fabric would be my preference but it would probably be a neutral caramel-ish sort of color for more practicality. I do plan on a new slipcover for it but it is going to have to wait because nice slipcovers get pricey (especially when you're incredibly sick of microsuede and duck/twill just doesn't work for the room). Too much else on the right-now list!

Actually, Mari, I did read your post! I always read the OP's question or predicament, just not the whooole thread at first. I usually like to work that way, too, because I don't want the answers first ;) and want to see what I think about things before having someone else plant things in my head :) Sometimes posts/threads are so darn long, too, that I just can't ride it out.

It didn't read as 'settee' only though, to me, as it says 'sanity check on my lr combo,' and I probably clipped the pics early on and ps'd it later before you clarified.

Amazing, lime green! It's a darrrk mustard yellow here, with purple and deep plum paisley splotches. Although I can see some green around now that you mention it.

Just tryin' to help you visualize the pieces :)

I did directly address the settee question, even if I did extrapolate about the couch slipcover and other fabrics. Everyone does it...you know, like someone specifically asking about a window treatment...and getting a critique of the bed placement and bedding as well ; )
It's called Taking An Interest, and it's not meant to sidetrack or criticize.

I think that's to be expected if you post pictures. Everything visible in the photo is up for grabs and as Kim nicely put it, it's called taking an interest.
Would you prefer your post to be ignored because people don't respond the way you want them to?
Posts frequently get read quickly and significant details are often misread or overlooked. If those are nicely pointed out than it's not a big deal and most people are quick to retract any mistakes they might have made while Taking An Interest.
It's just the nature of these type of forums.

My first response actually did address the combo of pieces but then I did comment on the rug and drapes as the whole thing was presented.

Well, just to clarify, I took the 'thank you for eventually reading what I actually posted' as a knuckle slap, but in retrospect maybe it was actually a thank you for taking the time to revisit and comment more clearly later.

I don't know. I posted the pics to see the shapes of the pieces together.

I'm confused why it should be a bother, but no matter.

I explained in my very first followup that what I was asking about was the settee. As in did it go with this existing group of other things I already have (which I like together or I wouldn't have kept them :-)). Quite a few people got very caught up in the whole "the drapes don't go with the rug" kind of bit despite my specifically saying that my question was NOT about that and that the colors/patterns were fine despite how they looked on the monitor, and that's what was frustrating me. I guess the best comparison I could make is that it's a little bit like like asking someone if they think a certain pair of shoes would look nice with an overall outfit that you really like and hearing instead that your hairstyle is horrible and you should throw away your dress and get a new one. Maybe y'all are just way better people than I am and never get frustrated.

Squirrelheaven, your "in retrospect" is 100% correct. I was indeed thanking you for going back and reading my clarifications! Trying to put this as gently and friendly-like as I can... I do understand not wanting to read everyone else's answers to a question, but maybe might want to try just quickly skimming a thread to look for any more posts by the OP, just to see if s/he has posted any followups with more information/clarifications? (Thankfully GW is nice enough to put posters' names in brightly colored print where we can see 'em in the sea of black and white! :-)) I try to do that as much as I can because of the limitations of this forum's setup, I know that not all of what I need to know may be in the initial post because I certainly don't always manage to get the initial post perfect! Seems like I screw it up more often than not, actually. Yeah, it would be very nice if we could re-edit our initial posts but it just ain't going to happen here, we have to rely on the followups. And I DO appreciate your putting the shapes of the pieces together, that's just the sort of thing I needed to know and why I thanked you for the virtuals! I appreciate them because I know it's time consuming to do them, which is why I've never asked anyone to do any for me.

Well, then, that feels better! I was going to take it that way anyway, because I liked it better :) Anyway, I did pick out your posts, and usually do!, but commented anyway ;)

Who knows the course of events -- I'm sooo maxed with rl requirements right now ... and it's free!

Glad the virtusls did help! I was more concerned with the shapes since that's what you were after. Thought the least I could do was provide virtuals for a regular contributing member!

Why don't the op's posts show in a different color over here??? Does that happen with other people too?

No, SH, the POSTS don't show up in a different color, the various poster's names do. On my monitor they're bright blue. :-)

I'm talking to a guy about a different (secondhand) settee that would work even better but don't want to show it lest I jinx myself. He's wicked slow with his emails though. :-(

I heard you, JM. Anyone else? I don't have this feature.

All posters' names in blue -- that feature I get and use. I thought you'd said the poster's name.

I'm tooo, tooo tired to comprehend or speak :)