The Living Room Art and How To Grab Hex Codes parts 1 and 2

Hi Everyone,

I hope you’re doing well this week.

Today’s post is a fairly brief conclusion to Sunday’s post about the art and hex codes for my living room and entry.

Thank you so much for all the kind words.  If you’ve already read part 1 please click the link below to skip to part 2. Otherwise, please keep reading from the top of the page.

 

Part 2 Begins Here

 

Hi Everyone,

Oh, man! I’m still recuperating from Thursday night’s party. However, things are 99% cleaned up, and I’ve been taking it easy the last two days.

 

Okay, here’s a funny story.

 

In the middle of the party, the wine in the kitchen had run dry. Of course, there was more wine.

There were 9 more bottles in the mini-fridge under the stairs behind the hidden doors. Above, you can see how they looked before everything was color-drenched Benjamin Moore hc-160 Knoxville Gray.

 

Natch, I was busy in the kitchen and two friends volunteered to go and fetch the wine.

 

I told them to look for the wine in the closet under the stairs.

About 20 minutes earlier, I had taken them and about ten others on a little tour of the place.

 

Well, Laurel, did they like it?

 

Yes, they liked it. I gave smelling salts as a party favor. ;] Now, please let me finish my story.

A couple of minutes later, the two friends reappeared in the kitchen.

 

“We can’t find the closet under the stairs,” they said.

 

Oh man, I was dying because, of course, they couldn’t find the HIDDEN doors under the stairs. That’s the whole idea! So, I explained that the doors are intentionally made to not look like doors. “So, when facing the stairs, you will find a notch. That will open the left side door, and you should be good.”

That worked, and they returned quickly with the wine.

 

But, yes, yes, yes, the ladies were plotzing all over everything.

 

Several had been to my place before the reno, but not since. So, they very much appreciated the new staircase and kitchen.

And, I think I heard someone say. “Wait until you see the bathroom.”

haha

The next time I have a large party, it will be muuuuuch easier because I won’t be getting things like lampshades, toilet paper holders, ice buckets, hangers, and coat racks; plus, I have the plexiglass clothes hanging bars in two closets now. Oh, and let’s not forget all the running around getting the door knobs and stuff for the kitchen! I needed cookie sheets!

 

Okay, we’re finishing up the living room art which needs to coordinate with the art in the entry.

 

By the way, I sent off the schematic and colors for the entry tapestry mural to David Harrison at Romantic English. He’s so nice and said he’s on the task!

M, in the comments, asked for the hex codes. Okay, for Monday or Tuesday, I will make a tutorial showing how to grab them yourself. It’s useful to know, and it’s frighteningly easy to do. But also, please remember that in every image, there are thousands of codes, and some differences are so minute that our eyes can’t tell the difference.

 

Alright, back to the living room art for over the stairwell.

 

I had a lot of fun searching for the perfect art.

 

Somewhere along the way, I found a rather blurry image of an elegant apartment (Above). At this point, I don’t remember where, but I kind of fell in love with this tapestry and instinctively felt it was the right choice for my living room art. This pre-dated the entry art you saw the other day.

Something about it grabbed me. However, there was no information about it. I knew it was in the French Aubusson Chinoiserie style and looked like the work of François Boucher.

This will coordinate so well with the Gracie panels.

 

So, I did what I always do in these situations. I took a screenshot of the page and then cropped it (see above), so all I had was the tapestry. Then, I dragged and dropped that image into Google Images, and voila! It spat back at me many iterations of the tapestry.

This is when I found out it was the Parisian apartment of the legendary designer Elsa Schiaparelli, photographed by François Halard.

 

Below, you can see some of what I found in my Google search.

 

 

The company Meister Drucke can reproduce it, but their largest size wasn’t nearly large enough. When I contacted them, they said they could not make it in my needed size.

So, about a month ago, I thought I would take a chance and send it to David at Romantic English, asking if, by chance, he had this artwork in his library. It was such a shot in the dark!

 

As usual, David got back to me quite quickly and said:

 

I actually do have The Chinese Fair you selected—excellent choice! It was sold for 58,500 euros and is part of the Chevalier Collection I’m rolling out 😌. Would you like it on pure cotton canvas so you can stretch it yourself? I can create a custom size for you, just as you wish ✨.

Warm regards,

DH

 

Well, as you can imagine, I was overjoyed to hear this!

 

So, I got to work with my renderings to ensure the living room art would look coordinated.

First, I had to findhighest-resolutiont res image I  find. I did, from this auction house.

 

However, the colors look a bit on the peachy side, so I needed to color-correct the image.

Interestingly, I found a few iterations of this design.

 

 

Below is the color-corrected version of the peachy Chinese Market by Francois Boucher.

 

Francois Boucher also painted the well-known  Le Jardin Chinois (below)

 

I adore this piece’s colors but feel it would be a bit much for my living room art.

 

Okay, let’s see how The Chinese Garden tapestry might look reflected in the mirror.

 

Ohhhh, I love it!
And one more image.

 

Now, this is important.

You can only see all three pieces peripherally, NOT AS SHOWN. They are facing three different directions.

 

I’m sorry, but I have to make that stand out. If I don’t, someone will say something they would be better off keeping to themselves. That’s because, occasionally, someone comments based on the images without reading what that image represents.

The point is that I want a natural flow for all of the living room and adjacent art. Yes, if I had these three pieces lined up on one wall, it would be awful.

 

 

I’m very happy with how this looks. I plan to work on the color code for David tomorrow and Monday.

xo,

 

*********************************************************

Part 2 Begins Here

 

Monday February 26, 2025

Hi Everyone,

Today, we will see the color key for the Boucher reproduction. This image goes by more than one name. GL was so lovely to send me more information about this historic piece.

She sent a sister tapestry, and then I found an original (I’m assuming more than one was made) much larger than this one. And then I don’t know what happened to it, but I can no longer find it.

 

Wait, no Wait! I did find it!

 

Some parts of the design don’t show up on this version. This piece is La Danse Chinoise, a tapestry in three sections. I can tell that the image is off-color, so I took the liberty of color-correcting it.

 

 

I looked for a better version of this image, but this was it. After exhausting my resources, I enhanced it further using Picmonkey.

 

 

The only other larger version of La Danse Chinoise is this one, below, from Christie’s, however, it’s only a little larger.

 

 

To add to the confusion, the piece GL mentioned in the comments is indeed La Foire Chinoise (The Chinese Fair). While it has many of the same elements (in reverse), it’s not the same piece.

The figures on the left are the ones in La Danse Chinoise. (below) It’s easy to confuse these pieces, as no two are identical. I am not sure how many pieces were typically woven. However, I believe I read somewhere that one piece was about 50.

 

Thank you, GL, for providing your insights into this story!

 

Earlier while trying to find the more complete piece, I did find (see below) a super high-res version of the one I’m doing on this French website.

 

Natch, it is still looking peachy. Now, this might be how it is, or it could be a function of the photograph of the piece. Incidentally, photographic reproductions of a work of art already in the public domain are also free of copyright. At least, that is the law in the US. In other countries, that might not be the case.

 

Okay, below is the color-corrected version* I created in Picmonkey and my photo editor.

*I have about six versions of the updated version. Why that is so is a mystery. haha

 

Oh, these colors are fantastic! While many of them are the same as in the entry piece, there are also many new colors I grabbed from this piece.

What is fantastic about this is that, by doing this exercise, one can instantaneously create a beautiful whole-house color palette practically in your sleep!

 

Okay, many of you would like to know how to grab the hex codes.

 

I am going to show you two ways. There are more, but either of these will get you there.

In Picmonkey, you upload your image onto a plain board and leave space for your colors.

 

Above, I transferred the color I picked to the square you see that’s surrounded by dots.

 

Oh, wait, below is a better image because the menu is missing from my screenshot above.

 

 

• Okay, please go to the left menu and click “Graphics.”
• Click “Basic”
• Click the square icon or whatever shape you want to use. The square is near the top of the page.
  It will pop up on your board or graphic and it will be black to begin with.
• You must click the square graphic so the program knows what layer you wish to change.

 

Go back to the menu and click “change color.” (It’s highlighted blue)

 

Click the dropper (also highlighted blue) and use your mouse to hover over an area you’d like to grab.

That’s all you have to do. The square automatically changes colors as you move your mouse around, and you’ll see the hex code for the red square #bc3c1f next to the dropper. Of course, I grabbed the color from the man’s red robe. You’ll see an arrow on your screen, but unfortunately, it doesn’t show on the screenshot.

 

Method number two is from a site created to grab hex codes called Image Color Picker.

 

People create pages like this and then run ads on them. This is a super clever way to make a passive income. However, the technology has to be in place, and I’m sure part is not easy.

 

The palette was created for me. I did not do the line of colors on the bottom.

The colors in the circle change as you move your mouse. However, the colors you see are where the (invisible in the image) cursor is, off to the side, somewhere. In other words, the colors it’s grabbing are not directly underneath the circle. In this case, I held my cursor over the palm fronds.

 

Below, I selected another green by the boy’s shoulder.

 

Okay, I’m ready to send all of this off to David at Romantic English!

In the meantime, the fabric for my Roman shades has arrived at Dianne’s, the owner of By Harrington. Her prices are so reasonable, and like me, you’ll get 20% off your order if you put in promo code: SECRETSALE.

I realize the changes to my home are not moving very fast. However, they are moving. There is still a lot to do, but I am focused more on family, friends, and my business.

 

That reminds me. I forgot to include the shot of me at my party last Sunday.

 

I had to crop out my friends who are sooooo cute. However, I don’t have their permission to post them on the blog.

And, below, is the bar!

Next time I give a big party, I’m hiring help! But still, it was fun.

Finally, unrelated but not insignificant, there were two comments about what I will do next. I just wrote a response to Anastasia and Terry. It’s about brand partnerships and why I will most likely never do traditional publishing. (if you’re interested.) You can see the response near the top of the comments as of this writing.

xo,

 

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