Tour a super-posh Idaho designer log cabin vacation home done in full-blast Winter mode with ultra-custom details.
One mark of professional décor is the presence of a consistent color palette, style and range of motifs throughout the house. And for certain designers that represents a signature look. One glance at a designer log cabin home by the New York firm of Diamond Baratta (now Anthony Baratta; William Diamond has retired) makes that clear: bold color, abundant pattern, buzzy ceiling and floors, intensely layered rooms, and unwavering attention to thematic details are instantly recognizable as theirs. No doubt you’ve seen their work (which we love for the color and pattern) in the Red Gingham Ceiling Kitchen and the Turquoise Harlequin Kitchen as well.
Red drives this cabin’s color scheme which also includes white, green and the designer’s trademark sky blue. Checks, stars, stripes, plaid, animal, Indian, lake and ski motifs are used throughout in textiles, on painted surfaces and for art. Antique Swedish and German painted furniture mix with Adirondack-style birch and hickory pieces, plus intricately upholstered seating.
The dominant element of both structure and design are the giant reddish logs which comprise walls, beams and structural supports. In the living room [top] and throughout, red pushes the wood tone and keeps everything in play with the log-cabin meme. Hand-quilted pillows and contrast trim enhance the primary colors which are picked up in the custom quilty-rug.
In the living room, a massive fireplace has Idaho spelled out in stone above a silhouette of the state. Adirondack mountain furniture style — birch-wood and canoes — is imported from the East coast and blended with neighboring Pacific Northwest totem poles.
A pair of blue-painted dressers plus a star-motif runner were created for the hallway leading to the family room.
Plaid fabric, reminiscent of Pendleton blankets, was made by Lee Jofa to the designer’s specifications for use on the family room ceiling and sofa. A hand-painted blanket box as coffee table features a pair of game boards on top and scenes of pioneers crossing the Great Plains on the sides. Additionally, a red tartan fabric was created for the vintage rattan chairs. Red barber poles fashioned into lamps and lanterns galore keep the mood festive and on-message.
Green enters the color scheme in the kitchen and adjacent seating areas. As a family kitchen, this one has a modestly sized work area. However, tiles behind the Viking range are hand-painted to match the overall theme, and the cabinets even manage to look a little understated.
Banquette seating in the breakfast area leans on the quilt and twig themes while dining room chairs again borrow from the Adirondacks. This is the type of furniture used in the Fishing Camp House.
Muting the Christmas-pine green helps keep the heavily quilted, banded red-gingham dining chair cushions from looking overly seasonal.
Forgive me for drooling over the paint-decorated green and white bench with its red tartan seat pillow. I adore this piece, which sits beneath a piecrust-edge shelf inset with European style folk art panels. A piece like this shows the value of the designer in a designer log cabin. The black and white enameled cattle sign, hanging from the rafter, is a hoot.
The wonderfully rustic white-birch bed, inset with a painted scene of a mountain lake, is a showstopper in the master bedroom. Red-and-white bed linens coordinate with the borders of a custom rug. Anyone who knows Swedish furniture would immediately spot the elegant antique dresser bedside and a converted paint-decorated vintage water jug inset with a polar bear repurposed as a lamp.
More details of the travel-theme rug, plus a good view of a 19th-century German blanket chest are features of the master bedroom sitting area. The chest can be used for accessible storage and does double duty as putting-down space at the center of a group of wicker chairs with matching settee done up with red and white awning stripe cushions — as if Santa came down the chimney and sprinkled half the room with essence of candy cane.
The kids’ room has bunk beds with fun blankets, a ski-sweater carpet, and a sky-blue ceiling complete with snowflakes, a bit of outdoor-indoor fun.
A place to perch on a loft balcony, just under the rafters, is no less decorated than other rooms. Here, the upholstery on the sofa goes blue (to coordinate with the ceiling) while red-and-white take a backseat as accent fabric on chairs. Taken as a whole, such determinately cheerful, winter-is-forever theme-park house seems contrived — which is precisely the point.
(Source: Architectural Digest)
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So cozy!! I sure would’ve never thought of plaid ceilings! (Have to admit I prefer the painted wood ceilings, though.) The seating textiles, the linens, the rugs…all so consistent, homey, and bright without being too much and the patterns in balance with the bold solids and the wood.
I really love the kitchen backsplash tile. Something like that was my initial vision for my kitchen, but it never came together, so I switched gears. Not that I’m unhappy with my choice, but I’m still wistful about that plan I gave up.