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Stately Classic

Classical authority

Rooms with the measured grace of a London townhouse. Perfectly proportioned, quietly commanding.

Formal 18th-century English. Symmetrical facades, classical proportions, refined interiors. Restrained elegance.

More restrained and symmetrical than Traditional; warmer and more residential than Grand Classical.

Jeid Studio

What sits closest

The styles nearest to yours, measured the same way the quiz measured you. A room of yours that does not quite fit this style often fits one of these.

Grand ClassicalHeritage & Formal
TraditionalHeritage & Formal
Art Deco / GlamBold & Statement

How pattern works here

  • Stately Classic runs on symmetry first and pattern second.
  • Each room has one center, the fireplace, and everything pairs off around it: sconces, chairs, windows, pilasters.
  • Pattern comes in damask, in a floral chintz, and in a geometric rug, and the same damask can repeat on the curtains, the seats and the wall above the dado.
  • The house stays in soft greens, putty and warm whites.
  • Color can still be bolder than people expect, since saturated reds, greens and blues sat under the muted whites in the period, so pick one deep color for a dining room or library and keep the drawing room in a soft green or putty.
  • Trim stays in one warm off white with a slight sheen through the whole house.
  • If a room has more than three patterns or more than two strong colors, it has slipped into Traditional.

Surface by surface

What this style asks for on each surface, and what pushes it into a different style entirely.

Flooring
  • The style calls for plain wood boards in the main rooms.
  • White oak or old pine in wide boards, with a waxed or matte finish that shows the grain.
  • Georgian townhouse kitchens today can keep the original boards and relay them unsanded, or lay engineered white oak.
  • Walnut can go in a library where the room wants to be darker.
  • The entry hall gets stone: flagstone, or black and white marble squares.
  • Avoid: gray stains, high gloss, plank widths under 5 in, and wood that pretends to be distressed.
Tile
  • Tile is rare in this style and stays near the entry, the bath and the scullery.
  • The entry wants a honed marble checkerboard, 12 by 12 in, often set on the diagonal the way Vermeer painted it.
  • A kitchen backsplash is a single slab of honed Carrara, or plain antique style ceramic squares with a soft glaze.
  • A pantry or scullery can take reclaimed encaustic cement tile in a muted pattern.
  • Marble can etch with mild acids, so many designers honed it and accept the patina.
  • Avoid: subway tile, glossy porcelain, large format gray tile, and busy mosaics.
Carpet
  • In the period, the best parlor got an expensive Brussels carpet wall to wall, and lesser rooms got cheaper carpet or mats.
  • Today that reads as wool Brussels loop or Axminster weave in a small repeating pattern, fitted in a formal sitting room, a library or a bedroom.
  • Stairs take an Axminster wool runner.
  • Keep the pile low and the pattern tight.
  • Avoid: plush shag, sisal, bound carpet tiles, and pale nylon broadloom.
Cabinets
  • Kitchen and pantry cabinets are painted inset joinery with raised and fielded panels, the same panel language as the doors and shutters.
  • Plain English style painted cabinets in a muted color suit Georgian kitchens, in London or in Brooklyn.
  • A library or study gets fitted mahogany bookcases with glazed uppers, like the fitted bureau bookcases of the Georgian House in Bristol.
  • The scullery can be simpler painted pine.
  • Avoid: slab doors, frameless boxes, high gloss lacquer, and stained oak.
Cabinet hardware
  • Hardware is small, solid brass and left to age.
  • Oval or round knobs about 1 1/4 in, cast brass cupboard latches with an oval turn, and sand cast bronze pulls in a dark living finish.
  • Unlacquered brass will patina with use and can be polished back.
  • Keep one finish per room.
  • Avoid: long bar pulls, matte black, polished chrome, and oversized backplates.
Plumbing fittings
  • The kitchen faucet is a bridge mixer in unlacquered brass with lever or cross handles, the classic fit for a Georgian kitchen today.
  • Pair it with a fireclay apron front sink in white.
  • Bath fittings follow the same rule: brass, classical form, nothing minimal.
  • Unlacquered brass darkens over time, which the style wants.
  • Avoid: pull down sprayers as the main faucet, matte black, wall mount modern spouts, and vessel sinks.
Lighting
  • The main rooms get one center fixture that reads as candles: a cut glass chandelier in the dining or drawing room, or a simple antique brass chandelier with candle arms in smaller rooms.
  • Wall sconces in brass flank the mantel and the mirrors, which is how a Georgian room was first lit.
  • The entry and stair take a glass lantern in a brass frame.
  • Keep bulbs warm and dim.
  • Avoid: recessed can grids as the only light, drum shades, black metal, and oversized modern pendants.
Fireplaces
  • The fireplace is the center of every formal room.
  • The best rooms get a carved marble chimneypiece in white or a veined white, with a frieze, jambs and a mantel shelf.
  • Secondary rooms get a painted wood bolection surround or a plain stone surround with a carved tablet.
  • The hearth is honed slate or stone.
  • Many marbles suit fireplace facings and hearths, and in the period plain slate was even painted to look like marble.
  • Avoid: stacked stone, floating shelves, tile surrounds, and modern linear gas boxes.
Windows
  • Georgian windows are tall six over six wood sash with thin glazing bars, and the first treatment is the panelled interior shutter that folds into the reveal.
  • On top of that, formal rooms take silk damask as a festoon or a lined drapery with silk fringe, as in the Norfolk House room.
  • Bedrooms can take chintz.
  • Paint the frames in the trim color, or a soft dark color, which is often more true to the period than white.
  • Avoid: vinyl windows, roller shades alone, heavy valances, and grommet panels.
Stone
  • Counters and vanities are honed white marble: Vermont Danby or Carrara, 3 cm.
  • Marble is calcite based and can etch with acids, so most designers hone it and accept the patina.
  • Black basalt works where the room wants a dark counter.
  • Slate in honed green or gray suits hearths and mudroom floors.
  • Avoid: busy granite, engineered quartz with fake veining, waterfall edges, and leathered finishes.
Interior doors
  • Doors follow a hierarchy.
  • Principal rooms get six panel mahogany doors, oiled or waxed, with raised and fielded panels.
  • Secondary rooms get the same six panel door in painted pine.
  • Door furniture is a classic knob on a brass rosette in polished or unlacquered brass.
  • The front door is paneled, centered, and topped with a semicircular fanlight.
  • Avoid: flush doors, two panel shaker doors, lever handles, and matte black.
Stairs
  • The stair is a feature of the entry hall.
  • The period rule is two turned balusters per tread, painted, with carved tread ends and a mahogany handrail that ramps and wreathes in one continuous curve.
  • A grander entry can take a stone stair with wrought iron balusters.
  • The runner is patterned wool.
  • Avoid: cable rail, square iron balusters, open risers, and carpeted treads with no wood showing.
Wallpaper
  • The best room in a Georgian house often had paper with a border.
  • Today that means a block printed damask pattern such as Adelphi's Reveillon Damask, a large floral chintz such as Williamsburg Butterfly Chintz, or a classic English floral such as Bird and Thistle in a hall.
  • One principal room can take a hand painted Chinese paper.
  • Paper goes above the dado, not below it.
  • Avoid: peel and stick, grasscloth, metallic geometrics, and small busy prints.
Paint
  • The style has two palettes.
  • The muted one is the default: plasterwork and panelling in Lime White, Off-White or a putty like Harwood Putty, with walls in Lichen, Pigeon or French Gray.
  • The saturated one is the upgrade for one deep room: Picture Gallery Red, Prussian blue types, greens, and the saturated Williamsburg colors.
  • Trim gets an eggshell or satin oil look with a slight sheen, and walls and ceilings go flat.
  • Avoid: pure bright white trim, greige, accent walls, and high gloss on plaster.
Ceilings
  • Ceilings are smooth plaster in flat white, kept flat so the mouldings read.
  • Formal rooms get a deep plaster cornice with dentils or modillion blocks and a plaster rose centered on the chandelier.
  • High ceilings and boxy rooms are the point.
  • Avoid: wood beams, tray ceilings, coffers, and painted dark ceilings in formal rooms.
Wall details
  • The wall is built in layers: baseboard, panelled dado to chair height, plain plaster or paper above, then a swagged frieze under the cornice.
  • The fireplace wall can be panelled full height in raised and fielded panels.
  • Pilasters in mahogany or painted wood flank the fireplace or the doorways.
  • Keep every room symmetrical about the fireplace.
  • Avoid: shiplap, board and batten, picture frame moulding applied over drywall, and floating shelves.
Furniture
  • Furniture is mahogany first.
  • Carved Chippendale armchairs with needlework or damask seats, Adam style dining chairs with tapering backs in leather or silk, and a mahogany bureau bookcase in the study.
  • A giltwood console under a pier mirror brings the gilt in one dose.
  • Pieces sit in pairs and on axis with the fireplace.
  • Avoid: sectionals, glass tables, live edge wood, and matched suites.
Textiles
  • Silk damask in green or crimson on curtains and seats, matched room to room the way the Syon and Norfolk House rooms were done.
  • Silk velvet in green as a loose cover with braid trim on the best chairs.
  • Chintz for bedrooms and bed hangings.
  • Tent stitch needlework on chair seats and backs.
  • Avoid: performance velvet in jewel tones, boucle, faux fur throws, and bare linen everywhere.
Rugs
  • Rugs sit on wood floors in the formal rooms.
  • A Caucasian knotted wool rug in red with a geometric lattice, an Aubusson flat weave with florals in a drawing room, or an English needlepoint carpet with floral and geometric blocks.
  • Axminster's 1755 line re creates period designs in all wool.
  • Size the rug so the front legs of every seat sit on it.
  • Avoid: jute, cowhide, distressed overdyed rugs, and rugs smaller than the seating group.

Where to start

Real paint colors and products, so you have something specific to take to a paint counter or a showroom.

Wall paint
Farrow & Ball Lime White No. 1Plasterwork and panelling, the house white
Farrow & Ball PigeonDrawing room and bedrooms, gray green
Farrow & Ball Picture Gallery Red No. 42Dining room or library, brown based red
Farrow & Ball Setting Plaster No. 231Bedroom or kitchen, dusty pink
Benjamin Moore Harwood Putty CW-5Williamsburg putty for walls and trim
Benjamin Moore Hale Navy HC-154Study, one deep room
Flooring
White Oak Plank, WaxedMain rooms, wide boards
Reclaimed Pine BoardsRelaid unsanded, waxed
Honed Marble CheckerboardEntry hall, black and white
Carpet
Wool Brussels LoopFormal parlor, fitted
Axminster Woven Wool RunnerStair and upper hall
Slab stone
Imperial Danby Marble, HonedVermont white marble, 3 cm
Carrara Marble, HonedClassic white, 30 mm
Black BasaltDark counter, matte
Tile
Honed Marble Checkerboard, 12 by 12 inEntry and bath floors
Reclaimed Encaustic Cement TilePantry and scullery
Hardware finish
Unlacquered BrassLiving finish, patinas
Polished BrassFormal doors, lacquered or not
Sand Cast BronzeDark living finish, kitchen pulls
Lighting
Cut Glass ChandelierDining and drawing room
Visual Comfort Keira, Hand Rubbed Antique BrassSimple brass chandelier, smaller rooms
Visual Comfort Paris Flea Market, Antique Burnished BrassSeeded glass and brass, hall
Fritz Fryer Brass Wall LightsSconces beside mantel

The architecture underneath

A lot of what makes a room read as this style is in the architecture, before any furniture comes in.

Symmetrical Facade, Centered DoorMirror image each side, windows aligned floor to floor
Red Brick or Ashlar StoneRusticated base, plat band, parapet cornice
Pedimented Doorcase with FanlightPilasters, Doric entablature, semicircular fanlight
Six Over Six Sash WindowsTall, keystones, operable shutters
Hipped Roof with DormersSlate, tall paired chimneys, pedimented dormers
Dentil or Modillion CorniceBold eaves outside, deep cornice inside
Palladian WindowThree part window over the stair or entry
Central Hall, Matching RoomsBoxy rooms, high ceilings, stair as the feature

What to know about the materials

A few materials this style uses need more care than they look like they will. Worth knowing before you choose them.

PineIt blotches. Pine takes stain unevenly, so it is either painted or handled with a gel stain, and you see it on the real board before it is ordered.
MarbleMarble can etch. Lemon, wine and tomato can leave dull marks, and sealing does not stop that. A stone pro can polish the marks out, and a honed finish hides them better. Plenty of people like how it ages. If you would not, we will steer you somewhere else.

If you are working on a house and want to see what this style would look like in it, set up a time with Jeid Studio and we can go through it with your answers in front of us.

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