Movie Interior Design Inspiration: Sense and Sensibility

I think I was born in the wrong era. I watch Sense and Sensibility and want to walk right into the country estate that the ladies are forced to “trade down to” and I want to put my stakes down. This movie is among my favorites not only because I’m a Jane Austen fan, but also because beyond the great acting and writing – the sets, architecture and costuming are like dessert.

Wonderful wall color here and the beefy wainscoting is so well done, and as feminine yet strong as the characters who inhabit this country cottage. Not like the “faux-scoting” of today.

I love the exterior of the main house on the estate with its stately stone front and the espaliered wisteria I think it is that is growing along the facade?  Well, it’s green something growing up that house and the whole thing makes me want to just walk inside and see more. Great architecture and materials always beckon people to want to see more.

I know this is a stylist stretch for some of you – but truly, this is how beautiful period rooms were done. Furniture floated in the center of the room. Formality, not comfort, was the order of the day. Let’s face it, if you spent most of your waking hours jammed into a bone breaking corset, what’s a puny little uncomfortable chair going to do to you? Maybe this is really why people died early back then.  From discomfort.  It probably felt good to just drop dead already.  Let it all go. Still…this is a marvelously done period room, from the architecture to the wallpaper to the finely appointed English furnishings.

Look at this painting-perfect pastoral shot with the handsome Mr. Willoughby looking off in the distance. “Hey Willoughby! I’m over here…blogging about you…turn around, you cutie…)

Sense and Sensibility…a feast for the sensible design senses (and no – I was not drinking while writing this post!).