French Shabby Chic

What is Shabby Chic

Shabby Chic is a term that was first used in the early eighties, a designer called Rachel Ashwell used it to describe her style and as it became more popular in the very late eighties she used it as her business and trademarked it. Vintage or distressed pieces of furniture are coated with modern paints and combined with new pieces to create this stunning effect. As the style grew and evolved interior designers looked towards a more Mediterranean fashion which could be found in France and Italy. This style was influenced by grand French country style living and Louis X1V antiques, hence the name French Shabby Chic.

How can I achieve the French Shabby Chic look?

Achieving the French Shabby Chic look is great fun and can be fairly inexpensive. You could create a beautiful bedroom, you will need just one new item of furniture such as little white dressing table with a cheval mirror. You are now ready to build on this to create your charming room. The shabby chic look is synonymous with pretty pastel colours teamed with soft creams. There are vast selections of paper you can use to produce this look, from pretty pale pinks to gorgeous mint greens and pale blues, from lovely floral patterns to beautiful butterflies the choices seem endless. Why not visit our website at digitalpaper.shop where you will find a wide array of colours and designs to choose from. In addition to decorating your room you can use your gorgeous paper in the lovely craft of Decoupage.

French Shabby Chic Decoupage

Decoupage is the art of decorating with paper and was first used by the Victorians to decorate objects.  This is very easy to do you just need to paste the paper, fix it on to the item that you want to decorate and then simply glaze it. Decoupage is a fantastic thing to do and will enhance is the look of your French Shabby Chic room no end. A lovely thing to do decorate an old tatty looking lampshade , when embellished with your gorgeous shabby chic paper your light fitting will come back to life, old jars and interestingly shaped bottles look brilliant when they have been treated in this way also. You can even completely transform the look of an old tin can! Another fantastic way of adding to your gorgeous theme is by using some of your French Shabby Chic design paper to trim glassware, this looks particularly effective when different shape glasses are grouped together. Remember to create this look it is not only small objects that you can decorate – pieces of furniture also look fantastic when treated this way, an old chest of drawers when painted and then papered. You can create numerous beautiful looks depending on the design and colour scheme you choose. Remember that you can find a vast selection of French shabby chic style paper to help you optimise your creative skills at our website digitalpaper.shop