 |
The Dining Room restored to the 1815 scheme showing the new carpet.
Photo courtesy of Ralph Harvard, Ralph Harvard Inc. |
One of the most popular posts of
The Devoted Classicist blog has been
Historic Paint Color At Monticello which presents the re-creation of the 1815 chrome-yellow paint scheme for the Dining Room. One of the pleasures of authoring a blog is making new acquaintances, and hearing from old ones. So it was a great treat to get an email from the distinguished New York City designer Ralph Harvard, of
Ralph Harvard Inc., an Attingham graduate that I had met just prior to my own wonderful educational experience at the school. Ralph read my essay on the paint color and thought the Devoted Readers would appreciate seeing the carpet he designed for the Dining Room. I am sure that will be the case.
 |
A detail of the new Dining Room carpet at Monticello.
Photo courtesy of Ralph Harvard, Ralph Harvard Inc. |
The new carpet was based on the documentation from the original order that Jefferson placed for a carpet in Abeville, France in the 1780s according to Ralph Harvard. No examples from this period survive from the factory, this so this design is an interpretation. But it is known that the moquette (cut velvet-like pile) carpets produced there were hand-woven wool on linen, the loom-width strips sewn together to make wall-to-wall or room size carpets, Harvard said. He added that the Abbeville carpets were in the British taste, small patterned and without extravagant colors.
 |
A cartoon for the new carpet's border showing yarn samples.
Photo courtesy of Ralph Hardvard, Ralph Harvard Inc |
Jefferson's carpet was not wall-to-wall, so Harvard duplicated the original dimensions but added a neutral border to increase the size to protect the floor and keep the edges from curling up.
 |
The model for the new carpet's border.
Photo courtesy of Ralph Harvard, Ralph Harvard Inc. |
The Devoted Classicist thinks it is particularly remarkable that the 1815 scheme for the Monticello Dining Room is so in keeping with today's taste: a testament to the timelessness of classic residential design.
 |
The Dining Room of Monticello restored to the 1815 scheme.
Photo: Philip Beaurline for Thomas Jefferson Foundation. |
And again, special thanks to Mr. Ralph Harvard for sharing this very interesting update to the previous post.
