My Thanksgiving Table—After Pictures

Thanksgiving with my family and friends is one of my favorite celebrations. It’s a rare chance I have to spend time with all the people I care about in one room—which is very important to me. I also think of Thanksgiving as the official kick-off to the holiday season, so it’s important to get things started on the right foot!

I spend a lot of time creating transformations for my clients throughout the year, so it means a lot to me to get to do it for my family. Just like surprising my clients, I like to surprise my loved ones with my design and transformation.  Like I said in my post earlier this month I love seeing the look on my family’s face when they walk into the room I decorated just for them. Not only that, but I get to relax, eat great food, talk and laugh with all the people I care about in the world.

My family is so big that each year we empty out my studio to make room for our Thanksgiving table. I showed you the empty space in the before pictures, here’s another picture of the finished table:

I also use this time to hand out my Christmas presents (I’m usually traveling around Christmas), along with little giveaways for each guest. Here’s a picture of one of the giveaways:

Thanksgiving is always a time of abundance, so my table this year is only decorated with fruit. Besides leftovers and presents, everyone is also taking home a basket of fruit:

One design tip I want to share, which I may have mentioned earlier, is that you shouldn’t overlook everyday materials you have laying around the house when planning on what to decorate with for Thanksgiving (or any event!).

I focus on using and re-using readily available, accessible materials for all my personal events. Whether that means going into the archives of my studio and finding leftover materials we can bring back to life, or walking down the street and being inspired by nature’s offering (leaves, twigs, flowers), there’s a lot that can be tapped into to create a fabulous design. Don’t think you need to break the bank to decorate your space, you just need to think inventively about the materials you already have access to.

With that, I’m going to put one last picture of all of us at the Thanksgiving table. We enjoyed a Panamanian feast and I'm still stuffed!

Hope you had a wonderful holiday too.

Past Thanksgivings

As I’m sitting down today to plan this year’s Thanksgiving, I took some time to look through my old pictures to remember the designs from years past. Thanksgiving is the beginning of the holidays for me. As I mentioned yesterday, I use this day to hand out my family’s Christmas presents. I love being the first of the pack to hand out my gifts, and I look at it as a way to kick-off the gift giving season!

When I think about designing my Thanksgiving event, I approach it similarly to how I design for my clients. I enjoy transforming empty raw spaces into something unexpected, so this is where I usually start with my Thanksgiving dinner. My family is so big that the past two years I’ve held the dinner in my studio space.

Below you’ll see a picture of the space as it normally is (click the pictures to make them bigger):

Here’s how we transformed it last year:

I get great pleasure from seeing the looks on my family’s faces when they walk into the room. The element of surprise is signature for me. It’s a labor of love to design this event for them every year, and I make sure to invest the time needed to get everything just right.

I focus on using readily available, recycled, and accessible materials. You can definitely make something glamorous with materials and objects you find all around you. It’s all about how you put the elements together that makes the impact.