Interesting question. I, too grew up moving a lot (23 times before leaving home). Consequently, I make many of my decisions with having to move in mind. Simple furniture that, like the game Tetris, can be stacked in a moving truck easily.

OS, that *is* an interesting thought! My Mom always had whatever was 'in' at the time, and all matching. I think I liked it, but thought she never had enough accessories, although at the time, didn't know what it was that seemed missing.

When I got married for the second time(now my ex), we visited his parents home and it was a cape cod with all traditional furishings. For me it was love at first sight, right down to the painted white brick fireplace, and built-in corner cabinets in the dining room. The DR table/chairs were Duncan Phyfe, and the upholstered pieces were from different eras, including antiques. I found out later that the new stuff was Ethan Allan, which at that time would have been considered pricey. My MIL had an eye, but was also lucky enough to work for a business that handled estate sales.

I think my Grandmother on my Dad's side was also an influence, but she liked fancy brocades, and very ornate things, kind of high Victorian.

I was definitely influenced by my childhood home. We lived in a lovely house that was beautifully decorated. When my mother finally downsized to a city condo, I was the happy recipient of many wonderful pieces of furniture and oriental rugs. One of the sofas I have was my parents', then my brother's, and he had it shipped to me when his new wife did not like it. It's 40 years old, more than 8 feet long, and built like nothing else today. (It's been reupholstered about six times!) I have her dining room server that was made to order for her by Baker... the things they did in the 60's and 70's to please their customers, lol.

When I look around I see my childhood all through our house and it makes me very happy :) I could live in a modern setting very easily, but my default choice is always "traditional=home."

We were a military family growing up, so we moved a lot. Mom decorated with mostly homemade accessories and she bought quality, but plain furniture (she still has some of it 30 some odd years later). The biggest thing I think that influenced me was the military white walls... now I can't STAND white walls, give me COLOR!!! But, I still like the homemade accessories and am currently planning some quilted wall hangings and homemade roman blinds for our house.

But, I have to say that my current decor is much more influenced by my children, haha. I have no accessories because Stevie would destroy them, and I have brown microfiber upholstery, not because I love it, but because it camouflages drool spots pretty well.

~~Veronica

Since I have a lot of my mother's stuff and it is good stuff, yes. She passed away in 2000. But if I had to do everything with just my taste ( go away dh!) it would be completely different.
Mom had nice, traditional furnishings and if I have learned anything, it's that 30-40 years later, they still look good.

Veronica, when my husband and I purchased our first **real** sofa I went to Rich's warehouse sale in Atlanta and asked the salesman to show us something that had upholstery with a high cotton content (for comfort) and the color of mashed potatoes, throw-up, and Coke (for camouflage)! We had a six-month old and I was preparing for the worst. We got it for half its cost (the original ordering customer had already paid half) and it has done yeoman's duty for more than 25 years. It's been reupholstered and is in our bedroom now. At the time I couldn't believe we were paying over $700 for a sofa!

I suppose I was influenced in a way too... In 1971, when I was 1 year old, my sister went off to college studying -- what else?? -- Interior Design.

With my sister's help, my parents' uninteresting track home quickly began to morph from 1950's stark modern to a clean, warm, traditional. Everything was accessorized to a "T" as well. I literally grew up in the midst of fabric swatches, paint chips, and fine furniture catalogs.

While my style is not exactly traditional (it's a bit more relaxed), overall I know I am strongly influenced by both Mom and Sis to this day.

(On a side note... I moved to the town I currently live in to be near my sis, who has now just recently sold her house and moved out of state. I would have nearly KILLED to have purchased her custom built, GORGEOUS house!)

Lis

My parents were the original house flippers in California when I was growing up. Every 18 monthes or so, a new house. My mother loved to keep a very traditional beautiful home with white walls. She took it to extremes though. She would rather have a nicely decorated house than have food in the cupboard. She would rather buy custom furniture than buy clothes for her kids. She has absolutely no memory of this whatsoever.

While I think I have her eye for what looks good, that's about it. She loves to have lots of accessories, patterned fabrics, yellows and gold. I like cool colors, solid fabrics and simple lines. We can admire each other's homes, but are worlds apart in what we put in our own home.

I lived in modest homes as a child and we had little in the way of interior decoration. Mom had so many other things in her life of value, but interior decoration was not one of them. I think this was from her and dad going through the depression. My decorating style comes from homes of childhood friends. Rooms I dreamed of living in and still remember the specifics of each one. Being an artist also brings my specific decorating style into my life.

As for the depression, up until mom died she still washed clothes the same as she did her entire life. 3 loads of clothes were washed by pulling the loads out at each cycle to reuse the water. With our economy as it is I am almost ready to do this too. Nope, not yet, but it has entered my mind. She would be agast at the new washers/dryers and I could never explain how practical they are at this point regarding the use of water, etc. Can't try her trick anyhow, the FL won't open when it is full of water.

Never in my wildest dreams, did I ever imagine that I'd end up living in the mountains of the Southwest when I grew up! I was born and raised in Michigan, with a summer house on Lake St.Clair outside Windsor, Ontario. In our home, our furniture was Early American from Ethan Allen in golds, sage green and rusty reds. Although I never wanted that style in my own home, I think I'm still influenced by the rich warm colors my mother decorated our home with. On the other hand, our summer house on the lake highly influenced me. If I ever move to a lake again, my home will be decorated very much like that place was, very Cottagy in white and blue with yellow, pink or red accents in every room. Ahhhhhhhh . . . I love Cottage style! But, that style doesn't look very good out here in New Mexico and I find myself definitely leaning toward the bright, rustic Talavara accents these days.

My folks are still in the house they bought in 1955. Like emagineer's parents, they were products of the Great Depression. My mother has beautiful tastes and prefers modern clean lines, but was too sensible to spend money on luxuries like fine furniture and decor. She bought what was affordable and available (not much, in rural America) and made it last. Clothes were her thing, and if she had extra money, she bought beautiful clothing (and still has every piece).

But I realize now how sensitive I was as a child to architecture and interior design. There was a House Beautiful magazine circa 1961 that featured an International Style house in California: two stories of window walls. I spent hours imagining that I had a bedroom of my own like the one in the magazine: a window wall, bright colored fabrics and built-ins for all my stuff! I had favorite buildings and houses in my home town. Some were ornate Victorians; some were wonderful modern things with lovely blond brick and walls of glass; capacious brick four-squares; Disney-esque Tudors; comfortable long ranches with picture windows. I would ask my parents if we could drive down certain streets so I could get a glimpse of the pretty neighborhoods, and my folks would be puzzled about my request. I was too embarassed to say I merely wanted to look at the beautiful homes. It was an interest that we didn't (and still don't) share. My sister, though, loves to drool over architecture & interior design with me.

Tastes? It depends on the house I'm living in. I've had 2 modern & 1 traditional home. I love both styles. My mother hates traditional decor. She thinks it's dark, depressing, fussy, & highly pretentious. We drove her around here in Connecticut, showing her all the gorgeous colonial homes nearby, and she kept saying ugh, blech, yuck, and "you like THAT?!" So, in short, I have no idea where my interest & tastes came from.

My parents were quite poor raising us six kids. I don't ever remember my mom buying new furniture besides the original traditional style pieces she bought after she was married in 1947, except for bedroom sets for us kids and a new dining table after we beat the life out of the original one. So MY decorating style has largely been traditional, and focused on good-quality pieces that "stand the test of time". (No plexiglass chairs in my house, thanks) *** Note to emagineer: I can't believe your comment about your mom and the laundry! My mother STILL "reuses" the washing water from the laundry. Those two ladies were WAY ahead of everyone in the Conservation movement, huh?

I only lived in two houses when I was growing up. My parents are very traditional in their decorating style, although the colors of the times were certainly evident in their homes - harvest gold, avocado green. etc.

I learned from my parents to buy quality furniture, even though it will cost more up front. They had lots of Ethan Allen (when it was high quality), Baker, and Henredon. My parents were not wealthy until I was in my late teens, and they have never bought anything except a house on credit. If they bought something, they saved the money for it and then purchased it. My style is also very traditional, but more colorful. My parents have always had white or off-white walls, and I like color. My mom does not like wood floors because she grew up having to wax them, I love my wood floors!

When my parents moved off the ranch to town, they sold most of the make-do furniture we'd had. And then, flush with cash, my mother bought ugly, cheap stuff "for the time being". Which never got replaced, never got changed. She knew it wasn't nice looking, but somehow never got around to figuring out how to get rid of it. She was a great person, but not Martha Stewart, to put it mildly.

So, when I was in college, I haunted auctions and second hand stores, and bought real furniture. I still have some of those treasures, and I never buy anything as a stop-gap. If I don't love it, it doesn't come in the house.

Honestly, I have *no* idea why I came up with a schitzo combo of rustic tropical Mexican and Miami Modern. The house in which I grew up was traditional, my dorm was, well, a dorm, and DH and I started with modern and ended with rustic. I have no idea how that happened. In the meantime, my mom got the Southwestern bug, but only after she moved from my childhood home and had room for a SW basement- her 1st floor consists of a Victorian living room and a French Country kitchen.

Maybe that answers it- I get my schitzo tendencies from Mom!

My childhood home was probably most like Texanjana's...the house had white walls (except for the kid's bedrooms) and gold/green in the living room & kitchen and orange/brown in the den. VERY 70's, with a very spanish influence. Heavy, dark woods & lots of wrought iron.

When they moved to Oregon, my dad chose cooler, contemporary styles. He was very cutting edge, having a black refridgerator before anyone but designer homes had it. Dad had impeccable taste but he also loved whimsey. My grandparents home was filled with traditional furnishings of the finest quality. But it had a touch of roccoco, too. A lot of Italian influence in their home with gold leafing, marble, and such.

My mother, on the other hand, is still a fan of silk flowers and wallpaper. She left most of the decorating up to Dad, fortunately! After he died, she really did it up in her style...which is sooo not me.

My style is a traditional/ecclectic with a big wallop of flourish.

OMG, my Mom would 're-cycle' the wash water also. The machine was set to another cycle to drain into a laundry tub so it could be re-used. She washed aluminum foil so it could be used again, and found uses for all kinds of things.

I never realized I was becoming more like my Mom until I saved a large Oatmeal box the other day cause I could 'use it for something.' I re-use foil too.LOL

Lord, I thought my mom was the only one who rewashed aluminum foil, called tin foil, back than!! My brother said she'd have saved the wrappers of the juicy fruit gum if she could wrap it around something. LOL

My sister closest in age to me, has the recycle till it hurts, bug. She makes me crazy because she's being smothered in "stuff" all in the name of not wasting anything, as she calls it.

I hesitate a few moments before I throw away things like oatmeal boxes and the like, but then realize I'll never use it, and opt to pitch it. I do however, try to go to Whole Food and buy my oatmeal in bulk and that way I don't keep buying those dang boxes that I hate to throw away!!

My taste in decorating comes from what I grew up with, which was traditional with French influence. Would go to my great aunt's on Saturdays to shine her antique furniture. What I wouldn't give to have her furniture today.

Um, nope :) Now *DH* is influenced by his family's furniture, which was high-end Danish modern, purchased in Denmark, the year his dad did a sabbatical/visiting professorship there (DH was 4). They brought back a way-cool Volvo, a house full of way-cool furniture, and it all got sold off at divorce-sale prices.

I think if he could find (and we could afford) that level of furniture, it would fill a deep emotional hole he seems to become aware of every time he sees anything like that furniture in a magazine or a store....(I want to go hug him right now)

My parents had/have a weird mix of trendy furniture/wallpaper, bought when they were flush, and cheap/make-do stuff bought when they weren't. Some pretty hand-me-downs from my grandparents, some gorgeous antique pieces no one likes except for me and my mother, but also a lot of junque. Dark, ugly, vaguely psychedelic paisley wallpaper in the living room for a really long time (it's not there anymore), which coincided with the metallic/pink/acid-green wallpaper in my room, which was replaced by clusters of falling leaves in purple, orange, red, and olive green. What can I say, they had a thing for wallpaper.

Anyway, perhaps in response to that, and partly in response to my house, which demands a simpler vibe (theirs did, too, but they ignored it!), I'm very pared-down compared to my parents. Paint, not wallpaper, and not even much of that: white walls; simple, strong shapes and styles. Like them, I like antiques and modern art; unlike them, I don't crowd the nice stuff with crappe or junque, even if it means the rooms look a little empty sometimes. I also buy a piece at a time and live with it for a while -- some might say too long, esp re the stuff I need to reupholster!

And in contrast to my mother, who was big on throwing things away and buying new, we also save, reuse, and recycle -- and compost, which she thinks is just unutterably gross. (:

After my father ditched us (w/ no child support) for his next wife, my mother struggled to pay the rent. Going to the beach and visiting model homes was the cheapest form of entertainment for us. When I walked into a model home I was escaping into a pretend world where we could afford to not only live in a home but a beautifully decorated one at that. There was no clutter and everything coordinated because it wasn't mis-matched hand-me-downs. Long after my mother died my sister & I were still going to model homes, the more expensive the better because they had the largest decorating budgets. We didn't like empty models!

I think I'm still striving for that model home look...one that is un-cluttered, not as cramped, and perfectly coordinated. I'm enjoying the journey, the trip to perfection is half the fun. ;-)

My parents bought our track house right before I was born in 1960. Everything was green. Green carpet, green paint, pink and green kitchen. Slowly that was all changed, but I do think it was what my Mom thought was in at the time. I do remember when I was in about 4th grade she decided to do my room. Pink and white striped wallpaper on all 4 walls, candy striped carpet, heavy pink brocade drapes and a pink tulip light fixture. For awhile it was OK, but when I graduated high school couldn't wait to rip it down.

I had a friend in grade school whose mother collected antiques! Boy how I loved going to her house and seeing all those wonderful treasures. I think that is where I got my love of antiques from. Surely not from my mother, who only shops second hand stores. Now mind you there are treasures to be had there, she just doesn't know that!

I grew up in a home with lots of dark wood, books, patterned wool wall to wall carpets, french polished antiques.

I like most of that stuff now. What I don't like is french polished finishes and anything that people have to be terribly careful around for fear of spoiling it. My father bought a lot of lovely refinished items from a particular antique dealer in our town, and I spent most of my childhood a bit scared of scratching or dinting things. Not that my parents were mean about it, just the whole scene was oppressive to me on some minor level. Now I like tables I can put mugs straight down on, sofas that feet can be put up on, cupboards that you don't have to remember only to touch the handle of while opening. I'm glad I'm not raising my kids around so much delicacy... not that having kids was a pivotal factor in me rejecting the delicate finishes, I pretty much said "no" to french polished stuff as soon as I left home myself.

My father was (and still is ) very much into modern decor. I grew up in a very modern, open concept home that was decorated in modern style. My childhood was filled with pain, and I got relief from that pain while visiting my grandparents in their old house that was filled with old painted furniture, quilts, hand-braided rugs, etc. I developed a love of everything old, and now collect old things for my apartment, which is in an old house. I dream of the day that I can buy an old house of my own. I dream of old doors with squeaky hinges which have glass knobs, I dream of creaky floors, I dream of everything old, because to me that's comfort. My nightmare is a new house, open-concept, modern decor. To me, it's cold and lonely. An old house is where my heart belongs. Crooked floors? YES! Peeling paint? SIGN ME UP! Lots of little rooms that don't have "good flow"? BRING IT ON!!

By the way, I still call it tinfoil.

My folks divorced when I was 5 (and inflicted joint custody on me for another several years). My dad and stepmother moved a lot and virtually always lived in tiny rented houses, which meant that their possessions were kept pretty pared-back, and a great deal of what they had was handmedown or yard-saled for lack of money. I remember some pretty incoherent combinations because they just used what they had simply in terms of functionality rather than aesthetics... like an Eastlake stick-and-ball side table next to big flabby recliner next to 1960s teardrop-shaped tile-and-teak coffee table. You could sit on the chair and put your drink on the table so it was fine. They didn't really do much decorating the way we think of it at all, maybe they thought it was pointless because we'd just have to move again (often the houses we were renting were sold out from under us). I think I always had the most "decorated" room in the house since I tried to coordinate my things as best I could and attempted to accessorize. I do remember, though, that the white-and-gold Sears French Provincial Horror bedroom set (which I KNOW some of you had too, remember the plastic posts on the canopy bed and how the airbrushed-on gold paint never lined up with the details they were supposed to accent?) that greeted me when I moved in with Dad was almost the only new-from-a-store furniture they bought except for Dad's monster recliner, so even though I hated it from day one it was pretty cool that they did that.

There was a mental undercurrent in the family that matched sets of new furniture, even if they were cheap junk, were a sign that you were a successful grownup and for a while I bought into it, then I went pretty much into the complete opposite direction and back into the antiques and mismatching items (although I hope I combine them with a little more sensitivity). I KNOW it's where I got my preference for getting a room DONE the way I want it and not fiddling with it constantly the way many of you do, because IMO change is overrated. :-)

Mom, OTOH, has always tried to make her living spaces pretty even when there wasn't/isn't any money to spend on it. When she remarried around '78 she and my stepfather went on a bit of a spree at Ethan Allen for living room and bedroom suites (don't know where they got the money for it, because I remember they couldn't afford to get me a bike that summer) and did the Early American Country thing that EA was so well known for at the time; that eventually morphed into the "leave no surface undecorated" Country Clutter style through the mid-late 1980s (which I absolutely loathed, and still do, apologies to its adherents), and then since my stepfather went to the Happy Hunting Grounds she's really gotten into the English country cottage style... not my taste, but again there's the appreciation for the "accumulated over time" look. I wish I'd gotten her "magic touch" with yard sales. She can just about always find something wonderful at a yard sale while I almost never have!

(I call it tinfoil too, and even in my blackbelt-tightwad days I never washed and reused it... it tore too easily and never really felt clean so I just rarely used it.)

Aluminum foil vs tin foil. My best friend who still lives in the small town where I grew up, calls it tin foil. I may have at one time also, but can't remember~maybe I started calling it AF when I moved to CA??

She also calls lunch supper, as do most of the people I know who still live there. Supper to me is the dinner meal. Has anyone else heard the term 'supper' and where did the it come from? I think my Mom referred to our dinnertime meal as supper, not lunch, but it's hard to remember so longgggggg ago. ;o)

Flyleft - I think you must be married to my brother ^_^
(except for the divorce.)

My mom still all has the gorgeous Danish furniture from our little California ranch. (It puzzles me how they chose such beautiful pieces when they were so young - in their 20s. The Saarinen table and chairs in the kitchen, the Josef Frank draperies...and they were frugal, saved up for each piece.)

As they became more successful, our houses kept getting bigger till now my mom is in a massive colonial with a lot of antiques and Sturbridge Farm type furniture. She still has the MCM stuff, but it all fits into her master bedroom suite (with some gorgeous pieces moldering away in the basement.)

Unfortunately, all I inherited was my parents frugality, and none of their natural taste. Maybe it is some kind of subconscious rebellion because I had a lousy childhood. My house is a mish-mash of secondhand furniture...but I think I'm a pretty good parent!

I really never thought about decorating until about 5 years ago, so maybe there is hope for me yet.

postum: Parenting counts more than furniture, so you're waaaay ahead of the game. :)

This thread has been interesting and eye-opening to read. Thank you all so much for sharing. It's also comforting to know that I'm not the only one on here dragging a loopy childhood behind her. . . :)

Back to sharing. . . .

If my parents, grandparents, three of my great-grandparents, one great-great grandmother and one great-great-great-grandfather all showed up at my place, they'd all recognize at least one thing that had belonged to them, and in the case of a few of them, a lot of pieces, but while I inherited their stuff, I didn't necessarily inherit their tastes.

As far as I can tell from the surviving photos of their houses, some of which photos date back to the 1860s or 187Os, most of them--until my grandparents, anyway--didn't have much taste of any kind, good or bad. Or maybe I should say "good" or "bad". Or, to state it a little more clearly, taste "consistent with my own" or otherwise. They bought what they needed that they didn't inherit, in whatever style was available in a small prairie town, and they didn't give much thought--as far as I can tell--to making sure any of it went together. Which, going by those photos, it usually didn't.

By the time it got down to my grandparents, one set had money, and one didn't, but each set had some nice things: through inheritance on one side, and, on the other side, through familiarity with fine furniture stores, of which--back then, anyway--Danville, Illinois had several. But the actual look of my places, any of my places, doesn't really have much to do with anyplace my own family ever lived.

Here's my watercolor of the house where my dad grew up, as it looked when I was in grade school, a big old farmhouse fallen on rough times, with faded cartridge wallpaper from the 192Os, time-darkened oak woodwork, a threadbare wool carpet, and a few pieces of revival-style department store furniture from between the wars. My dad's grade-school art project of a carvelle under full sail still hung where it had hung for the last 20 years, and the wooden ship shelf that he made in 8th grade, and the brass lamp that was a gift on my grandparents 25th anniversary on the big console radio, next to the big moahir plush chair where my grandfather sat smoking Lucky Strikes, listening to the Cardinals games coming up from St. Louis, and, when the Cards weren't playing, staring off into space. The coat hanging above the door was--I know now, though I couldn't have told you at the time--glossy, deep blue mohair, with a broad collar in dyed Persian lamb, and it hung there for most of my childhood. I never saw my grandmother wear it, not once.

One time, after we moved ninety miles away to Clinton, we were back for a weekend vist and the coat was gone. My little brother sat on the dusty Empire sofa between another brother & me, and he kept whispering "What happened to the coat?" but we grabbed his leg and told him to be quiet. None of us wanted to be the one to ask. I mean, after ten years, why move it then? Anyway, we were normal, curious boys, but we had been brought up to be polite--even with family, although politeness, of course, didn't automatically rule out pinching your little brother, not, at least, unless he told--and we knew without being told that it would have been wrong to ask about the coat. It could lead to other questions: Why is the wallpaper peeling off the ceiling? Why is there only one light? Why can't we go in the kitchen? At any rate, it's good that we none of us had the nerve to ask, because the next time we came, the coat it was back hanging in its old spot.

I don't know what ever happened to it, or to the Jacobean dining room set (I remember eating a sunny Easter dinner there when I was little, but by the time I was in high school, the dining room existed in a perpetual gloom from the drawn window shades, and the table was completely buried under piles of crumbling newspapers & teetering towers of bone china teacups purchased one-at-a-time at rummage sales & bundles of string-tied wrapping paper waiting to be re-used) or the Duncan Phyfe chair, but the radio--no longer working--was set out by the trash when we finally emptied out my grandmother's rented storage unit years after she died, and the big mohair chair was bought by a local antique dealer. I've still got my dad's ship picture & shelf & the brass lamp & the pressed glass spooner with its array of sterling souvenir spoons & some of the cups, and my brother has the ship's wheel clock.

Everything else, though, is gone, and a whole subdivision of tacky houses stands where the house was. You can't keep everything. But my grandmother, bless her heart, sure tried.
Magnaverde.

My friend in Miss still calls it Super. I really don't remember what my mom called it.

Magnaverde: What a charming and beautifully written family story. Thank you.

"A small prairie town." The phrase brings me back to a story by Willa Cather, "Neighbor Rosicky." I teach that story over and over again.

Your watercolor is fabulous. I DO hope it's hanging in a prominent place somewhere in your own home. :)

Oh oh, typo, supper!!

Magna,

How fortunate for you to have so much of your family items still! I am jealous. When my grandmother passed away, my father went back home to Michigan and packed up grandpa and moved him to a trailer on my mom and dad's property. Being men not particularly concerned with home making, they packed up grandpa's things (his clothes, a few of grandma's crocheted blankets and one old tattered quilt) and then called Goodwill. They gave it all away... the old china, the drop-leaf claw foot pedestal table that grandma kept her african violets on, boxes of hand-made appliququilts, the antique pie safe that housed more rhubarb pies than I can count... so much history gone. Mom was somewhere between horrified and pissed off when she called to tell me and I sobbed for days. Dad is now under threat of violence that he will never call goodwill without asking one of the family's women again.

~~Veronica

PS My grandma tried to keep everything too, and it made it so great to go visit and dig through her basement and attic!

I was born in Costa Rica, although my parents are both from Texas (they lived in CR for 18 years) and they sort of had a mishmash of furniture (albeit nice), and my mom kicks herself to this day for leaving behind/selling all of her furniture when we came back to the states, especially her very large, all-wood dining room table, chairs and sideboard (from what I can remember, it was beautiful). We also at one time lived in Honduras as missionaries and were put up in a very nice home by our church completely furnished, with some of the living areas having chrome and upholstered furniture. Blech.

Once we came back to the states for good, my mom's taste was traditional with a little country.

Since we lived in other countries, every house in the neighborhood was different. And while tract homes are very much prevalent here in the U.S., I think one influence of my childhood is that I really don't care for tract homes and love homes with personality, that are different. THAT SAID, we are in the process of buying a house that looks like many others on the block, but it's what we can afford right now. I know one day I can have my "forever home."

I would say I tend towards traditional, with cultural/rustic/eclectic items thrown in that mean something (as my mom had a few things she brought back from those countries).

This is my first post on the HD forum (I am usually on kitchens) and I found this thread fascinating.

I too was highly influenced by my parents, and also other family members. I grew up in a very 1970s, and then very 1980s (say no to peach and seafoam!!) after we moved, decor. Lots of the orange, avocado, gold, brown in the 70s (still hate it, always will), but my mother did her first dining room in a beautiful shade of cobalt with bright white and rich woods. She had awful "mediteranean" style hutches and a console, but the chairs were directors chairs covered in the same cobalt as teh walls. It was very fresh and I remember it as my favorite room in the house.

Interestingly, my parents still had that orinial d/r furniture (which they bought unfinished and stained themselves) in the basement, and a few years ago my mom and I both took a fresh look at it and realized that the ugly part (the center panels of the doors) would pop out. So we did, and I sewed double rod pocket curtains for the inside if the door panels, and painted the whole piece cream (exept the top, which I kept in the dark stain) and it looks like a piece you would spend $1500 on from Ballard Designs!!

I have a lot of pieces like this that I got from her or other family members, where I transformed something to look like something completely different-the magic of paint and fabric!!

It is funny how you evolve too, becuase now they big joke in my family is, "does anybody have a ___________ that they aren't using?". My parents, my sister and I all have similiar color schemes, and overlapping tastes, so we are always swapping stuff that works best for each of our homes.

I have no idea where my taste came from. I see no connection to my family.

In rural Kentucky, the noon-time meal is dinner and the evening meal is supper. Messed with my head when I went to school, and had "lunch". :)

Lovely thread... My (eventual) family home (we moved 5 times before the last house) was nondescript and cheap (5 kids, other priorities), with dreary, ugly furnishings. I longed terribly for a house where I felt at home. The setting of the house was gorgeous--on a small river out in the countryside, in Michigan--but I was acutely aware that the house itself was dreadfully designed (my parents worked with a builder... one of the more peculiar touches was a hall in the upstairs that was enormous, square, and more spacious than any single room in the house), too small, and just plain bizarre and uncomfortable, with "pinch points" at every entry, no privacy, and a simply unworkable layout, made worse by truly hideous furnishings. I was 13 when we moved into that house, and every fiber of my being rebelled against that space.

Anyway, I used to lull myself to sleep by walking through the rooms of a house full of sunlight, with lovely flowers, artfully placed furniture, artwork on the walls... When I finally got my own home, I made it comfortable and attractive; my parents moved to a condo, and I was not surprised that they picked a place very like the old house--dark, weirdly designed, awkward flow and layout, with stiff, uncomfortable, ugly furnishings. Everything about their design sensibility informed the decisions I make about my space. Just not in the way you'd expect.

I love this thread, so many interesting stories! We called it supper growing up, but my kids call it dinner.

I have no idea where my love for old stuff came from because my DM didn't seem to like it. I think perhaps my DF liked old stuff altho he didn't seem to care to have much input into the decor. My DM decorated the LR of our new home when I was a child with new furniture, drapes, rug, then 14 years later had a decorator help her completely redo it. Yes that was 14 years later! Didn't change at all in the interim. I never liked much of either style but adored going with her to visit her older friends who lived in old houses with real antiques. I can still see those rooms clearly and remember curiously peeking into bedrooms whenever I had the chance. Loved the lace curtains and the smell of lemon oil and lavender. Our home smelled of pinesol if anything. Didn't need lemon oil on that MCM formica coffee table!

My style has always been comfortable traditional with cottage/eclectic/ethnic overtones.

I was thrilled when my DM gave me several things that had belonged to her mother as well as a small 30's Duncan Phyfe table she had for years. I love the "feeling" such old things give a room.

I would say if I have a taste it came very early. Once I found out -about the age of ten- I was adopted, it all made sense that my dad would always say "I was very special and that he and mom chose me. There I was in a tiny basket just waiting for them to come and take me home."
Well for the longest time, I just thought that was what happened to everyone.lol. Anyway, once I found out, not that my parents kept it from me, I just had to have it put in different terms for me to get IT. It was my next door neighbour that explained to me. I can't say I was devastated, I was a little miffed. Anyway, I think from that day on, just because I was different in the fact that I didn't know my true background and that I felt like I lost a connection of sorts I have continued to be different in my life and the way my taste evolved. Now everyone associated with me expects that I don't follow trends and actually do everything opposite. Nothing ever surprises them which is okay with me.

Absolutely!!!

When I was 11 and saw the carpet color my mom had chosen for my bedroom in our new home, I cried and cried. She liked it and some designer had suggested it, so she didn't even consider changing it. I STILL hate that color with a passion (a dark rosey mauve).

The rest of our house was cream and peach and grey. We had a living room with ultra plush cream carpet that we were not allowed to enter, except for photos. It had to be carefully vacuumed with perfect lines (like a baseball field). We had built-in laminate desks in the office and master bedroom that never opened or closed properly, and were always getting chips. We had cream laminate with oak trim kitchen cabinets. And of course, unimaginative art show 3-D artwork whose only merit was that it matched the pillows. When my parents had to replace their grey carpet last year, my mom chose a very light cream plush (this was for the stairs too). And when they renovated their kitchen with granite and stainless, they thought it perfectly great to leave the hideous laminate cabs.

More than that, though, I just never could understand their purchasing decisions. They always went with cheap quality (not necessarily cheap cost)/immediately available. So everything was always breaking and needing to be replaced - the garbage disposal, the garage door, our cheaply made clothes purchased at full retail. My father still brags about the amazing deals he's gotten on his new unheard-of brand camera or MP3 player (which are predictably never working 2 weeks later).

Thankfully, my husband and I are of one mind and always carefully search for the right item, well-made, and if we can't afford quality (paid for in cash), we wait. Quality is always cheaper and less effort in the long run. I search Ebay, Goodwill, and Craigslist. I don't pay retail for anything except groceries.

And of course, my mom hates my house, with its British Colonial/Spanish design, antique furniture, wood floors, hand-knotted rugs, and rich colors. My husband and I aren't wealthy, just patient and determined to have things that last. Life's too short!

My parent's taste never appealed to me so now as an adult, I am slowly trying to find what appeals to me and that makes me happy. I love this post. I love reading each post and learning more about the members of this forum.

OMG
Yes! my taste was influenced by my parents....
to never repeat the same decor again...EVER!!!

My parents never met a window shade they knew how to raise. We lived with blonde maple furniture my whole life, multi-brown shag wall to wall and tin-foil Christmas trees (yea... with the color wheel). We even had a velvet flamingo dancer painting in Dad's den!

I'm not done with decorating my new home and it might take years to find what I want but I can wait....because as gardenweb is my witness....there will never be a flamingo dancer set foot on my doorstep!

Organic, I think I can see why from your post with how come I am all of a sudden into decorating. Once I had to paint my walls 2.5 year ago, I realized that since I moved out of my home, I have not been grounded until I bought my townhouse. I rented since I was 18 and I had no choice in wall color and only had flat off white walls, ceilings and trim with no contrast. I moved so much that the longest I lived in a place was 3 years. Even in college, I moved and moved and before college I went to three high schools so I felt so unsettled. Finally I am feeling this is my home and I want it to feel like a home.

My parents were/are antique collectors so the house was full of really nice but also a very eclectic collection of antique furniture and clocks. I adore antiques now. We spent every summer traveling and camping, stopping at little towns along the way to check out the local antique store. the smell of antique stores makes me think of my childhood. My parents are old now, mom is in a nursing home and dad still lives surrounded by his lifetime accumilation of treasures. Some day, those antiques will be passed on to the three kids. There are SO many of them I know I will have to sell off a huge percentage of what I inherit just because there is no room for them all. While their house was crammed full, I prefer to keep the numbers reasonable. Where Dad has 15 clocks on one wall, I think one clock or maybe two clocks at the most stand out better and is not lost in the crowd. So I was influenced by their love of antiques, but do not have the same "collector" mentality they both had. And I WON'T use antique bedroom furniture. The beds are too short and the dresser drawers do not operate as smoothly as modern furniture.

I always thought my mother bought the most boring, dull things like huge crystal bowls and chinoiserie desks.
I could not understand why we couldn't have cool stuff like they sold at World Bazaar. I desperately wanted beads in our doorways and papasan chairs instead of wing chairs.

30 years later, Thank you, Mom!

We moved fairly often, but my Mom and Dad always made me feel a part of the "team", so I always had input about household things! (even when they KNEW I was wrong :^).
A lot of our furniture was hand-me-down, and what didn't "show-up", my Dad built antique reproductions to fill in. Imagine my surprise and excitement when they bought me a BRAND NEW piano...at the age of 6!!!
Forward to 2008....Mom and Dad are both gone, I still have the piano and play it regularly. My kidlets had big discussions over who was getting any pieces of the furniture not already taken by moi! I think we are carrying the torch, and everytime I walk into their homes I smile...Mom and Dad would have been so proud to see their treasures still being well taken care of and enjoyed.

My parents really like to decorate and renovate a relatively older house they bought. They've redone the kitchen, basement, patio, and my room. It sounds like it's cool, but they decorate almost everything with grey and black and white. Hardly ever fun colors. In the prior mentioned basement, there's a video game area where my parents hardly ever try to make look nice. I thought of a really cute decoration arrangement for it, and I told my Mom ad she just told me there shouldn't be anything on top of the cabinet (Where the consoles were) and I was shocked, because its more of an area for me and my 2 siblings, not them. I told her that nothing on top would make it boring, and she told me THATS THE POINT. Now I don't know if having a boring house is a thing people do, but I had a good plan, and my Mom just doesn't get my style of decorating. If anyone has advice please tell me.

My parents really like to decorate and renovate a relatively older house they bought. They've redone the kitchen, basement, patio, and my room. It sounds like it's cool, but they decorate almost everything with grey and black and white. Hardly ever fun colors. In the prior mentioned basement, there's a video game area where my parents hardly ever try to make look nice. I thought of a really cute decoration arrangement for it, and I told my Mom ad she just told me there shouldn't be anything on top of the cabinet (Where the consoles were) and I was shocked, because its more of an area for me and my 2 siblings, not them. I told her that nothing on top would make it boring, and she told me THATS THE POINT. Now I don't know if having a boring house is a thing people do, but I had a good plan, and my Mom just doesn't get my style of decorating. If anyone has advice please tell me.