Several more furniture pieces have made their way home with us to begin filling our empty rooms. We bought 5 various items from one dealer after hours scouring his over crowded rooms in Arezzo. The pieces are perfect - they have lovely lines, fit our budget and will be useful in our home. This writing bureau is for the 2nd bedroom and with deep drawers, an upper area for book storage, and a writing slope for computer/desk work, it simultaneously serves several purposes. We also bought a marble topped wall hung console for the entry, a bedroom chair with lovely fringe detail around the base, a dining chair to use at the writing bureau and a little brass coffee table base which needs some serious polishing.
But the piece de resistance is this fabulous gilt mirror. It was an accidental find - in fact we had ventured to an industrial area of Arezzo in search of a standard lamp as the lighting in our house is currently very scant. The lighting shop was unsuccessful, but just down the road was a wholesale antique dealer's warehouse and among the enormous array of dusty stock was this beautiful gilt mirror. We haggled over the price and in the end walked away as he was standing firm and we had set our limit. So home we went without it. However we both kept talking about it and 24hrs later phoned to increase our final price. Again the dealer said no, to our increased final price, so we both gave up on the idea of owning it. Then 3hrs later, he phoned us back and said he would accept the price - clearly part of the game really, but we were thrilled and immediately drove the 45minutes to Arezzo to collect it - at 10pm! Shortly thereafter it was resting against the wall in our home to begin its life in Cittå Della Pieve. I think it is about early 1800's and the carving on the top is beautifully detailed with birds, flowers and leaves and the gilt is in wonderful condition. At 1500mm high it will certainly create a spectacular impact over our fireplace and fits perfectly with the look of "lived in, faded elegance".
So for the time being, we are now finished with furniture purchases - still a long way to go, but we now need to begin the preparations for the conference we are running in Cortina D'Ampezzo beginning at the end of the week.
