Eddie Ross and a Lobotomized Goose at Terrain

Last Thursday night, I attended the "Stylist's Secrets to Fall Design" event with Eddie Ross at Terrain at Styer's. Terrain is the totally cool store that is owned by the Anthropologie people. There is only one Terrain store in the country, and, lucky me...it is about 20 minutes from my house.

I first learned about Eddie when he was on the Bravo channel's Top Design show. Since then, I've been following his blog. When I read that Eddie and his partner, Jaithan were doing an event at Terrain, I emailed them to let them know that there were a lot of great antique stores near Terrain (including Brandywine View, of course). They ended up going to the shop on Thursday. Yay!

Here's Eddie giving us some ideas on decorating a tablescape and using fall vegetables for entertaining and floral displays:

One of my favorite tips was using a gooseneck gourd to hold a dip and vegetables. My damn camera battery died, so I didn't get a picture of the finished product. But you lay the gourd on its side (like a sleeping goose, if a goose slept on its side). Then, hollow out the big part of the goose (give your goose an appendectomy) and hollow out the bulbous part at the top of the gourd (that would be a goose lobotomy).  So, it is similar to hollowing out a squash, but there are TWO places to hold your dips or hummus or crudite. And they used chalkboard plant stakes to write the name of the dip. I love that idea.

As part of the price of admission, we each created our own floral arrangement using a pale bluish-green pumpkin. Four people each shared a project table that was set up with a pre-carved pumpkin filled with a piece of floral foam, along with the supplies that we needed.  AND THERE WAS WINE! Which explains why they already hollowed out the pumpkins for us - they obviously didn't want anyone handling sharp knives.

There were two flower carts filled with a huge variety of flowers. We could pick any flowers we wanted for our arrangements: hydrangeas, stock, scented geranium, scabiosa, and lots of other fancy flowers whose names I don't know. It was interesting to see how different everyone's pumkpins ended up looking.

Eddie and Jaithan were so gracious and funny. They floated around the room and helped all of us with our arrangements. I am terrible at flower arranging, so they both helped me make my pumpkin look less like bug with antennae and more like a pleasing autumn centerpiece. The Terrain employees were so friendly, too. They kept the wine flowing and made sure that we were all having fun. Here I am with Eddie:

One of the highlights of the night was meeting Janine, who is a reader of freshvintage. She has a booth at Heritage Antique Center in Adamstown, PA. I will definitely stop there next time I hit Renninger's. Start that blog, Janine! 

I met a few bloggers, too: Amy, Shannon and Lizzie. Lizzie was smart enough to have a camera with a charged battery in it, so check out some photos on her blog. She's even got a photo of a lobotomized goose stuffed with orange peppers and bean dip.

And here's my final product, sitting on the barn wood hutch in my family room:

Thanks, Eddie & Jaithan!

Comments

[brandeye]

you are making me really sad that i didn't go to this! i thought about it, then forgot about it. looks like it was fun!

[susan]

Your gourd turned out gorgeous. Sounds like a wonderful evening. Will your arrangement dry out so you can keep it??

[Grumpy]

Wait!!! Colleen Allison decorating a tablescape using fall veggies with a floral display???? Yeah sure!! Will that work with take-out??

[Eddie Ross]

thank you so much for your sweet post! It was so great meeting you! your flowers look amazing in your home! xo
E

[sue]

Hanging out with Eddie and Jaithan is priceless! I'm glad you got to do it! And look at you all gussied up.

[Wanda @ Just Vintage]

Wow! That's one heckofa pretty arrangement! I'd be like you. Not so much of the arranging would have been done by me. I've always wanted that to be one of my talents, bought all kinds of books, but cannot arrange flowers in a vase or bowl to save my life.

Tell us more about Terrain. I peeked at the web site. Oh, my! Yummy! And is it decorated as well as Anthropologie? Lucky you to live near! I'm jealous.

[Shannon]

Awesome recap! Your arrangement looks great on your hutch...is it still alive??

[LizzieBeth]

Hello from Lizzie in Progress!

Ahaha, love the "lobotomized goose" comment! It was so great to meet you, and I look forward to following your blog!

LB

[Jeanine]

It was so exciting for me to meet you, Colleen! What a great night that was! I enjoyed talking to you and getting some blogging advice. I'm almost ready to start. Thanks also for giving Heritage Antiques a plug. I would love to see you stop by some Sunday when I'm working.

[Kelly Galvin Robson]

Colleen-- I can't believe we were at the same event and didn't meet! Well, I'm glad you had as much fun as I did (and if you're like me, I don't want to throw my pumpkin away!).

xoxo,
Kelly
High Street Market

[Gabby]

I love Terrain. It's almost like going to a spa but it is soooooo expensive!