Red, Purple & Gold Tablescape

Remember the red plates from my last post that I chose not to use? Well, when I got home from work this afternoon, the purple dahlias were quite wilted so I decided to toss them out and change the table to something that would work with those red plates.

As is the usual case, I have little idea where I am going when I start a table. For this one, I knew only that it would be purple and red.

I started looking for chargers and came across these very formal round gold beaded charger type placemats. I liked the formality of the mat on the crinkled taffeta tablecloth. So gold will be my third color.

They are large enough to "double" charger, so I did with a red one. The first dinner plate I auditioned was pure white milk glass.,,,too white....I needed something with a rim pattern. The only patterned rim plates that I thought would work were these red/burgundy plates with some white in the rim design. You won't see much of this plate when I am finished.

I added these Fire King plates just for the gold edge. See how you don't see much of the red plate now?

You can see the big white space does not work. This is where the red salad plates come in. Ta da...this is almost what I had in mind.

They cover most of the white, leaving just enough to perk up the gold rim, but I think I now have too much red!

After a little thinking and searching the table setting cupboards, I found these gold Tiara dessert dishes.

I think (once they are put on straight)they will be just what I need.

My 20-yr. old gold QVC flatware will be perfect for this table.

The glassware had to be these big red goblets--the red/white pattern fits nicely with the red/white of the dinner plate.

A small gold liqueur glass completes the glassware for this table.

Now I need a centerpiece--I grabbed a gold compote

and went downstairs to get my old "flowertree" vases ( love those old vases!).

They are great when you have a limited number of flowers. I went out to the deck and cut down all the red dahlias I could find--one for each little vase. My flower supply is getting pretty limited.

The centerpiece still looked too sparse.

I wanted only red flowers, but did not have any more.........now what?

Ah, how about some of this green mint?

Perfect!
It adds just enough contrast and also has a light minty pineapple scent. I also chopped a handful of green tarragon to fill a small vase.
These Rembrandt dahlias have a touch of purple in the center, which blends nicely with the tablecloth.

Now it's off to the napkin boxes. I opened three boxes looking for some purple napkins. In the third box, I found these very formal green napkins.
I held them over the table and decided they would be better than purple as they would tie in the green color of the mint I added (and I didn't feel like looking for a better choice---life is too short to fret over a napkin color-this one will be fine).

I still needed a little something purple so the purple tablecloth would make sense. Luckily I had two purple candles, which I think do the job.
The table is complete.