How to Decorate a Warm Fall Vignette

Gather some of your favorite vintage books, old ironstone, pumpkins and leaves to create a charming warm Fall vignette in your home!

printable, books, ironstone, berries, leaves, pumpkins

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Hi sweet friend! Our mornings are finally feeling cooler and I've been sipping pumpkin spice coffee every morning! Here in the South, that means Fall is here!

You'll love these easy tips and ideas for decorating a cozy and warm Fall vignette in your home using items you have (I'll be sharing my top tips for getting the look without heading to the store!)

Pinterest Challenge

It's also Pinterest Challenge, a monthly decorating challenge hosted by my sweet and funny friend Cindy of County Road 407. We are a group of decor-loving bloggers who each share our own spin on an inspiration image from, you guessed it, Pinterest!

The idea is to show you that you can create a similar look using your own decor, ideas and imagination! If you hopped over here from Decor to Adore, welcome! Didn't you love Laura's French inspired Fall vignette? You'll get to visit everyone's Fall ideas below and hopefully be motivated to decorate your own Fall corner 🍂🌰

If you're new here, I'm Cindy, and I love crafting and DIYing - no corner in my home is safe, even the rental we're currently (temporarily) living in. Decorating a budget-friendly home and making it inviting and cozy for my people are what I do best! I invite you to follow along with my weekly projects, you can sign up here.

Inspiration

Our inspiration image this month is from Gloria Parker's 1830's Connecticut home featured in The Cottage Journal. What a gorgeous image, I love the warmth this vignette evokes, all the antique and vintage items used, and the old photos!

books stack, vintage photos, fall berries, pumpkins

To recreate this look in my home using items I already own, I'll show you how I used stacks of old books (keep reading for a cheap tip for sourcing old books), pumpkins, ironstone, a vessel filled with fall foliage and wood tones.

How to Decorate a Warm Fall Vignette

To start, I needed something to build my autumn vignette on. In my office and crafting space, I have a vintage sewing machine table that I found for $10 at the thrift store years and years ago. The original color was a dark green, but I painted it with white chalk paint. It's a little wonky, the door doesn't fit right, but I love the medallion on the front and the turned legs. It's a sweet piece and served as the base for my warm Fall vignette.

blanket with tassels, white vintage sewing machine

I draped a cozy throw with fringe over the top of the table. That fringe adds interest and texture. When you're creating warmth in a room, texture is where it's at!

In hindsight I probably shouldn't have set up this vignette against a window, because it was hard to take nice, clear pictures. But it was the only free spot in the room, lol, so I hope you can see past the flaws 😉

Backdrop

The inspo image is set up in front of part of a window as well as a mirror. I love to decorate in front of a mirror because you get that yummy reflection, and your items just look bigger and better! See my Fall hanging basket to see what I mean!

Instead of a mirror, I propped up a 16x20 framed printable that I made, using coffee and cinnamon to stain the printable and add age and warmth. It's a way to get vintage looking art for just the cost of the printable. The colors were just perfect for this vignette. To see how I stained this printable with coffee, check out this tutorial.

By the way, if you're a subscriber of DIY Beautify, you have free access to my complete Resource Library, which includes all my printables! Look for the link in every email from me. If you're not yet a subscriber, you can sign up here.

Vintage books

I love vintage books but only actually own a few truly vintage books. Here's my tip for collecting books that look old. Visit your local Goodwill or thrift store, and take a peek underneath the dust covers of hardback books. Collect books in the colors that you want for your home. I have a collection of blue, green, gold/brown and black books. I like stacking books in similar colors to elevate a piece of decor.

Just like the inspiration photo shows a stack of old hardback books holding vintage black and white photos, I created a stack of three old library books with warm mustard and brown covers.

vintage books, velvet pumpkin, framed pumpkin, ironstone

Here's another tip for making those not-so-old books look like antiques. See the white pages in the top book above. To make those pages look vintage, I could have brushed on some coffee stain. I've done this before and it works beautifully to quickly age the bright white pages (and even the covers) of a book. It also makes the paper look ruffled and aged once dry.

To age a book quickly: just add a little instant coffee to warm water. Stir to dissolve, and then brush the mixture over the white book pages to instantly age them! You could add a little vanilla and cinnamon for a wonderful smell. As they dry, they will resemble an antique book. I recommend laying the book outside to dry in the sun if possible.

Small framed pictures

I love the idea of adding black and white vintage photos to a vignette, but all our photos are still packed away in boxes. Did you know we moved from TX to MS last year and are currently in a rental? You can read more about our journey here.

Instead of a collection of small frames, I used a single smaller oval frame with a little felt pumpkin set onto a small book page. I made this little piece several years ago and enjoy pulling it out each Fall! The pumpkin spice color works beautifully for this warm fall vignette. The secret here is to create layers of items to give interest and depth to your vignette.

fall leaves and berries, ironstone pitcher

Ironstone and leaves

The inspiration picture featured some beautiful vintage ceramics filled with pumpkins and fall berries. I have a whole hutch and cabinet filled with vintage white ironstone that I've been collecting for over a decade. I pulled out some of the older pieces, the ones that are stained and have crazing (little cracks) all over them.

A little stack of vintage butter pat dishes is the perfect place to set a tiny velvet pumpkin from the dollar store. I filled the stained ironstone pitcher with dark rust colored fall leaves and a stem or two of faux blackberries.

Tips for collecting real (or faux) ironstone: I have lots and lots of white dishes stacked in my two hutch cabinets. Some of the pieces are true vintage and even antiques, but some of them are just white pieces. The majority of my ironstone has been collected from thrift stores over the years, and for very little cost. If you're wanting to start a collection, I suggest scouring the shelves at the thrift store. Look at the shape of the piece, and if it's a good price and looks vintage, buy it! I even buy pieces that are chipped and stained because I like the fact that they have a story to tell! The stained pieces help to add authenticity to a collection. Building a collection of white dishes is so much fun and doesn't have to be costly.

Pumpkins

A Fall vignette is never complete without a few pumpkins! I do have small white baby boo pumpkins, like the ones used in the inspiration image, but I chose to go a different direction. I used some little rust colored velvet pumpkins (from the dollar store), as well as a little drop cloth pumpkin that I made. I stamped a little frayed fabric tag that says 'pumpkin' and attached it with a rusty safety pin. A small touch but I love these kinds of little details! Click the link above to see how I made the drop cloth pumpkins (there's a video tutorial too!)

I recently made the most adorable rustic fabric acorns, and they've gone viral on social media. I couldn't resist adding a couple handmade acorns to this Fall vignette. These DIY acorns were made using plastic eggs! I used timeworn fabrics and the rustic tops add more texture to my vignette.

To add some of those warm wood tones that the inspiration image has (from the rolled wood blinds), I stacked a wood pumpkin on some risers.

wood pumpkin, wood risers, ironstone, coffee stained printable

I've been using just a touch of blue in my fall decorating this year. If you want to see more, you can visit my Fall dining room tour as well as my living room and bookshelves Fall tour. You'll see pops of blue throughout. Coming soon, I'll be sharing my Fall decorated kitchen, where I decorated with copper and, you guessed it, blue, as well as some simple ideas to decorate a bedroom for Fall.

I hope these tips have helped you to shop your own home and use items you already own to create a warm Fall vignette! Get creative and have fun!

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warm fall vignette with vintage books, ironstone, pumpkins

To see more of this Pinterest Challenge, please visit the ladies linked below. Rachel of The Ponds Farmhouse is next on the tour, and she's sharing a budget friendly Fall table that you're not going to want to miss!

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