Roses have long played a role in home decor and decorating. As standalone embellishments – cut roses or rose bushes – the rose has been the front-runner of all the flowers in the world for a centuries. In paintings, carvings, and textiles, roses began appearing (along with other blooms) with regularity in something like the 17th century. And why not? Images of roses are gorgeous whether they’ve been captures true to life or in stylized fashion, in 2D or 3D. Plus, as decor goes, roses tend to be timeless. Not every rose curtain or wallpaper will stand up to the passage of years, of course, but the iconic rose will certainly do so. Love roses? Me, too, which is why I put together a little inspiration for us to share.

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In my heart of hearts, I’m lazy. I usually start decorating with two colors (or non-colors, whatever) and then branch out color-wise as I see things I like. My living room, for example, started with a palette of blues and browns, but I’ve since added orange, which meshes with everything else a lot better than you might at first imagine.

Black and white are easy starting points because ‘black and white’ is a proven combo. Once you’ve got your timeless and classy black and white interior established, you can start adding other hues, like vivid red, bright yellow, baby blue, or even apple green. Voila! Instant eye draws!

I’d like to say that from now on, all my bedding will come to me from DwellStudio. Except I can’t say that, because I don’t have $265 to spend on a duvet cover, and I simply can’t justify spending $80 on a single pillow sham. Yes, that’s one (count it, one) sham, which is just one ‘e’ away from being a crying shame.

But aren’t the linens shown above just divine? I might be persuaded to spend more time reading in bed and less time in front of The Beard’s computer watching Battlestar Galactica if I had a full set…or maybe just one of the duvet covers. All right, so on blah days like today I don’t exactly need a lot of persuading. The kicker is that I have to get up, out of my warm cozy bed, and actually do things if I want to afford the kind of linens specifically designed to keep one in bed!

Ever since I got into sewing–thanks, in part, to some gracious tips left in the comments by Manolo for the Brides readers–I’ve been enamored with all of the great fabrics out there. The ones I like most either have really striking patterns or really vivid colors, so imagine my pleasure when I opened my new Pottery Barn catalog to find nothing but!

Intricate embroidery will cost you, if a lumbar pillow cover that costs $79 is any indication. I’m going to guess it was machine embroidery, which is something the ladies at the sewing center I frequent seem to do without eighty bucks worth of effort. But maybe they jut make it look easy!

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