Styling the Foyer for Fall with a Tray

If you want to decorate for autumn but don't know where to start, one of the easiest ways is to group your favorite fall items together on a tray. By styling them this way and placing the tray near your front door you'll create a lovely autumn welcome for all visitors to your home!

   

Thank you for joining me and a creative group of bloggers today for a tour of our autumn trays coordinated by Katherine of Katherine's Corner. If you've just come from Decorative Inspirations — welcome! I know you enjoyed  Meagan's tray as much as I did.

 

For my fall tray I continued my personal challenge to design with only the things I already had (with one exception I'll talk about below). But of course if you find something while shopping that would be perfect for your tray, use that to inspire your style!

   

Our house has a two-story foyer that is flanked by the living room and dining room on either side, then opens to a family/great room. There's a lot going on visually, although the foyer itself does not have a lot of square footage. So I tend to keep seasonal decor here to a minimum, usually limiting it to the chest. Which is perfect for styling trays and other types of vignettes! 

Because the ceilings are high I generally use tall vases with long-stemmed florals. To balance the apparent mass of the creamy silk flowers I styled my tray with a variety of items in vibrant autumn colors and allowed the items to spill off the tray to increase their visual weight.

  

 

The pillar candle becomes the focal point, surrounded by autumn hues and natural textures. There's a smooth gold glass pumpkin with a stem that sparkles next to a round ornament that was hand-crafted of methodically gathered pheasant feathers by a native Hawaiian artisan.

 

  

A ceramic quail is nestled among several mini pumpkins and squash (all faux). All the colors are offset by the beautifully made wooden box bought long ago at an artists' fair.

 

  

On the other side is a larger pheasant feather ornament which blends into the quail's ceramic plumage. I delightedly bought the feather ornaments I've used here directly from the artist on Maui when we spent a wonderful vacation there in September. For more texture I added raffia balls, another glass pumpkin and one of the acorns I've had for a number of years.

  

These silk flowers were a bit of a splurge when I got them a dozen years ago. They remind me of the flowers found in Old Master paintings — and those on the salad plates I used in Mums Lead the Way to Fall.

 

 

For the tray itself, I used one of my favorite silverplate trays, a favorite because of the lovely handle detail. It's also one of the larger round ones I have. I confess to owning about 15 round trays and a handful of larger and smaller rectangular ones. Several were wedding presents and the others were found antiquing. Silverplate trays are inexpensive and are indispensable when entertaining larger groups of people. They hold lots of hors d'oeuvres, mini deserts or specialty drinks for parties. I also use them as chargers for dinners. I'm looking forward to entertaining like that again — it's been far too long!!

  

  

The ceramic quail by Fitz and Floyd isa lidded box, though I've never used it that way. It's one of a pair.

  

There's more inspiration waiting for you on the tour! Next up is The Apple Street Cottage — click over to see how Ann expressed autumn on her tray.

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