Prim

                I like country style décor with the cozy, comfy look old things like quilts, candles, and firkins give a room. My favorite magazine features several homes in country style and is full of ways to get what they call “the look.”

            There is a country style called “primitive” or just “prim” for short and it’s what I would call hard core country style. You couldn’t find an upholstered chair or a cabinet that didn’t look like someone took chains to it, to save your life. The more beat up, rusted, many paint layered, the furnishings are, the better. The home owners tell of buying, say, a 20^th century ranch home and removing the carpeting and wall paper. They cover refrigerators with barn wood and take down the matching cabinets in the kitchen to replace them with odd cupboards or a wooden box, its bottom nailed to the wall, to house ancient crockery. With a lot of hard work, historical study, and dedicated salvaging, they create a home worthy of the 19^th century’s best from the hollers of Appalachia.

            I was discussing this primitive style with a friend who was born and raised in Appalachia.  She became a nurse and settled here in upstate New York. In a soft voice that still harbored a hint of a southern accent, she chuckled and said, “I worked very hard to get away from that look.”

            For her, that was all her family could afford. For others, it’s the height of period correct décor and worth every penny invested.

Our personal spaces are as unique as we are, aren’t they?

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