Orchard Blog - autumn Archives

Design Inspiration | Autumn Dining Room

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In these days of TV dinners, there is something special about sitting down to eat in a dining room. Having a separate room to eat in was a requirement on our ongoing house hunt. It is a room for entertaining in, but also just to sit together and have a catch up over supper. Inspired by our recent Havest Themed Dinner party we have created this Autumn Dining Room scheme.

Where to Buy | Autumn Dining Room

fig.1 Autumn Leaved Print Minted
fig.2 Pendant Light Lighting Lighting
fig.3 Autumn Leaves Plates Pottery Barn
fig.4 Plaid Napkins George by Asda
fig.5 Wine Glass John Lewis
fig.6 Rochelle Table made.com
fig.7 Rochelle Chairs made.com
fig.8 Wilton Mirror One World Trading
fig.9 Recycled Glass Vase Cox & Cox
fig.10 Sunflowers Vase Sainsburys
fig.11 Hunter Rug wayfair.co.uk
fig.12 Glazed Sideboard Maison du Monde
fig.13 Oro Antico Colour Courage
fig.14 Soft Grey Colour Courage
fig.15 Terra Di Sienna Colour Courage

10th November 2016

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How to Style an Autumn Porch

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Orchard Blog

Have you noticed our love of decorating with pumpkins yet? Big ones, small ones, blue ones, glass ones! It is turning into a bit of an autumn obsession. But it makes us happy so we’re not going to apologise. So we have decided embrace autumn and pumpkins for all it’s worth!

Our Autumn Porch

We are currently staying at Rich’s folk’s cottage whilst we are midway through buying a new house. They live in a very cute 17th Century cottage. The front porch is a tiny little doorway that we both struggle to get through without banging our heads. We have hit our head more times than is funny in this low ceiling-ed home!

Pumpkins and Chrysanthemums

To make the tiny front porch more autumnal we decorated with pumpkins and chrysanthemums. We also used our lovely autumn wreath that we found in Homesense and used some heathers, some hardy herbs and some old garden boxes and terracotta pots. Chrysanthemums were thought as criminally old fashioned for a very long time, but in recent years they have had a bit of a rehabilitation. In terms of Autumn colour, there really is no competition to the masses of blooms on each plant. Our local garden centre had a great selection of autumn shades to choose from, we opted for a soft purple and a golden yellow.

What do you think?

Do you decorate your outside for autumn, or just for Halloween? We love the colour and interest at the front door and have received many nice comments from our visitors and neighbours about our Autumn Porch. What do you think, let us know in the comment’s section?

19th October 2016

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Our Autumn Harvest Table Setting

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Orchard Blog

Time for Harvest Festival

Now we are into October and the weather has turned we start thinking about cosier parties inside the cottage. The past weekend we had an autumn harvest dinner for a group of friends to celebrate the season. Harvest Festival is the traditional British celebration around this time of year, it is the less well know cousin of the American Thanksgiving. We both have memories of our churches harvest festival celebrations from when we were little, and many churches continue to celebrate. We though this is a perfect excuse for a party (we don’t need much encouragement).

Pumpkins Galore

To us, autumn decorations for can only mean one thing, pumpkins! We used this Mottled Rose Gold Pumpkin Battery Light from Lights4fun to create a table centre. Fresh pumpkins are now in the supermarket so it was easy to pick up a couple of small ones, along with a mini variety known as munchkin pumpkins. In addition to this, we mixed in some ornamental squash and gourds we picked up on a recent trip to Garsons farm shop in Esher. We found a mix of different colours and shapes to compliment the pumpkins.

Our Harvest Table

When we were laying our harvest table we added in some eucalyptus foliage from the garden to create a base, and placed this on a plan linen table runner with some decorative autumn maple leaves for colour. We then arranged the pumpkins, squashes and gourds and twisted in some micro fairy lights, again from lights4fun to give some warmth and interest.

A great night

We finished laying the table, put on our Autumn Jazz playlist and opened some English sparkling wine. It was a great evening celebrating with our friends. Calum cooked pumpkin soup (obviously) followed by a lovely roast pork followed by a delicious orange ginger and treacle pudding.

What do you think?

What do you think of our Harvest Table? Do you celebrate at this time of year and if so how do you go about it? let us know in the comments, we’d love to hear from you.

12th October 2016

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Orchard Escapes | An Autumn Break in Bruges

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Orchard Blog

A couple of years ago we headed took a mini break to one of the loveliest northern European cities, Bruges. Located in Flanders in western Belgium, Bruges is a charming medieval city that has been attracting visitors for generations. We visited in October and were blessed with some glorious autumnal weather and relatively light crowds. We think Autumn is one of the best times of year to visit.

A bit of history

Bruges’s golden age was in the medieval period and was one of the most important trading cities in the world at the time. The city was home to the first stock exchange in the world, and goods from all over Europe and beyond were traded. The city boomed and in in the 15th century, Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, set up court in Bruges adding to the cities prestige.

From the 15th century onwards Bruges started losing trade to the nearby city of Antwerp and went into decline. The population fell and by the 1800s the city went from being the most prosperous in Belgium to the poorest. By the turn of the 19th century, the city started to attract the attention of wealthy English and french tourists, attracted by the preserved medieval architecture. The city capitalised on this new attention and now attracts more than two million tourists annually. The city is now protected as a UNESCO world heritage site.

What to do

The charm of Bruges is to wander around the picturesque streets aimlessly soaking up the architecture and the atmosphere. The city is not a big place, the centre is charming and where all the main sites are located. To help get your bearings consider climbing the 13th century Belfort. The 83m climb might prove a bit of a challenge but stunning views make it worth it. If you’d rather stay closer to ground level a canal boat tour is a great way to see another side of the city, allowing you to admire the canal-side houses.

Everywhere you look you will see stunning buildings, but make sure you check out the gothic excess of the 1420 Stadhuis. Bruges has museums dedicated to chips, chocolate, diamonds, and beer. Our favourite was obviously the Bruges Beer Museum! If you are after something higher brow head to Groeningemuseum, the city’s most celebrated art gallery.

To experience to best of the city it is best to stay overnight in one of the many gorgeous hotels. You can experience the city after the day trippers have gone home, and enjoy a beer in one of the atmospheric bars, and a meal in one of the many excellent restaurants. We got up early and headed for an early morning walk to experience the city as it wakes up. We were blessed with a crisp sunny weather. The peacefulness of the city in the early morning really took our breath away.

Find out more

We think Bruges is a stunning city and a perfect mini break destination. It is easily accessible from the UK by sea, train or driving. The city is easy to wander around and has enough attractions to keep you occupied for a day or two. The crowds can get a bit hectic so going off season is a good idea, as is spending at least a night in the city. For more information check out Visit Bruges. If you have any recommendations let us know in the comments

7th October 2016

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Cocktail of the Week | Pumpkin Cocktail

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Orchard Blog

After making a pumpkin cake using our Nordic Ware bundt tin we found ourselves sitting with a few teaspoons of pumpkin purée. Rather than waste it, we decided to create a cocktail using it. There are very few pumpkin flavoured ones, but did take inspiration from Serious Eats and came up with our own Pumpkin Cocktail.

The pumpkin is ubiquitous with Autumn. It has received a massive push in the last few years thanks to a certain coffee based drink! None the less, it is a great ingredient to use for many things. Calum has been known to make a pumpkin and chilli ravioli in addition to the pumpkin cakes and soups. We also like to carve our pumpkins for Halloween, so keep an eye out for efforts in the next few weeks! We may find a need to try a different pumpkin cocktail when we do!

For this week’s cocktail, you will need;

2 tsp Pumpkin purée
1 measure Vanilla vodka
1 measure Pressed apple juice
Ginger beer
Ice

Take the pumpkin purée, vanilla vodka and the pressed apple juice and pour into a cocktail shaker with ice. Shake the mix well before pouring the mix into a tall glass with some ice. Fill the glass with the ginger beer. Add a straw and there you have our pumpkin cocktail.

The drink has a lovely smooth taste and certainly would be a hit and any Halloween or autumnal party! It even has Rich’s Mum’s seal of approval!

6th October 2016

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Top Five | Hello October

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This morning there was frost on the ground, the first this side of Summer. It made getting out of bed a bit more difficult than a normal but is was a glorious day so very much worth it. Today was the type of crisp autumn day that writers wax lyrical about. With an autumnal state of mind lets look at our top five:

One

This weekend was Chobham Flower and Music Festival. Rich’s mum did a couple of displays so we took the time out on Saturday to admire her work. Chobham Church is a beautiful building, it brings back many memories of Rich’s schooldays in the village.

Two

This weekend we had family visiting. It was a great excuse to get ur our Nordic Ware autumn wreath cake pan. We made Nigella’s Pumpkin Bundt cake. We are not being half-hearted about embracing autumn here!

Three

We picked up this wreath at Homesense to add to our ever growing supply of Autumn decorations. We love Homesense, especially for quirkier decor like this. We were also excited to see the start of their Christmas range in store, but we can’t get to excited about that, it is only just October!

Four

Look, if you haven’t realised this by now we love decorating the house for autumn. We are especially loving this Pumpkin lamp from lights4fun we have plans to use this as a table centre at an upcoming dinner party, watch this space!

Five

Hooray, it is the season of stews and casseroles. On Sunday night we had the first of the season in our brand new Crock Pot (we accidently broke our last one). We are looking forward to many more slow cooked dishes. Any recipe suggestions?

3rd October 2016

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The Perfect Autumn Jazz Playlist

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Orchard Blog

Whenever we host a party we always spend time before hand trying to make sure the music is just right! Sometimes you can find the perfect playlist but sometimes you need to make your own. This is what we have done here, we have gone through our favourite jazz artists to create a nostalgic and sentimental playlist perfect for a cosy autumn soiree. Put on some candles, pour yourself a glass of wine and enjoy! You can follow this Autumn Jazz Playlist on Spotify here

30th September 2016

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Cocktail of the Week | Harvested Apple

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Orchard Blog

As we continue to seek out the delights of autumn, finding an autumnal themed cocktail that in not just about apples is not the easiest thing! That said, we did find one from Williams-Sonoma that was all about the apple and looked good enough to tempt us trying. After rummaging through the bar we found the ingredients we needed to make this week’s Cocktail of the Week, the Harvested Apple.

The key ingredient in this cocktail is Calvados. This is essentially an apple brandy that comes from Normandy region in France. We did bring back a bottle from our recent trip to France for Rich’s Dad (just don’t tell him we pinched some). Calvados is first recorded as being made in 1553. Over the centuries the drink has been subjected to taxation and prohibition. The production was important enough to the French that the area it is made in was called Calvados after the French Revolution; this is likely to be as the locals were already calling it this. World War II had an impact on the production of the drink where many factories were rebuilt. It also became the regimental drink of three Canadian regiments who passed through the area following the D-Day landings.

For this week’s cocktail you will need;

Champagne
1 measure Calvados
½ measure Elderflower Liquor
Thin slice of apple
Sprig of thyme

Take a champagne coop and add the elderflower followed by the calvados and top the glass up with the chilled champagne. Drop the slice of apple into the glass and give it a stir with the thyme leaving the spring in the glass. Once settled, you the cocktail of the week, the Harvested Apple.

The cocktail is a great way to enjoy the start of the autumn season. It has a great apple undertone and could be very easy to enjoy two or three of these!

29th September 2016

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