Enormously fond of intense color, but doggedly insistent on durability, Mr and Mrs Michael M Thomas worked these admirable qualities into a room that was vividly dramatic, clearly upscale, yet reasonably impervious to the onslaughts of two small children and a large basset hound.
Although the orange & green family room — a central part of their 1960s home in New York — was comparatively simple with “nothing in it that can be hurt,” it was not inelegant.
In contrast — and because there was a formal living room next door — the furniture was comfortably squashy and homey to the point of including a little rocking chair and a Victorian dining table cut down to sofa-seat height.
A champion needlepoint artist, Mrs Thomas designed all her own cushions, an accomplishment recorded in Henry Koehler’s portrait over the sofa of her and her husband. [Michael M Thomas was a stockbroker, a well-known novelist, New York Observer columnist, and even spent some time as a museum curator. See his obituary here.]
ALSO SEE: Sit back & relax in a country-style sitting room with a pastel green backdrop
