Preppy Plaid Dessert Table

A few months back we had a client come to us requesting a dessert table for her son's christening.

Her little boy was receiving this gorgeous christening box from his grandparents - so this became our jumping off point (as interior designer Sarah Richardson would say!).


Isn't it just beautiful - it's from www.blessedchristenings.com.au and they have so many different themes to choose from.

So we had our inspiration - vintage car - seafoam green - chocolate.

Even though in this box set there are polkadots and stripes, when I looked at it, I saw "plaid".

The vintage car just gave me images of the English countryside, herringbone hats, tweed jackets, plaid, convertible vintage cars and bow ties.

Di and I found this fabulous plaid wallpaper from www.creativewallcoverings.com and knew that it would work so well for our backdrop.


Our lovely client also wanted to include flowers.  As this was a christening for a boy we didn't want it to look too feminine or girly.  I'm thinking HYDRANGEAS are in order.......luckily our client agreed!

Unlike Madonna....I LOVE Hydrangeas they are one of my all time favourite blooms - If they weren't deciduous I would have them planted all along the front of my house - I'm thinking Gardenias - another one of my favourites - are a more sensible choice.......sorry, I digress.

Back to our dessert table.

The christening luncheon was to be held in a waterside restaurant with a bright airy interior and views of the water....perfect!


This lovely venue is LeSands Pavillion at Brighton Le Sands.  They had me at their chairs.  So many venues have very ordinary chairs, but these were lovely......we were off to a good start!

As our client wanted a floral centerpiece for each table we decided that we would add a giant balloon to keep it fun and juvenile (perfect for a baby boy).  Our client stressed that she didn't want it to look too weddingy (is that a word???).  We thought the addition of a giant balloon brought a "fun" element to the table.

We were really happy with the space that we had to work with.  The walls of the venue were a rich charcoal navy and we knew this would work well with our overall idea for the space.

However, we did not know initially just how much we would come to depend on those rich charcoal navy walls.

I like to keep it real, so I'm gonnna give you the good with the bad.  You see our initial plan for our table backdrop was to have two plaid covered panels and this is how it almost was.  Di and I were so proud of ourselves - we were all organised, we'd got together a couple of weeks before the event to finalise our props and styling.  We covered our backdrop panels with our wallpaper and covered all of our riser boxes....we only had a few off cut pieces left, we had calculated everything so well..... we were on track and on schedule.

The night before the event Di came over and we had a lovely time making the floral arrangements, we organised who would take what to the venue the next day, packed up Di's car and at 10.30pm she set off home.  At 10.45pm I received a panicked call.......the backdrops are "stuffed" she told me....I said "what do you mean" ....."their all bubbled and lifting.....we can't use them"........."can you come over".

Being as tired as I was from our early morning flower market trip....I WAS ALREADY IN BED!  but what could I do.....this event was TOMORROW!  I had to drive to Di's and get this figured out.

When I arrived....she was right.....it wasn't good.  On the trip over to Di's my husband called me and said....."if they look really bad.....don't touch them......just bring them home and I'll fix them"  he is so good to me!

Yep....they looked bad....Di and I didn't even try and do anything with them.  I had to be the calming force.....Di was flipping out - I put the backdrops into the car and with a wave goodbye said "don't worry hubby will fix them".

When I got home I just gave them to my hubby and said good luck and I went to bed!

The next morning I woke with a start at 5.30am......the backdrops were my immediate thought....were they fixed.....had we saved our skins???????  I crept out of bed and went to investigate.  On the floor in the living room in the semi morning light, it looked good - I crouched down for a feel and oooohhhhhh it was not good - bubbles and creases ......holy sh*t what are we going to do.......hang on ...... holy sh*t where is the other panel.

I woke up hubby...."what happened" I said....."how did it go?"

He had managed to save only one panel...the other one.......TOAST!

Oh dear.....it's 7am and we have a dessert table to be ready by 1.00pm.   WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO?????

I remembered I had some white frames - 6 in fact......brilliant - we could use these and put some of the plaid wallpaper inside....yep that would work.

And yes sireee it did work......sometimes you make a mistake (NEVER....EVER...use spray adhesive to secure wallpaper to a piece of foam core - you should probably use a wallpaper glue...ha, there's an idea or maybe just water......which is what we probably should have done!) and the solution leads to the final result being better than what you had planned........look.....


The white frames pop against the charcoal navy walls.  Originally we were going to have just two panels of the plaid back drop.  I don't think that would have worked so well.

Why have I just told you all of this.......well don't be discouraged if things don't look how you expected them to....take a step back think about it and you'll come up with the right solution, sometimes things need to be changed....be flexible.

When my hubby saw this pic....he was impressed....he said it looked like something from a  
Ralph Lauren store launch.....yep....I could handle that!

We absolutely LOVE how this table turned out and here are all the details.



For the cake we turned, once again, to the talents of Lorinda Seto.

She is such a perfectionist and her cakes do not disappoint.  Di and I designed a cake that was classic and simple and Lorinda executed the design perfectly.  Our client was absolutely thrilled with the cake and she said it tasted just as good as it looked.

The treats on the table included, gorgeous vintage car vanilla sugar cookies made by Di.


Mini vanilla bean cupcakes with vanilla buttercream (made by me) with custom designed fondant disc toppers made by Di....the fondant queen!


Our client made a special request that donuts be featured on the table.  She didn't mind what kind of donuts there were - there just had to be donuts as one of the Godfather's loved donuts.  We are all for those special little details that really personalise a table so we loved this idea.  As our client didn't have a preference for a particular type of donut, we thought that cinnamon would work best.

We used mini cinnamon donuts from good old Donut King and dusted them with extra sugar and authentic Greek Cinnamon provided from Di's personal stash!  The scent of that cinnamon......heavenly!


We used the gorgeous Rosanna Inc footed bowls and filled them with Allens Milk Bottles (so appropriate for a baby), chocolate malt balls and delicious vanilla macarons from Baked Patisserie.


Finally, we finished off the table with two glass squat jars filled with Toffee bon bons - always a favourite for their yummy English Toffee goodness!


To carry the hydrangea theme through to our dessert table we included two custom painted trough vases brimming with blue, green and white hydrangeas.......these blooms were just heavenly.