One Great Room

When Amy Mayfield moved to Corey’s Landing on Longboat Key, says her friend and decorator, Bob Bacon of Bacon & Wing, the living room was a plaster box with no casements or moldings, and shag carpeting over concrete floors. “It was a challenge to marry Amy’s wonderful antiques with architecture of the ‘50s and ‘60s,” Bacon says.

His solution: Create interest with millwork and cabinetry that would also prominently display Mayfield’s 17th-, 18th- and 19th-century china (including rare Rose Medallion, Fitzhugh and Armorial pieces), antique English tea caddies and hand-painted miniature portraits. “As collectors we are rat-packers; we can’t stop,” Bacon says. “My concept was to keep the design clean and use architectural features to change a flat, cold base into a real home.”

Mayfield first invited Bacon and his late partner, Thomas Wing, to her family home in New England. “I wanted them to see that I wasn’t a turquoise and mauve person,” she says. “I like strong colors and a warm, open plan.”

Botanically accurate cotton print called Tulipa, from the Royal Horticultural Society collection and available through Zoffany, picks up the room’s rich green and pink tones.

Handmade ceramic lamps with deep glaze and custom fittings by Amy’s son, Christopher Spitzmiller, also grace the homes of Oprah Winfrey and George W. Bush.

Custom-mixed Sherwin Williams wall paint in hunter green harmonizes with, but purposely doesn’t match, the lush imported Italian silk table round.

Detail and scale are the first things Bacon considered when adding character-building architectural features such as window detailing, crown and ceiling moldings.

Custom-designed cabinetry, built by Bacon & Wing's master carpenter, was created specifically to highlight Mayfield’s antique Chinese export china collections.

White cotton duck covers Bacon & Wing’s classic Charles of London upholstered furniture pieces; they’re designed and primed to be changed out with slipcovers.