Fifty shades of grey

We have finished redecorating the back spare room.  Barmy but slightly wonderful is the general consensus. The furniture, including the bed, has been painted a very light stone-colour with the exception of the mule chest which it would have been a shame to repaint since it has very spirited 19^th century faux graining. The walls have acquired a dado rail, beneath which is a medium grey with a much lighter, luminous grey above. Woodwork is white. The carpet remains pale grey, and the charcoal grey Lesbian toile-de-jouy curtains have been re-hung. The bed is surmounted with a gilded corona  faintly reminiscent of a wreath of oakleaves, hung with pale grey muslin; there are gilded brass tie-backs to either side of the headboard. We had to go into work, but Godmama spent the whole day sewing, since the muslin needed about ten metres of seaming. The bed itself is adorned with a nineteenth-century quilt made of blue and grey striped ticking. Even as I write, a committee of taste is deliberating over hanging the pictures, which are also grey, with gilt or silver frames, and there is a ghostly mirror with very foxed antique glass, which I also gilded. Most of the decorative items have been removed, but there was a good agonize over the spongebowl on the mule chest: blue transfer-ware with a spirited representation of Bacchus and his pards, plus Greek temple and palm trees, or grey Grecian spongeware? (Grey Grecian). Girandoles were tried, and taken away again. The effect is on the whole Swedish, and extremely elegant. Also, comfortable, and surprisingly jolly, and thanks to almost everything being pale grey, the corona etcetera is very much less reminiscent of Disney princesses than one might have feared.