About a year ago my sister-in-law Lynne graciously allowed me to use her dishes as the touchstone for four table designs based on the seasons. The pattern she uses for company is Royal Doulton Princeton, a white based porcelain with navy blue and gold edging. One of the issues I kept in mind with Lynne's dishes was their formal, finished quality. My usual work is pretty loose and I was afraid it might be too casual for Lynne's pretty dishes and her preferred traditional style.
For spring I found a machine embroidered sheer polyester at our local fabric store. I'm not a fan of polyester, but this white on white pattern caught my eye. It reminded me of the gauzy film of green that spring throws across the hillsides. I used fabric paint to color the leaves on the pattern gray blue to echo the color on the dishes, and embroidered the leaves and vine edges with sharpening colors of regular sewing thread (dark green and blue inside the leaves, chartreuse along the vines and outsides of the leaves). Then I layered it over a soft green undercloth, with matching napkins.
The following pictures were taken in Lynne's dining room, with her dishes, as they might look in springtime.