I have always been drawn to natural specimens. Bones, shells, pressed botanicals, pinned insects — the kind of things that sit somewhere between art and artifact. Butterflies specifically have been part of my life for twenty years. This is not a phase.
That said, the past few weeks have been a particularly good run. A cloche here, a framed set there, a pair of $2 portraits from 12 Vultures that somehow ended up being the most perfect thing on my dining room wall. The collection keeps growing and I have zero regrets.
The Cloches
I have a thing for glass cloches and I’m not going to apologize for it. There is something about putting a beautiful object under glass that immediately elevates it — it becomes a specimen, something worth looking at closely.
The blue morpho cloche lives on my painted cast iron radiator in the sitting room. Blue morpho butterflies against that radiator color — it just works. Estate sale find, and one of my favorites in the whole house.
The side table in the living room is one of my favorite vignettes in the house. A cloche filled with butterflies, wood, and moss — an estate sale find — sits alongside a smaller dome with a single pinned moth. A skull with a faux air plant tucked into it sits nearby (I like to add plants to my skulls — pretty but creepy, or something like that). In the back, a small vase holds dried black hydrangeas and tallow berries from our wedding florals — still one of my most treasured objects in the whole house.
The radiator shelf in the hallway is its own universe entirely. An absinthe bottle brought back from Amsterdam, a candle with a portrait that says “but first let me take a selfie,” a botanical bust candle from a vintage store, a butterfly cloche with orange butterflies, a brass dish with faux air plants from Etsy, a butterfly from a vintage store, a brass teapot, a carved African figurine from a vintage store, and a skull with a faux air plant. It’s a lot. It works.
The Gallery Wall
The butterfly wall in the hallway was the first art I hung in our house when we bought it — start with the hardest first, I always say. It has grown and evolved over the years and it’s still one of my favorite things in the whole house.
The oval frame with the gold chain I just picked up at an estate sale — it holds a beautiful collection of mixed species that feels like something out of a natural history museum. The black frame to the left came from the Art Artifacts Antiques pop up — those orange and purple butterfly colors were impossible to pass on.
The wood frame above it is a framed set with pressed botanicals mixed in — found at a vintage store in San Francisco years ago. The mirror hanging alongside it came from a Goodwill in San Francisco. The frame below is a hand study — a medical drawing — that we bought in Amsterdam on our honeymoon, alongside other skull and feet drawings that live elsewhere on the wall. I wrote about that trip and that purchase on the blog. That post is still one of my favorites.
The Leaded Glass Window Sill
The breakfast nook has a beautiful leaded glass window and the sill has become its own little world. The centerpiece is a branch with moss and mushrooms made by my wedding florist and terrarium guy — the same person, and one of my favorite humans. I visited his shop every single week. I told him our wedding colors were black, white, and gold, and he came back with black calla lilies, black hydrangeas flown in from Japan, and tallow berries. He made my bouquet and all the boutonnieres for the groomsmen — black calla lilies, succulents, and white peacock feathers that he suggested and I immediately said yes to. It was a very collaborative process and everything was more beautiful than I could have imagined. This branch was his gift to us for the wedding gift table, and I’ve tended it over the years — swapped out the mushrooms and air plants — but the bones of it are his. It will always have a spot in our home.
The Portraits
Two dollars. Each. At 12 Vultures.
I only discovered 12 Vultures two weeks ago and I genuinely cannot believe it took me this long — it is completely my vibe. These are beautiful Velázquez-era style portraits — a queen in an elaborate gown, a nobleman in embroidered dress — printed on heavy art paper with gorgeous aged toning. They’re now framed in simple black frames on the dark floral wallpaper in the dining room alongside the vintage globe and the neon eye and they look like they’ve always been there.
Two dollars. I will never get over it.
The Ones I Can’t Part With
I have a set of lucite butterfly displays that are some of my most prized pieces. I used them in a client photoshoot for a downtown penthouse project — and the client loved them so much she asked if she could buy them. They were a gift so I couldn’t part with them. But I took it as the highest compliment. Some things you just keep.
How I Actually Think About Styling Natural Specimens
A few things I’ve learned from twenty years of collecting:
Group things by mood, not category. A butterfly cloche next to a skull next to an absinthe bottle next to a carved figurine — that’s a vignette. It works because everything is operating on the same frequency, not because it follows a rule.
The vessel matters. A beautiful specimen in a cheap frame is a missed opportunity. Estate sales and vintage stores are where I find the best frames, cloches, and display cases — pieces with real character that make the specimen inside feel intentional.
Let things find each other. I don’t go out looking for a specific thing. I find things I love and they eventually end up together. The portraits found the wallpaper. The blue morpho found the radiator. Trust the process.
Natural specimens love natural materials. Wood, bone, stone, dried botanicals — they all speak the same language. Put them together and they feel cohesive even when they’re wildly different objects.
Some pieces carry meaning beyond aesthetics. The wedding branch on the windowsill. The Amsterdam medical drawings. The dried black hydrangeas and tallow berries in that little vase. Not everything in your home needs to be just a pretty object. The things that hold stories are the ones that make a space feel truly yours.
Where I Find Everything
Estate sales — this is where most of my best pieces come from. Cloches, framed specimens, oddities of all kinds. Go often, go early.
12 Vultures — Minneapolis. I only just discovered it and I am making up for lost time immediately. Completely my vibe.
The Art Artifacts Antiques pop up — furniture, butterflies, dishes, pottery. Found some real gems there.
Vintage stores — in the Twin Cities and beyond. Some of my San Francisco finds are still among my favorites.
Craft markets — underrated for this kind of thing. I have found some really cool specimens and objects at craft markets over the years.
The Oddities Expo — if you know, you know.
Etsy — great for specific pieces when you know what you’re looking for.
Ready to think about your space differently? A complimentary discovery call is a great place to start.
