Al Shallal

Comments on my villa: I'm now living in Villa #26 at Al Shallal. This place is huge - about 2x the square feet of my house on Hastings Street. I have a large living room/dining room combination, study, very gracious winding stairway, three bedrooms with tons of storage in them, three full bathrooms, a half-bath on the first floor, large kitchen with enough room for four barstools at the counter, PLUS a maid's room and bathroom with a shower! That's a lot of room for Popcorn and me.

The ceilings are high - about 9 foot with big crown molding. All of the floors are tile. And the drapery, which I commented on with the photos in my first posting, are really heavy brocade - fully lined, plus sheers and black-out drapery underneath in the bedrooms, PLUS tie-backs and heavy brass rods!!! Very baroque - way too fancy for me, so I ignore them.

Lots of VCUQ faculty live here too, so that's pretty handy - especially during the first week when I didn't have a car. The campus is about a 15 minute drive north of Al Shallal, so I had to rely on the kindness of others for transportation until I got my rental car. I'll take pictures of the outside tomorrow and post those soon.

The only negative thing about my villa: I don't have any artwork, so lots of bare walls! My colleagues, however, who have settled in have done lots of wonderful decorating of their spaces with paint, local and imported crafts, and terrific art...most travel a lot and have collected some beautiful pieces.