Yesterday's Trend is Today's Inspiration

2011-04-06T07:45:00.000-07:00

Your home's color palette is beige, or brown, or cream... or maybe even black. You threw in a few colors, like red, green, or yellow... so did everyone else.

You succeeded in the basic concepts of design - start with the base colors and add the accent colors so that they are interchangable... in other words, trendy and inexpensive enough to trade-out when the next trend comes. Browns and blacks are pretty much essential base colors for a living space. But, why not go bold?!

Our suggestion: re-upholster or add a slip cover in an accent color to that couch or chair, and accent it with beige, brown, or black pillows with a mix of shades and textures (shiny, fuzzy, embroidered, looped, and so on). The red-green-yellow Mediterranean is over-used these days. If that's your color-scheme of choice, pump it up by focusing on one of the colors over the others.

Repaint that red accent wall a creamy butter yellow and add varying yellow accents around the room. You can do this inexpensively by repainting some picture frames, or adding an area rug in the butter hue.

If you mix up the shades of yellow (or your preferred color), your palette becomes multidimensional. Try to stay away from the matchy-matchy same colored pieces.

Simply Put... your outdated design scheme can be updated by focusing on a single color and by mixing up your base colors with your accent colors.

Upcoming blog... navy and white is a trend again... but does that mean your theme is automatically nautical?

Simply Put - Start Out Small

2011-04-05T12:57:00.000-07:00

It's that time again - spring cleaning and refreshing your home with a few new things. It's time to get rid of the old and add some fun color!

Our first suggestion: If your home needs a repair, put your money into the repair first and foremost. Little repairs can become big repairs in no time. First step: REPAIR... the leaky faucet, the broken door handle, the cracked tile counter. Take care of your house first, and then make it amazing!

The next step is to clean and organize. Keep it simple: keep the things you want and use, and give the unwanted items away to someone who could use them. Or better yet, try reselling them to create a little fund for the new things you want to add. Organize simply. Keep like things together in a single place. Don't go overboard on storage solutions that aren't user friendly. Organize in a way that makes things easier and less messy.

Start Out Small. Repairing, cleaning and purging is hard enough. Instead of going to the store and just grabbing items that you feel a connection with, start off with a design concept in your home and make it personal. Do you love to travel, or dream of going on big adventures, maybe a capuccino in Florence? Focus on purchasing adventurous or culturally themed items. Tip: you can have your favorite vacation photos printed on canvas for an extraordinary piece of artwork on your walls. Try changing the coloring of the photo to black and white, or my favorite sepia, for a more classic vibe. Tip: don't buy things from the store just because they match your color scheme. It ends up creating a cold and impersonal space. Go for things in the same color families as your preferred color scheme, but select items with a story behind them, and keep it simple by not buying too many of the same type of thing. Spaces become personal when they provide character and creativity.

Simply put... design can be overwhelming. Keep it simple and start with YOU.