Making Design Decisions For Our Own Homes

Decision making can come easier to some than to others. In my design career I made decisions for other all the time. I was very methodical about making decisions with my clients

I will say I did not give them any advice right out of the gate until I had walked through there home and asked them what they liked about each room and what/why they wanted to change certain things.

After I did that I had them look at pictures of beautifully decorated rooms and had them put them into two piles. Like and dislike. I had them do this quickly in order to get their initial instinctive reaction.

Once we had two piles I went through each image and asked strategic questions that would give me clues to the colors, textures and elements that they truly loved. 

Only after that would I then go back through the rooms we were to address in the project and give them my advice.

When it comes to our own personal homes it is not always an easy or methodical method that takes place. We often get our thoughts jumbled in our heads so I think it is always a good idea to write down what changes you want to make before you ever start looking.

Recently I have been trying to add some Spring color to my family room in the form of two colors.

I have used both of these colors in my home in the past, in fact I still have yellow in the form of cream walls throughout the public areas in my home. Pink is in the wallpaper in my entry hall in the shade of watermelon pink.

Since I want to keep the same feeling my family room now has I have to be very careful on how I add color in there. 

Color can and will completely change the feeling of a room. I want my room to maintain it’s calm, relaxing mood that it now has, or at least that is what my visitor's always comment on when staying here.

So I have been on the hunt for the perfect additions to my room……

I have ordered several fabric swatches that are appealing to me, that I think might work…

I fell in love with this combination and just knew it would work. Well, this is a classic example of why you must always use swatches before taking the plunge. 

The fabric on the far right seemed to be a wonderful combiner fabric that would pull all the colors of the room together. It was practically glow in the dark!!

If your room can take very bright fabric this could work for you, but my room is a bit more subtle than this.

I sure liked it on paper, another good reason to have samples on hand!

Over the years I have found that I seem to gravitate towards medium value colors, not too dark/bright, or too soft/pastel.

During the week of ordering fabric samples I also spent a great deal of time on Pinterest pinning colorful rooms, and going through the process I spoke about earlier in the post.

 I pinned lots of colorful rooms, and dissected them to see where and how much color I could live with in my own personal space.

I found this to be extremely helpful to determine what I truly can live with, and what is just too much for me.

It is a good idea to live with the thought of what you might want to change in your home, and to really look at as many examples of the change that you want to make. 

You will either become more sure of your decisions or you will find you just can’t live with what you thought you could live with.

Decorating of one’s home is a very personal, and costly endeavor so I don’t jump in without caution, and planning.

Again, this looks good on paper. I am still waiting on samples of three of the fabrics, the last one pictured I already have as you saw in my family room picture above.

You will notice in this image I have changed out the yellow graphic pattern.

Something I noticed throughout this process is the yellow seems to go into the mix much more seamlessly than the pink for my personal design aesthetics.

In design we are always learning. One of the many things I love about design, always new fresh, or old ideas revisited. Constantly evolving and changing.

The first three fabrics in this image were fabrics that my friend Sherry from Design Indulgences had pulled together for me several years ago. She probably won't even remember doing this for me.

Even back then she, “GOT,” me. Here is a post I wrote on what Sherry came up with for me out of generosity……just click..HERE!

I have not received the samples in this vignette yet, but I will say that so far this is the most pleasing to my design aesthetics.

So you see my dear readers even we designers/decorators have to go through a process to come up with what will please us in our own homes. 

Personally I try to take as much time with myself as I would with a client. 

Where the difficulty comes into play is with budget constraints, the multitude of options that are out there, and practicality for the way we live. You see I am no different than all of you.

I will keep you all posted on which fabrics make the cut for my room and what I finally decide.

This process has been a lot of fun for me, I thoroughly enjoy sourcing and researching. I never seem to tire of looking and studying at good design.

Here are a list of the different methods I use in helping my clients and myself that you might find helpful as well….

My Style Has Been Confirmed

 ( a fun little quiz to see what style you might gravitate towards)

Likes Or Dislikes

What is Your Design Springboard

Informative Vignette