Vern Yip with our Market Editor, Stacy Kendall
Imagine three different clients who are in different stages of their lives: What would your advice be to a young couple buying their first house? They still have furniture from college, not enough of it, and they’re combining styles. Where do you begin?
I think when you’re first starting out and combining, you need to make the best use of what’s existing. Identify what you have and combine it in the best way possible. Paint is your best friend because it’s a unifying factor—it can pull together a disparate collection, or supplant art. If you don’t have great art, you should go for a bold paint color, because it can act as a focal point and distract from an empty wall. As you begin to acquire more art and greater things, you want your eye to be less distracted from your walls you want them to become more neutral. Save up to buy one thing at a time. The biggest mistake young couples make is trying to evenly distribute their resources, and not one thing is especially good quality, and down the road, you have to buy everything again. It’s wasteful and costly. You don’t have to buy everything at once.
What would you say to someone with young children, perhaps some dogs or cats, who is afraid of buying anything "nice?"
You can have an incredible, sophisticated room, and have kids and dogs. Just plan accordingly. It needs to be a marriage of function and aesthetics. There are great materials out there now like indoor/outdoor fabrics that I use for upholstery all the time. Ultrasuede is also practical. Look for furniture that has plenty of closed storage—an ottoman that will supplant your coffee table. Set aside designated areas for your kids to be free. Growing up, I had to learn to live with nice things, and I learned to be respectful of them.
How about for an older couple who may be downsizing, or they want to update their existing space.
If you have the ability and the money, change the light fixtures. It makes a huge difference and it doesn’t doesn’t take up any space. Another great refresher is artwork. It has the ability to enrich your life, it doesn’t take up square footage and you can take it from one house to another. If you buy things that speak to you emotionally, and have investment potential, it’s a great place to park your money. Photography is the last accessible part of the art market. Make a good investment in a wonderful piece that speaks to you.
Can you give an example of a particular client’s design problem that you think was solved especially well on your show? What is your latest design triumph?
The last episode on Deserving Design, Joe Cook was a River Keeper—he cleaned up the river in his backyard. He was also really into photography and he was using his living room and dining room as a gallery, so people were coming into his house and buying pieces off the wall. That left holes in the collection, as well as holes in the wall. We did a picture rail in his dining room, so now as he sells his art, he can easily replace them. That is a small example of a solution to suit a client’s specific needs. People think a designer is supposed to create a “signature stamp” so you know right away who designed something. That’s not how I define a useful and successful designer.
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