Meaningful Spaces through Design

Being masterful at playing with design trends is what brought me to writing to you each week. Creating the spirit in the way a house is meant to be enjoyed is a good goal for design. This week’s article offers how to begin to capture the spirit inside a home. Each home is unique in this way. That means that understanding the place where the home is located is important. Understanding how you want to feel inside the home is an important part of design in the place the home was built.

TIMELESS MEANS IT WILL LOOK GREAT FOR YEARS TO COME

The word timeless is being used in overabundance as homes come available on the market. I believe that to achieve this forever feeling is to root designs in materials that also might be referred to as tireless. I do like to introduce current trends, but do so carefully by adding them in easy-to-refresh accessories and elements that can offer an opportunity to change them in the future. Reclaimed and repurposed components of a home add depth and history and should be purposeful. Adding something spectacular like marble countertops provides the sustainability that we look for when we term a home as timeless.

SPACE TO LIVE

Practical features are especially important if you plan to enjoy life in the home space. Useful space is especially appreciated by all buyers since the recent pandemic. This means that you have comfortable places for yourself and for inviting guests into the home.

Special collection spaces have become something that homeowners are appreciating as a feature of the homes they admire. Collections, when properly displayed, speak to the way life is appreciated and often represents bringing favorite places traveled or places remembered into the home.

Floor finishes are especially important in these enjoyable spaces. The way that a home leads you in walking through it can be enhanced by flooring that feels good to the spirit.

STYLE AND IMPACT

Style can be developed and personalized as you go through the process of creating your designed space. I always recommend patience and flexibility in the process of making a home a designed space whether you are moving walls or simply trying to enjoy the space better or trying to prepare the space for a new owner. Sometimes something unexpected happens as you go. Preparing yourself for an unexpected event such as realizing that you really do get some great sunlight through a particular window that was previously covered up or finding more electrical and plumbing in a wall than was anticipated will bring underutilized spaces to their best use.

Starting a project by understanding what it is that you already have that you love is the most important part of any design project. When it is clear that something is loved, it creates energy that translates choppy rooms, chunky odd-placed furniture, and old-outdated features into a new and fresh space for life and living. Loved pieces and features of a home become amazing when they are moved to their best space. Then, the space becomes the best place for the people of the home to enjoy. It sounds simple. Taking one step at a time helps the process.

It can help to walk through a room with three different colored post-it notes. Place one color of the post it notes on anything that provides depth and history to the home. These are the elements that I would seek to enhance and build upon to create sustainability to the form and function of the home.

The next color post it notes goes onto items that you need in your spaces to enjoy. These items might be books or art or a collection of woven blankets. Spaces which feature these items give character to the home.

The last or third color post it notes is for stylish décor that you like and want as a layer within the home. Design happens in layers. Stylish components might be light fixtures or a rug or a lamp. These are the items that sometimes need new life brought into them, but can become fun, personalized features to the home that enhance spaces and can trend spaces forward.

You will see that some colored post it notes belong together. This is how you begin to capture the spirit of the home.

Call me at 360.635.1121 or email me atDianneMorrisHomes@gmail.com to learn more about how to best mix your loved things with new design elements to best list as well as to create your new, most-loved home.