Dan's Papers - June 5, 2009 - Designer Secrets: Achieving a Professional Look

Do you ever leaf through the pages of interior design magazines and wonder how to apply what you see and admire into your own home? Do you know what you like but don't know how to put it all together? Good interior design is both a learned skill and an intuitive gift combined. There is no substitute for hiring a good professional designer. But, there are a few simple tricks of the trade that anyone can utilize in their homes to achieve more of a "designer" look. If you apply some of these design principles in your own home, you may be inspired and appreciate what professional designers are capable of achieving even more.

There are some fundamental design faux pas that people tend to frequently make. We all have a tendency to be "gatherers" and we love our stuff; it's part of who we are, our memories and our personal possessions are reflections of ourselves. Hence, when it comes to our own homes we can't see the forest for the trees. At times all it takes is a well-trained eye to cull through your belongings, some rearranging and some editing to make major strides towards improving the overall look of your home. Here are some general rules of thumb to get you started.

A well-designed room will have a focal point and larger rooms with multiple entrances will have more than one. A focal point is defined as the central or principal wall you see upon entering a room, or the wall facing the room's dominant flow of traffic. Establishing a focal point will provide order and a sense of balance. It is a starting point, an epicenter for the room. Focal points give the eyes a place of impact at which to start before beginning their visual tour. They help the viewer to maintain a focus, and act like a homing device that can be returned to again and again. If a room lacks a clear focal point, it can make the observer feel chaotic and restless. A well-defined focal point will invite you to linger and enjoy the surroundings in a comfortable and serene environment.

Some focal points occur naturally in a home. They are inherent in the architectural features. Most commonly, these include fireplaces, bookshelves and built-in cabinetry or prominent windows such as bay windows and picture windows or sometimes it's simply one blank wall that begs for an important piece of furniture. These features should always be highlighted and accentuated. Allow them to be the stars. If a room is lacking focal points, you can create your own dramatic points of interest. Center a sofa, armoire, wall unit or any large piece of furniture on the most important wall or alternately use color, artwork or sculpture to emphasize it. Imagine you are setting a stage for a beautiful room. Well-ordered spaces with clear points of interest tend to evoke positive feelings. People are drawn to rooms with successful focal points, as they are ultimately more "livable" environments, which encourage conversation, intimacy and conviviality.

When it comes to designing your home "too much of a good thing" is a common problem. Indeed, less is often more and bigger is frequently better. One really good piece of furniture or art can literally make a room. Clutter, even expensive and tasteful clutter, rarely makes a successfully designed room. Empty (or negative) space is a necessary part of good design, as it gives the eye a place to rest and what you do place in the room becomes more important and more precious. If you invest in one really good piece that you love, you can design a room around it. The same holds true for accessories. There are several key methods to attaining that desired "designer" look when accessorizing a home. Think of accessories as mini focal points on a mantle, bookcase or tablescape. Some important things to consider are: color, height, weight, shape and texture of accessories. A good rule of thumb is to display accessories in odd numbered quantities of one or three, three frequently being the magic number. Try to achieve a harmonious balance and strive for larger more prominent accessories, as weight and drama will create more impact. Keep it simple and elegant. Try varying the heights of objects because accessories that are all on the same plane, unless it is intentional symmetry and architectural, will appear boring. If you are a collector, and not inclined to edit your accessories, group like objects together for more impact rather than spreading them out.

The proper height to hang window treatments may just be the greatest design secret never told. I rarely see draperies hung at the optimal height. Draperies should be mounted as high as possible, directly under the crown molding or at the ceiling. This will pull your eye upward, bring in more natural light and make the room appear larger. Mounting the drapery treatments outside the window (just barely covering the outer frame and extending well beyond the window) can visually extend small-scale windows and create a much grander effect. I recommend never covering any interesting architectural features on windows, such as transoms or arched windows, and striving to follow the architecture. But, please don't mount your window treatments below the transoms or arches, as this visually shortens the space.

Hang your most important and impressive artwork on your focal wall when possible. The bottom portion of the frame of your artwork typically should be placed close to eye level and group your art close together for more impact. Spacing artwork further apart or spreading it out on a large wall is not effective. It will appear under scaled and as if you are trying to "stretch" it. Pairs of prints and groups of three and four are desirable and will create the most impact. On volume walls, strive to bring the eye up by hanging large artwork or groupings to accentuate the volume.

The concepts outlined above are simply some good solid design principles that people are commonly unaware of, or frequently neglect to practice. You can experiment with them. There are also various additional and equally important design principles to explore, including: the use of texture, lighting, color and space planning. These "rules" are good guidelines and will help you to get started but remember, rules are meant to be broken. There is no substitution for creativity.

Allegra Dioguardi is the president of Styled and Sold Home Staging and Interior Design located in Sag Harbor and the author of Styled by Design, A Guide to the Design Principles of Home Staging. Visit her Web site at styledandsold.com. Contact Allegra at styledandsold@optimum.net.