Changes In Design: You Are The Change —
With the New Year in full swing, we find ourselves thinking about change. “What changes should I make this year?” “New Year; new me?” As Turnstylists we’re pondering the changes in our industry. “What’s changed in interior design?”
Power to the people is where we start on this one! So much has changed over the past few years in the way homeowners have become involved in the design of their own spaces. This is largely due to a multitude of offerings such as the choice among home décor stores, stalwarts like HGTV, and of course the pin-ability of Pinterest, and the beauty of looking through Houzz or Instagram.
So, what does this mean for the changes in home design? How can one update? How can you keep your finger on the pulse? Well, get your coffee, sit down a minute and let’s get into what you love. Here’s your opportunity to dare more.
The evolution of more accessible content in home design has put you in the right place to better get to know your style and individualism. Though it sounds obvious; the real question begs: what do you love and what do you like to surround yourself with? It may seem like an easy question, but somehow most of us only half answer it. We try to assess what we gravitate toward and then get lost at the first decision to make.
Our rule at Turnstyle is to ask – “what did you love most as a child?”
We ask this of all of our clients, not because we think a person’s style hasn’t evolved, but because we know that’s where it started – unabashedly so. As you stop to think and linger on what you consider to be your style, ask yourself these three questions:
What was my favorite thing from my room growing up?
What would I most like to pass on to my child?
Where do I see something in my home that unequivocally makes me smile each time I see it?
These are the starter clues to knowing which design you tend toward. This shift in offering more explicit information is a change in design that really helps answer those questions. Seek your individualism with it and go for your own moniker of what to call it.
For the past decade, I have seen all sorts of named categories of style in design – Modern, Mid-Century, Industrial and so on. While I think they serve as helpful clues to convey a sense of what one loves, I do always encourage folks to think beyond them. Combine them, borrow parts from them, tailor them to your own functional and lifestyle related needs.
There is no need to live purely by the bounds of minimalism, if you like only the paired down, well-edited side of it, but dislike how cold and impersonal it can sometimes get. Similarly, the term ‘Rustic’ has become so terribly broad, that these days it largely depends on what part of the country you live in to determine what it might mean to most.
By identifying the answers to the questions above, you can begin to build your own profile and name it whichever amalgam most suits. Then work with yourself, piece by piece, space by space and tackle it satisfyingly. Or, find a good designer to serve as your guide. With this shift in information, you can better convey to a trusted professional what you are trying to accomplish and get it right the first time.
Similarly, you may take the in between route and try a design in a box service. Our clients who love to go at it alone, but need the reassuring guidance of a pro, swear by our version of this. Turnstyle’s Your Turn, prepares you for just that – to make it your own turn.
So take a moment, sit down with paper and pen and define what you love. From there, the exploration of the design world and what information is these days much more readily at your fingertips, will serve you very well. This New Year, be the change – change the way you look at design and identify yourself in it.
