I've been thinking about this for almost a year now and, truth be told, I wrote this post in about February or March of 2023, got busy, and never posted it.
I've found myself in a reflective head space over the past couple months and I've been thinking of my relationship with design. I've noticed how my own tastes have changed and evolved. These changes have largely gone hand-in-hand with my stage in life. In my twenties, I loved all things ultra modern. In my thirties, I started out with a fairly moody esthetic and finished out loving all things light and bright (with a hint of moodiness). Now, I'm feeling another transition that I first described as a more "timeless design". Then I got to thinking....
Does timeless design really exist in residential design?
I humbly submit to you that it does not! (That felt formal! Haha!)
I feel like the idea that something is "timeless" makes it easier to sell - we feel better about our investment if we think that nobody will consider it to be dated in 20 years. The truth of the matter is that the houses that are being designed today will show what era they were from in 20 or 30 years. I was chatting about this the other day with a friend who works in the industry. She brought up the McAllister's house in "Home Alone". While the architecture is classic (note: we can still kind of tell when it was built but it's always in style"), the interiors that we swooned over in the 90s (puffy floral valences AND floral wallpaper?! YES PLEASE!!! IT LOOKS GREAT WITH THE TILED COUNTERTOPS!") were ditched faster than Kevin McAllister whenever his parents left town.
So what does this mean for us now??? Are we just doomed to make choices that we'll grow out of? Welllllll, in a way, yes, because we're always evolving and so are our tastes. But there's hope. We can take note of the styles that we've always been drawn to. I know that's easy for me to say because I'm pretty sure that I started taking note of design in the hospital when I was born. (Yellow exterior?! Ooooh, interesting!) What colours will we always love? I know that even though dark green cabinets are trendy right now, I would love them in my own kitchen for a looooong time because I've always loved dark green. Even though I like a kitchen that's white-on-white-on-white, I might be the kind of person who would tire of it. I feel the same way about a velvet sofa. This might have something to do with my childhood home having had a velvet sofa but oh baby, I just love them, and probably always will.
Over the past few years of my life I've learned the best thing ever: that reward never shows up without risk. When designing your home, you might want to choose something that's not the "safe" choice but get scared away because you're investing a lot of money and want to keep things safe. But there's no such thing as "safe" when your house might look like a bowl of oatmeal because you chose the "safe" choices (unless you get tremendous comfort from oatmeal, haha!)
So here's the shameless plug... Designers know where you can branch out and take a risk and where you should probably stick with the safe choice. I get to know you and your family to help you assess that risk to help you feel so comfy with it.
I know that design can be scary because it's so closely tied to your biggest investment but just like choosing a car, an outfit, a friend, or even a partner, sometimes a little risk carries with it a lot of reward.