Okay, I’m a week behind watching Top Design ( thanks be to DVR ) so I just caught the window display collaboration episode with the former Project Runway contestants. Oh how I love when Bravo mixes and matches their reality stars- genius!
What caught my eye this week was the display created by Andrea and Preston for PR’s Daniel. Though the design did not take home the prize ( it came in second ), their choice of colors to surround Daniels awesomely bright yellow gown received kudos from the judges and had me jumping for joy in my pajamas.
It reminded me just how much I love the combination of a muted purple, gray, black and yellow. It immediately brought to mind an apartment that was featured in the May issue of Domino magazine- interestingly enough designed by actress Julianne Moore for her wardrobe stylist- that at the time had really caught my eye.
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In the third episode of “Top Design” the designers were challenged to create a cabana inspired by one of three famous resort locales: Miami, Tahiti, and St. Tropez.
Felicia, Andrea, and Michael were victorious this week with a Tahitian cabana and their choice of a neutral palette while not extremely creative may have spared them the harsh criticism that the other two teams suffered.
When the judges viewed the finished projects Team St. Tropez and Team Miami received low marks largely due to poor color choices. Team St. Tropez built an innovative structure but lost points for choosing a brick red that was too dark and didn’t speak of their exotic beach destination.
The judges also had positive comments about Team Miami’s cabana but couldn’t get past the color scheme of acid green and purple. The judges didn’t see it as a color choice that would be at home among the pastel sherbert hues of Miami and in the end Team Miami lost the challenge “largely due to the horrible color which was your (Elizabeth’s) choice,” said the judges.
Elizabeth’s tearful departing words say it all. “I just wish I didn’t go out with ugly colors”
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This week the Bravo channel premiered their new reality show “Top Design”. I have to admit, being a huge fan of home decorating magazines, I have been anticipating it’s first broadcast. After all, how often do we get to hear interior designers and editors of prestiges publications openly discuss what makes or breaks good design.
Up until now this forum has been pretty much been cornered by the fashion industry with shows like Bravo’s own hugely successful “Project Runway” and E’s “Fashion Police” plus a bevy of stylists and fashion editors on every news magazine show talking about the latest and greatest hot trend.
I eagerly tuned in to find out how some of today’s top interior stylemakers—Margaret Russell, Editor-IN-Chief of Elle Decor, L.A’s top interior Stylista Kelly Wearstler, mod home product designer Jonathan Adler and former fashion designer turned home furnishing designer extroadinaire, Todd Oldham—would judge and advise a cast of hopeful designers in the world of successful high style.
The cast, which runs the gamat of ages, experiences and client lists, were challenged to team up and design a room that could act as an inter-sanctum for a “mystery client”. They were then presented with a handful of objects sent over by the mystery client as a means to visually communicate to them his/her taste and personality. The design inspirations items included a vintage t.v. set, a white figure painted on black velvet canvas, a large wooden Asian doll head, a framed exotic butterfly, and a disco ball.
Now I realize that designing a space for a client without a preliminary meeting could be quite difficult, even when it includes a budget of $50,000, access to the prestigious Pacific Design Center and a skilled carpenter but what seemed to be the most daunting task was defining exactly what an inner sanctum is and where in a home it should be located for someone you’ve never met.
Some teams thought it was a bedroom , to others it was a sitting room, and to one team it was simply a sparse room furnished with only a slightly cushioned deco-inspired swing onto which this person could rest their weary bones after what might have been a long night at the local disco.
While the six teams all had different ideas as to what type of space constitutes a personal sanctuary for this obviously eclectic client the one thing they did all agree upon was COLOR.
Each team chose a neutral palette and although the colors weren’t exaclty the same the overall effect was strikingly similar. Even with brightly colored object as their source of inspiration, the designers all knew that even the wildest of personality would find these soft neutral colors to be calming and relaxing.
Rather than focus on what they might have assumed were the mystery client’s personal color preferences based on the inspiration objects they drew upon their understanding of the effect of color.
While color likes and dislikes are very individual there are many physical and emotional effects of color that have consistently been proven to evoke particular responses and in this case the designers used colors that they knew would produce feelings of calm and quiet.
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