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.

More on the show   

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