Sally and I spent late Friday afternoon at the Boston Design Center zeroing in on final selections for our vignette. We begin installation the week of May 7. We saw two very different console tables at Charles Spada’s show room and I’m struggling as to which one to use. The decision is made more complicated because mid way thru the show, Sally and I are presenting a home styling seminar. During the seminar, we will transform our Belgian style vignette to a fresh modern take on a living room by changing out the rug, artwork and accessories. This console is quite neutral, making it an easy backdrop to the accessories and artwork when we do the seminar. What it doesn’t make is that big bold statement, anchoring the vignette for the opening Gala event. Will accessories be enough???

Our vignette will be the first space visitors will see upon entering the show gallery and this console, made from architectural salvage from the 18th and 19th century, has the wow I’m looking for.

I love how it relates to the brackets that Payne Bouchier is making for us. (Great residential builder!) And it will look fabulous in any photograph! However, I’m concerned it will make doing the modern feel very difficult because it is such a bold piece. The transformation has to be believable in the eyes of those attending…

What would you do?

Cheers,

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One clear singular thought emerged in my mind as I worked on Sally’s and my living room design vignette for this May’s Wenham Museum Show House. While color fashions and trends come and go each year, neutrals have a staying power that can not be denied, regardless of style or period.

They can be used as a neutral background against which a designer develops and expresses his or her details and color color palette, as in this project done by Boston’s own Richard Fitzgerald. (New England Home, July/August 2009, Interior designer, Richard Fitzgerald, Photographer, Michael Paternio)

Brooke and Steve Giannetti us neutrals as a stylistic and lifestyle expression. (Veranda, July/August 2011, Interior design  by Brooke and Steve Giannetti, Photography by Steve Giannetti and Lisa Romerein)

English interior designer John Carter shows us we don’t have to stick to whites. We can use browns, dark taupes – even wallpaper with wonderful success.  (2009 The English Home magazine, Interior design by John Carter, month of issue and photographer unknown)

Here’s an eclectic/modern living room done in 2008, an artful collaboration between the owners and Tate + Burns Architects. (New England Home, September/October2008, Interior deign a collaboration between the owner and Tate+Burns, Architects, Photography by Michael Paternio)

Finally, a page from John Saladino’s book Style, published in 2000.

What do you think of neutrals. Classic? Boring?

How do you use them?

Cheers,