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,

Sally and I are going through our annual “Let’s purge the office!” thing these days, which often triggers a cycle of reflection on my part. The usual where have we been, where are we going kind of thing – both as a family and as a business. I find it keeps me fresh. (And occasionally drives Sally crazy…) In spite of my best efforts, over the past year my desk area had become quite cluttered with stacks of design magazines and it was time to de-clutter. Rather than stack them neatly in another area of the office, (It’s a very clever trick – kind of like pushing a large pile of dirt from one side of the yard to the other, all the while trying to convince yourself that what you’re doing is actually constructive…) I decided it was time to go through them, cutting out the articles and pictures that I found to be of interest. I’m glad I did…

Which brings me to another thing I occasionally wonder about, that being, “What ever happened to all the professors I had in design school? Where are they now? What are they doing?” As a student at Cornell’s College of Human Ecology, I was very fotunate.  The Design and Enviromental Anaylysis Department was blessed with a group of absolutely brilliant professors – “Crazy” Jane Van Alstyne (She helped design the ’63 Split Window Corvette.), Alan “If it moves, chrome it.” Bushnell, Joe Koncelick, Steve Mensch, Michael Boyd, the list goes on… Do you ever wonder about a former professor or mentor?

Well, I found Steve Mensch, published in  Architectural Digest’s 2006 June issue. I couldn’t believe it! As a professor, he was always a little larger than life in what he did, how he spoke, carried and presented himself. And he was a ruthless critic in the studio classes he taught. I always wanted to prove him wrong!

His severe classic modernist approach to design and architecture seems to have softened somewhat with time. Not surprisingly, he is still thinking on a grand scale, similar to the old Adirondack Great Camps. This is his residence, located in the Catskill Mountains, north of New York City or as AD says, his family compound.

Here’s the link to the story in AD. (The entire issue is full of gorgeous projects.)

Cheers,