Trust Your Own Spontaneous Creativity When Using Color in Your Home

(ARA) - If you’re looking for permission to love color again -- here’s the visual nourishment you’ve been thirsting for.
     Today’s lively hues aren’t just for clothing and magazine spreads. Color and pattern can make anyone’s surroundings more interesting, personal, and vivid, says artisan, designer, and innovative colorist, Susan Sargent, who lives in a mango, lime, and violet world of vibrant as well as subtle color.
     Sargent, who honed her colorist’s eye mixing dyes in a Swedish textile mill for four years, is a firm believer in empowering others to work comfortably with color, even if that means letting go of inhibitions.
     Being creative with your home requires taking chances, expressing yourself, and staying relaxed enough to follow through on your instincts, says Sargent. “Play, experiment, have fun,” she urges. “Don’t be afraid to make mistakes.”
     Decorating for Sargent is not starting out with a grand scheme, but trying out ideas as they occur and time permits -- in an afternoon or over a weekend -- one corner at a time. “Home can be an ever-evolving stage for personal expression as well as a haven to relax and recharge,” Sargent believes.

Forget “The Rules”
     So, if you’re one of those who can’t seem to find the time to create a “grand plan,” if a cookie cutter designer look is intimidating or turns you off, or if your own personal design style just seems to “happen,” a piece at a time ... it’s okay. Give in to spontaneous self-expression and do-it-yourself creativity, says Sargent. Use a piece of furniture in a new way (dressers make striking buffets or add class to an entryway, for instance), or use paint and fabric to experiment with new looks, new colors.
     Looking for inspiration? Pay attention to color in the world around you, recommends Sargent. Which ones catch your eye? Which combinations please, surprise, or excite you? Sargent’s own inspirations include her vibrant Vermont landscape as well as Scandinavian folk art, and such design predecessors as Sweden’s Carl Larsson and Britain’s William Morris and Laura Ashley. Finally, forget the rules:

* Recognize that, like you, your home is a work in progress -- never finished, never perfect.
* Don’t fret about planning down to the last detail. Start with an inspiration and have the fun of following your instincts.
* Open your eyes to color. Trust your own tastes (not those of the palette police) and experiment when combining colors.
* Be flexible. Mix styles. Create visual surprises.
* Edit your belongings; surround yourself only with things you love to have around you.
* If you can’t find what you want, make it, paint it, strip it, fake it.
* Create a home that makes you smile when you walk in the door.

Paint Tips: Experiment

For those inspired to pick up a brush and experiment, Sargent offers a couple of tips to get you started:
* Expect to test several shades of a color before you find the one that’s just right. Be brave, think in color.
* If debating between several shades of a color, go with the lighter shade first. The paint store can simply add more pigment to bring it to the next darker shade -- and save you the expense of buying another quart of paint.
* Be sure to test your color on different walls and during various times of day. This is easily done by painting a large poster board that can be moved from place to place.
     A look around Sargent’s own eclectically decorated home and studio in bucolic and naturally colorful Vermont shows that color enlivens any decorating style, from classic to modern to flea market find. Her imaginative use of color and furnishings is the inspiration for a growing array of products she is designing for the home -- and a wonderful motivation to try mixing styles, textures, and colors to get the look you want.
     Her soft modern yet classic Susan Sargent furniture line (see it at www.lexington.com) celebrates design, proportion, and rich color, both in its sophisticated dark chocolate finish and a more relaxed honeycomb finish. With typical Sargent eclecticism, a few playful notes relax the otherwise sophisticated ensemble, including several handpainted accent pieces, a vine-etched table top, and a freeform, wave-like bed. The clean-lined furniture provides a stylistic yet neutral canvas for energetic, Sargent-designed fabrics, rugs, and pillows. And now she’s at work on another furniture collection, Fresh Air, with a relaxed cottage feel, expected to be in stores by fall 2003.
     Throughout her abodes -- as well as her designs -- is evidence of Sargent’s recognition that our homes, like our lives, are ever changing, that furnishings should be versatile, able to change with our needs, that colors we liked yesterday can easily be turned into colors that feel right today.
     To see more, take a look at Sargent’s recently released book, Susan Sargent’s New Country Color: The Art of Living, co-authored with Jake Chapline http://www.lexington.com/brand_susansargent.cfm

Courtesy of ARA Content