Accessorize to Please the Eye and the Soul
How do you accessorize your home to have it be pleasing to the eye? How do you enjoy the pieces that you’ve collected or accumulated over the years from family, travel or that you’ve collected and have it look like it all works together?
It’s a question we’ve all asked ourselves and tried to deal with forever.
I’ve had many clients come to me and ask to have professional help with organizing their accessories..What should they do??? It’s always harder to see it ourselves than it is to have someone else look at it with an objective eye. I guess it’s like the old saying “can’t see the forest for the trees” there’s just too many trees!
My first response is usually “less is more” when someone asks me to help arrange their treasures”. By minimizing the sheer number of pieces that will make the most immediate impact! De-cluttering will always clear the atmosphere and the energy of a room right away. Since all objects carry energy and the way they are placed in relationship to one another and in the room creates a synergy, its’ very important to understand what the impact is to our well being and state of mind as well. It’s not just our eyes that are affected, but the paths of energy can be blocked too by clutter and misaligned clutter. Some of us cannot work until we clean our desks off or straighten up a room that we plan on working in. There is a sensitivity to all objects that affects us whether we are aware of it or not. Some use Feng Shei to think about this way of organizing, but I feel it as a vibration or a “dis-harmony”….
So, the most common mistake made in accessorizing, in my opinion, is organizing pieces in an evenly spaced manor, on a wall, a shelf or anywhere where accessories are placed on display. This “balanced” design creates a “more” cluttered and unnatural design to a room that is unsettling to the mind’s eye.
By taking all of the same items and “grouping” them in arrangements that balance one another it calms the senses and becomes more of a “natural’ balance. Nothing in the natural world is actually symmetrical, but may look that way to our logical mind.
Using color and like objects to create a “story” with our pieces helps to make sense of all these details. For instance, I have a friend who collects arrowheads and stones. She groups them artistically in shadowboxes and hangs them on her walls or places the boxes in interesting ways around her house with other like objects such as feathers, photos and moccasins. It creates an interesting journey of the imagination looking through all these special treasures she has collected along her journeys in life.
Another example where homeowners become overzealous is in hanging family photos. Put all the photos in one area, grouped together. In a hallway or a staircase is a great use of that space. By framing the images in complimentary frames and not a mish-mash of colored and metal frames, it really cleans up the whole presentation.
Please remove and dried flower arrangement over a year old….just a big dust collector. We do re-arrangements for people who what to update the floral decorations and we have a top notch floral designer, Noel Knower who has worked at Sierra design Studio for almost 12 years.
The scale of decorations is critical as well. Using large walls and spaces effectively takes imagination and the use of items that really fit the space. It does not compliment a room or the décor to have out of scale pieces throwing off the balance of the room.
So, de -clutter, group, recycle and enjoy the free flowing grace that will flow through your home with the right action and placement of all you treasured belongings.
If you need help, ask a professional!
