The architecture of windows

Photo from Better Homes and Gardens

Ah summer is here!  Kids are out of school and the days are long. It is so easy to forget about the interiors of our homes when the focus is on the outdoors. We can bring summer into our homes by lighting things up. Light and airy window treatments are an excellent way to achieve this feel. Pick some flowers from the garden put in simple glass vases scatter around house.  Paint can be your secret weapon. Paint a chair or table a summery color. Open up the windows and enjoy the evening air.

When it comes to decorating your home, it feels that there are a million things to do, and a million places to start.  Somehow, in the middle of this major to-do list, one area of interest is often neglected – your windows.

Windows today come in all shapes and sizes and are often beautiful focal points by their own right – and yet so often we fail to dress or enhance them to really offset their beauty and bring the outside in.  It takes a very special window with a very special view to stand on its own, and not every window is up to the task.
Knowing just what to do with a window can be a problem in itself, and often the easy way out is to do nothing at all.  Unfortunately, this can leave a room feeling unfinished – as though you forgot to complete your design project – and can actually detract from the overall feel for the room you are trying to achieve.

Things to Consider:

The function of your window
What does this window need?  Think LIPs – Light Control, Insulation and Privacy. Read more

From inspiration to motivation

Photo from Country Living

Steps to creating inspiring spaces:

This is a guide line to help with your design process. These steps will work for any type of room, the example below is guest room.   This time of year another ares to think about is your outdoor living area. There are so many wonderful indoor outdoor fabrics and great furniture  available you can really get creative.

1.      Start with an item that you love. Look around your room – what might you find?  For example, maybe a white painted wicker chair with a pink stripe cushion.  And maybe the fabric on the cushion is not your taste, but you have great memories of picking out the fabric with your mother, so the chair and fabric are going to stay.

2.      Select fabric. Because fabric is so diverse, from casual to formal and every little thing in between, the fabric itself can guide you to the rest of the room choices.   For this room example, it was important that the new fabric choices work with the stripe of the wicker chair, yet allow for moving in a different direction. Read more