New Vintage
Eclectic design is rooted in artistic freedom, respect for the environment and a family budget
By Joanna Dehn Beresford 07/15/2010
My sister says that she never thinks about style or genre when she makes decorating decisions or purchases. She just knows what she likes. I call her style paradigm an amalgam of Victorian plush, New York City sophistication, and small-town Ohio comforts. There’s really no name for her quirky, complex approach to homemaking, but it happens to represent eclecticism, a current trend in design philosophy.
Tamara Kaye-Honey, owner and principal designer of House of Honey, a design studio and showroom in South Pasadena, has coined a phrase for her design concepts: New Vintage. Tamara loves to find vintage pieces — chairs, lamps, accessories — and give them new life. She mixes objects from the 1940s, the ’60s and the ’80s, and reinvents them with fresh, unexpected flair. Clients seek her out for simple, singular pieces, like a renovated coffee table, as well as for full makeovers of rooms and residences. They like her product and her sensibilities because both defy current classification and the unusual aesthetics give people an opportunity to feel that they’ve found something personal, unique.
One designer I spoke with recently explained that she used to spend all of her time trying to make a client’s home look just like the house next door, and maybe even a little better, newer or more expensive. Now, she says, the opposite is true. Most of her clients want to distinguish themselves from their neighbors or peers, in pursuit of singular and surprising design elements.
Paula English, owner of Fancy That in San Marino, avoids the word “trend” altogether. She prefers the term “au courant,” which refers to the evolutionary nature of the design and decor marketplace. Like Kaye-Honey, Paula’s primary goal as a designer is to listen to her clients, perhaps visit their homes, and suss out the essence of their taste, their lifestyle and, of course, their budget. Like Tamara’s House of Honey, Fancy That includes a generous array of unusual products, old, new and refurbished. She runs a bridal registry, and she loves to bring in fresh, seasonal products to the store. Presently she’s representing a super-cool line of flip-flops for women called Switch Flops, for women, created by Lindsay Phillips. She also carries a line of watches called STAMPS, which can be worn as necklaces or wristwatches. And she has incorporated other personal and home decor items from Europe and elsewhere that are classical, fun and varied.
Seasonal splashes are always a delight. Yellow, in all its glowing shades, brightens up a home and reflects both vibrancy of summer and a much-needed spirit of hope and optimism. The spirit of summer can also be captured in beachy tones and fabrics, like neutral backgrounds with bright splashes of color. Of course, holidays always provide a palette and theme for decorating, but incidentally, Independence Day is over, in case you hadn’t noticed, so you may want to retire patriotic colors and iconography until next year.
In a separate seasonal note, I should mention that, while patriotic themes and colors consistently offer a general design theme for Americans in the months of June and July, this tendency is regional and personal. Last week I was draping red, white and blue scarves across the walls of our family room, preparing for a Fourth of July family gathering and photo shoot. My daughter sat on the couch, offering a few comments and texting her vast coterie of friends and family. In all innocence, she sent her Scottish cousins a “Happy Fourth of July!” greeting, to which they responded: “Thanks. But the Fourth of July isn’t much of a big deal here.” A learning moment if I ever I stumbled across one.
In any case, regionalism is usually surpassed by individualism at its purest. My nieces’ father, my brother, doesn’t care much about the grand view of interior design — patriotic, seasonal or otherwise. Their home overflows with his framed photography, sailing and fishing gear, ski equipment, books and musical instruments and mementos from abroad. Add several pets, a busy kitchen, lots of windows, natural light and youthful paraphernalia, and you pretty much get the flavor. It’s definitely eclectic, and personally, I love the feel of the place.
The eclectic approach to interior design satisfies eco-minded homeowners because, by definition, an aesthetic theme that draws from both the old and the new includes the reuse of found and reclaimed materials, from refurbished chairs and chandeliers to revamped lamps and tableware, polished street signs and driftwood coffee tables. Some day this approach to design may look cohesive and quantifiable, the same way that past design proclivities have. For now, however, the premise of eclectic design feels rooted in an appetite for boundless artistic freedom, respect for the environment and a family budget, and a concerted effort to discover what's beautiful among the clutter that surrounds and precedes us.
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