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Home Sweet Home
Interior designers talk trends |
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Written by Amanda Ryder
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When it comes to home décor, interior designers are a great source of information and a potentially powerful teammate for you, the florist. Interior designers create beautiful living spaces that complement your flowers. Knowing what trends are popular in consumer homes will help you position your floral designs as the perfect home décor accessory. We talked with two Canadian interior design firms to see what trends are happening in the design world and learn how you can take advantage.
Carol Reed of Carol Reed Interior Design Inc. in Toronto (carolreeddesign.com) says she’s seeing more diversity in interior style than ever before. There’s a push for personalization in the home and a pull away from a cookie cutter style approach to suit all. “With this desire for more personalized spaces there is also much more interest in investing in longevity and quality,” says Reed.
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Flowering branches are popular in the world of home decor. This look speaks to the trend of bringing nature inside.
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Right now, Reed says grey, purple, orange, gold, turquoise and chartreuse are all hot hues dominating the home sector. Kevin Gray, associate, and Jane Dolyny, interior designer, both from Sizeland Evans Interior Design Residential Studio in Calgary (www.sizelandevans.com ) echo this finding. Dolyny says grey was announced as an “in” colour in early January and that continues on into late 2009 and 2010. The hue has moved from a cool grey to a warmer shade. “What’s driving the grey, interestingly enough, is the economic climate,” says Gray. “Greys used to be cooler as a neutral, which can be interpreted as depressing, so they’ve warmed it up a little.” Dolyny says gold is also popular but in a slightly burnished hue, not a yellowy, brassy gold. Purple is here to stay in quite a few colour ranges, with the exception of a colder, blue-purple which is on its way out.
Looking at the texture side of things, Reed says home materials and textures range from natural, organic, artisan and hand-crafted to repurposed or secondhand items. There’s a mix of the old with the new and people are welcoming tradition. “People are spending more time at home and making the home a refuge – a place to destress and rejuvenate,” says Reed. Homeowners are seeking out what gives them pleasure and what protects them and incorporating these things into their homes. The current trend is all about having a healthy environment to live in, eating healthy using herbs, spices, organic foods and improving our well-being through the use of aromatherapy.
Reed says florists can use this emphasis on the home as a sensory experience to market flowers to their consumers. “Flowers enhance any space and are truly enjoyed by men, women and children, both visually and with their scent. Smell is our strongest memory of spaces or places we’ve been,” says Reed. From a marketing standpoint, she says florists could associate flowers or foliage with aromatherapy, stress the healing benefits of flowers or associate flowers with moods or a current colour trend – there are endless possibilities.
There’s no doubt that flowers have a strong place in the home and a positive effect on interior design. “There’s nothing better than walking into a beautiful home and smelling something you can attribute to a real living thing,” says Gray. Reed also believes in the power of flowers. “To me, a house is not a home without fresh flowers or foliage. Despite how many thousands have been spent on renovations or new furniture, a space is just flat and lifeless without those flowers or greenery,” says Reed. “From a design point of view, flowers are an easy way to create instant ambiance and to add texture, height, colour or form.”
The economy and the everlasting going green trend have influenced floral accents in the home and Reed cites many examples of this. She’s seeing more large, wild branches (both bare and with blooms), casual bunches of untrimmed flowers to illustrate a “garden cutting” look, and lots of long lasting greens like mosses, wild grasses, succulents, topiaries and herbs and indoor gardens. Reed says interior designers typically gravitate towards a simple floral accent. “Over and over again, you’ll see designers and stylists clearly have a preference for single-bloom arrangements or groupings of single-colour blooms. They’re simple but dramatic. And the potted orchid is going as strong as ever. You can hardly turn a page in any magazine without seeing an orchid or multiple orchids on display.”
Gray appreciates when florists incorporate the unexpected into their designs and references a recent example where he saw one floral designer use kale in the base of a design. “I really like to see when florists use humble material like vegetables in flower arrangements.” He has a preference for flowers that aren’t overdone and feature a more natural look.
In the world of design, the containers you put the flowers in can be just as important as the blooms themselves. Reed says bottle vases, vintage jars, coloured glass, beaker-shaped vases and blue and white porcelain are all looks that are in at the moment. She uses lots of clear glass vases and containers because they are readily available in many different shapes and sizes. She advises florists not to “limit yourself to vases and to be creative. You can put a bloom in almost anything.” Her rule of thumb is that the container has to suit the style and personality of the room and has to be the proper size and shape for the stems.
Dolyny and Gray say the trends towards repurposing, recycling and regenerating have all had an impact on containers. “It’s not necessarily a container as a traditional container anymore,” says Gray. “It’s trying to reuse something in a different way or tease the eye and the imagination rather than just simply having a container with a flower in it.” Dolyny encourages florists to take a quirky approach and combine a number of containers or products to create a design. The two designers also advise florists to seek out creative-looking vessels to help distinguish the shop’s style from others and add a new twist to the flowers.
When it comes to working with interior designers, florists shouldn’t be afraid to extend the olive branch. Gray says in his experience florists don’t typically seek them out, but it might be a great approach if the florist’s style mirrors that of the interior design firm’s. “They could market their service by showing us a couple of examples of what they could do,” says Gray. “Go specifically to those interior designers they feel their product is most suited to and they’ll probably have a higher degree of success.” He says teaming up with an interior designer can be a great partnership for both parties. “Interior designers can be a fantastic source for these florists in expanding their business. Interior designers deal with residential clients so we can help them expand their database.” Sounds like a relationship that was designed to fit.
Resources:
Home trends can change frequently, making it difficult to keep up with what’s in fashion. Gray reveals a few secrets to seeking out style. “Where a florist could get some good stuff is to check out bathroom tile shops, believe it or not. Because most of these tiles come out of Europe a lot of the tiles are what they can look at in terms of inspiration.” He also lists the following websites as great trend information sources:
Color Marketing Group - www.colormarketing.org
Trendir – www.trendir.com
Maison&Objet – www.maison-objet.com
Decorex International 2009 – www.decorex.com
100%Design – www.100percentdesign.co.uk
Trendhunter – www.trendhunter.com
Veranda – www.veranda.com
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