Homey Design With Creative Inspiration
Artists think differently. I will admit we end up in the same category with musicians and people say we are all a bit crazy. Nevertheless artistic expression is not limited to art.
In fact a little bit of crazy from the artistic mind can help give you a comfortable homey design free of clutter and mess. Its about a lot more than just cleaning house.
Home styling needs to be done your way but also the right way.
I need to use someone in the blog world. I actually like this person and their content so believe me I am not trying to start a blog war. So no worries.
The content in the advise given is what I like. Yet we need to break free of something and bad habits that have formed over time.
Here enters Casey at The DIY Playbook. She is one of the better bloggers out there. Her ideas are sound yet we need to see the problem with our modern marketing culture, not Casey.
It is hard to get away from what surrounds us even when you have sound principles as she does. We all share this issue.
Creative Inspiration Comes With Time
The simple fact is that anyone can decorate the home styling to their taste. There are ways to use simple designs on a budget.
With that we all have a list of priorities by which we want to achieve things within the home. In the blog post Casey wrote she was speaking of the real cost to decorate and furnish your home.
I want to applaud her first on the things I did like. First do not go into debt. She stated that when she moved into her home that she had rooms which were unfinished.
I love that. That is real living. That is being responsible. Secondly she had her priorities and there is no pretending to be a Martha Stewart.
The fact is we all must have our priorities. She then adjusted budgets accordingly.
The debt burden people face is often more than they should. Seriously no one ever has all creative inspiration come to them at once.
It progresses with time as you and a space gains its flow. Take your time rather than spending money to only need to spend a second time around.
The third thing she nailed was focusing on furnishings such as the bed, couch and dresser. Items which see a lot of use deserve more investment not just for comfort but also for longevity.
Think about this, count the hours you sleep in bed within a week. We depend on our body to get us through a day. That is not an item to cheapen out on. I can deal with a broke couch before a bad bed.
The place where she broke my heart was ditching on artwork. How could you Casey? I thought we were becoming friends but then I saw that.
I’m just joking but hey all artists are accustomed to getting dirt thrown on us. Its our life. Who needs us when everyone has Chinese imports? But this leads to the next thing that I found and I seriously disagree with.
It is not Casey’s fault but rather a serious culture issue that is continually perpetuated in every corner of society. I begin with the artists mindset.
Artistic Mindset In Home Styling – The Home Is A Canvas
Casey mentioned how she would utilize bargain places for home decor such as Target, and a list of other import brands. In part of her blog she spoke of ways to save money.
Among them cutting back on what is spent on non essential things in a day such as a cup of coffee. Yes I know some of us would go nuclear without that coffee but we could bring some with us wherever we go.
Another point to the home styling was she did not spend much on her clothing as it was less important than her home. I have to say, lucky husband.
Yet these various avenues were for cost efficiency in order to allow things of greater importance to prevail. I seriously see cheap home decor as being the same way.
There will be some pieces we all find that we like, yet over consumption is like a bad binge on the McDonalds dollar menu.
In fact I reach beyond that and also look at other fads promoted by giants such as HGTV. Mrs Gaines loves her shiplap walls yet paints them to have lines, yes just lines on a wall.
That still confuses me. I thought we wanted to get rid of paneling like the 1960’s and 70’s. I’m a wood artist, painting good wood that never did anything to you is a sin. Unless its trim of course.
I give you two points. First following the trend or fad to be cool just messes up the home with a diy that should probably never happen.
Secondly the home decor we buy en mass clutters the home and one should really track that spending. It may shock you how much you spend on it. In fact I know it would.
I have a family member that I cannot name here who loves decorating for every little season. I kid you not, this is no exaggeration, they needed a storage building to be built just for the home decor.
I’m sorry but that’s a hoarding problem. I walk into Hobby Lobby and start twitching from the trauma. So what do you do?
Our home is a canvas. When we bring into that canvas mess and clutter which we overpay for though call cheap decor it destroys the canvas.
Shelves become too full, the garage and attic fills, at the end of 5 years the money spent could have done something quite nice.
Homey Design – How To Use The Canvas For Good Home Styling
Casey has the right idea even though I am having a bit of fun with her blog post. Remember I stated that when she moved into her new home there were rooms left unfinished?
The canvas needs to remain as clean as possible from the clutter of needless decor in home styling. Why?
It is about more than saving money although that is a big pitch. Yet you need to see more than the dollar signs. You need a visual incentive.
It needs a real purpose and meaning. That purpose and meaning is the flow and design of the home from room to room.
At the bottom of my blog post on home cabinetry I described how to bring your cabinets to life. By utilizing artwork within the wood you have something no one else does.
Items such as this natural edge bowl from MoonHill Wood Art are beautiful and excellent additions to any space.
Finds such as these are rare in that you must seek them out. It is an added beauty in natural design that no store bought items can compare with.
Art such as this is what begins to set apart pretty from unique and beautiful.
It is about more than being unique or having a unique feature. This idea is about creating a theme that is clean and transitions from room to room, or canvas to canvas.
Does this mean no imported home decor? No it doesn’t. Yet it does mean minimize it. What does this look like in real terms?
A Theme For Every Room In Home Styling
For example Casey should have her workspace built for working. Lighting in the spectrum to help her in her day. The furniture should facilitate that work.
The home styling should be comfortable but tailored for getting the job done. Distractions removed and inspiration in place for motivating work creates a tailored space. This is purpose that can still look nice but is separate from the rest of the home.
By contrast whatever room she chooses for relaxing no work should be allowed. The lighting should be cooler and the flow built around recharging.
Clutter does not help to recharge our batteries because we think about cleaning. Inspiring things, beautiful things, objects of meaning and definition help to recharge.
Here I would place exceptional pieces of furniture and genuine artwork made by artists not Hobby Lobby. This is about items that take the mind away from the daily toil.
A kitchen should be comfortable but like stepping back into time. If you remember what it was like as a child to go into grandmas kitchen to find the goodies, we need to bring that back.
Much like my example of the cabinets in my other article the kitchen needs to speak to meaning of family and friends. Building relationships and sharing memories is what we need rather than eating a meal in front of the television not speaking a single word.
The home is a canvas, so is every room. It is a tailored approach that must be defined over time. Yes it takes money. Indeed it will take years to build the pieces to bring back those memories.
If we cheapen our approach with the garbage imports just because it is pretty we miss building something truly unique. We miss building something our children will remember and carry with them.
Artist Mindset – Our Space Defines Our Life With Home Styling
Go back to ancient days when mankind lived in rock or wood shelters. Each evolution stepping forward led to key elements of living. Among them were protection, comfort, and raising a family.
As time moved forward our home styling began to be defined by the personalities that lived within the home. There was a time when each room was tailored for a specific person.
You say we do the same today? I am not talking about your kids BTS poster or the random geometric wall art.
The average home built today has fewer unique features in it since the time of living in stone houses or caves. Yes I understand Alexa can control your entire home and the cave men did not have that.
Yet our homes today on a spec sheet have no real definition, color, or taste. An expensive home is not much different than the spec house built for the lower middle class, its just bigger.
Step into the upper tier homes today and the dysfunction still remains. Yes they can have very nice and designer prefab cabinets.
The lighting probably still came from Lowes. Nothing wrong with that.
The bulb is more important I agree. Yet there is a trend. Giants control what we consume and put within the home.
What they offer is not about creating culture. It is not about creating a tailored experience. Our life is defined by a mass produced product on the cheapest budget that can be made and sold to us.
I seriously dislike HGTV and its commercials for it feels so plastic. It is a trap yet people eat it up.
How do you change this? What about the local craftsmen? Have we forgotten them?
The guys who can make custom tables, chairs, and yes even us lowly artists that time and history have forgotten can help you. These elements of our culture are in danger of going extinct while people fight to get into Lowes or Ikea every day.
Home is a space for you to live, not collect things. It is a space to build memories, raise children, and with that comes expression.
What we surround ourselves with should do more than be pretty, it should energize and give inspiration and creativity.
It should reflect who we are not the junk from the world made by the lowest bidder. That is not who we are, or are we?
I told you artists are a little crazy. Apparently I am the only one who chokes as they drive by the big box stores. They cannot even sell a decent saw for fine woodworking.
Breaking Free To Define Your Home Styling
My wife spent the majority of her adult life in marketing. She worked under the CEO of a major corporation so I can smell marketing a mile away. It stinks.
No my wife doesn’t stink shes not in marketing any longer. How a fly by the seat of the pants free thinker guy and a by the book of the corporate world girl got together I don’t know but it works.
Her background comes from Asia in a more rigid world. My background comes out of the hills of the Smokey Mountains.
My great grandmother raised 12 children through the Great Depression and the first of my family arrived in this country when we were still British Colonies.
I learned something long ago and it was reinforced when I talked to my father in law. I saw two worlds and two different backgrounds meet as one.
My great grandmother spoke of the dark days of the depression and how difficult it was to have simple things like food. Each family in the mountains had their own garden.
Often they would share a goat between families for milk. They did not have much. Yet the things they did have meant something. If money was spent on anything other than a need it was a splurge. It had to mean something.
My father in law reinforced this thinking yet from another vantage point. My wife’s family is a Chinese family and they are well to do. The furniture within their home each piece is custom crafted and handmade by local artisans.
That is how things are done there if you really have what people here who think they are wealthy just believe they have. The couch for example has quite comfortable cushions yet the wood is carved with artwork throughout. It is beautiful.
I noticed there was not much clutter in the home. I asked about the furniture because it was just striking.
My father in law said that it was better to have a few things that mean something than to have everything that means nothing. Interesting observations from two very different worlds.
In the end they both arrive at the same place. Life is about meaning and definition of ourselves with the cultivation of our culture.
To break free we need to find meaning in our culture again. Listen I love the ability to make money. I love the ability for jobs.
What I hate is the loss of culture. An expensive house with too much invested can still be as blank as an open field without real meaning. We need to bring what is important to us back into our lives instead of what is pushed in front of us by giants who do not know us.