Design lesson: A fine balance

After years of practical experience as an interior designer, I can tell you this: balance is everything. In fact, if there's any design lesson that requires mastery, it's this one. The ability to skillfully harmonize a decor's essential elements – scale, proportion, light, pattern and colour – takes practice but leads to great success.

Scale
In residential design, scale usually concerns the relationship between an item or a room and the human body. Does the room feel sufficiently cosy for reading or watching television? Is there enough space between the chairs and the armoire for people to pass comfortably? This inviting scheme answers a resounding yes to both questions. In this case, though, the furniture is slightly overscaled for the amount of available space. Oversize furnishings don't make small rooms feel larger, however; but they do make them feel cosier.

Pattern
Don't believe it's the little things that count? Remove the pillows and nothing in this cosy scheme works. The well-placed stripe, because it provides a high contrast to the white chair, has tremendous visual weight, essential for balancing the weight of the dark armoire. It takes two kilim pillows to keep the window seat from fading into obscurity. However, one darker pillow would have the same effect.

Light
Because lighting has both a physiological and emotional effect on people, the quality of light is an essential consideration. Balance, once again, is the key to success. Excessive contrast causes eyestrain, while uniformity is visually monotonous and dull. The requirements for a television room are different from those of a kitchen, home office or bedroom. Here, a standing floor lamp with an opaque shade will allow light to shine down onto a book for comfortable reading. In the daytime, the window provides subtly changing light.

Longevity
It's always a smart option to keep larger (and more expensive) furniture in neutral tones. In three years, when the stripes have had their day, new pillows will be all that's required to transform the look of this room.

Kimberley Seldon is STYLE AT HOME's decorating editor. For more great decor and design ideas, visit kimberleyseldon.com.

Photography by Robert Melnychuk.

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