Blue and White Wallpaper
This is a very good time of year to contemplate ways to bring both permanent and seasonal color into your home. Winter months can test the human spirit for loads of reasons, and surely one of them is the deficit of color in nature. We humans can begin to feel down, without fully realizing that our visual surroundings are slowly changing around us.
Take a cue from traditional Swedish design and art for some long proven ways to brighten the winter months. A little investigation into this Nordic country’s aesthetic soul will reveal how a culture, surrounded by snow and gray for most of the year, has learned how to compensate with an interesting use of color.
Generally, a Swedish home has rather neutral backgrounds: Walls, floors and major furniture pieces. There is a definite simplicity of line and ornamentation in the decorative arts, with the exception of some antique periods that were influenced by the French. But the antidote to a frozen winter begins with those simple elements being paired with literal explosions of color. You’ll observe strong hues in textiles, glass art, area rugs, and window dressings.
A dining room might hold very delicately sized dining chairs in a light tone of wood. Blond wood is combined with a light turquoise blue stripe fabric. Place all of this on a complex pattern rug with tones of blues, wheat, gold, deep cinnabar and pink. Then, toss in dynamic framed painting of a vase of flowers with bold pinks, oranges, and gold. Most interesting to me is that the prolific use of flowers in Swedish rooms is not particularly feminine in result. The strong colors, generally selected, force the floral motif into more of a gender neutral area.
Because color is so important in a frozen environment, the Swedish aesthetic sense has developed over time to consider color as a key element in a home. The designers of the Wallcoverings Association in the U.S. believe that changing wall papers seasonally is a new trend. Most of us have come to believe that wallpaper is meant to stay put for at least ten years and that seasonal wallpaper trends are an oxymoron. Perhaps a little new, the idea of changing a background for the season might have some appeal for those who experience truly forbidding winters. Is it really any stranger than spending money on a vacation to Hawaii or Arizona during the winter?
This might provide the perfect antidote for the senior who is house bound for health reasons, the young mother tied to the house by school schedules, or the person without vacation benefits. Plus, the Wallcovering Association designers study global trends and respond with product concepts that fit the way in which living patterns slowly are shifting.
Here one of their fall offerings reiterates some of the Swedish principles. Notice in the photo the neutral sofa as the main piece of furniture in the room. While the wallpaper makes the room feel like a springtime bouquet, the fresh white background is also a neutral. You might appreciate through this example how strong color need not be oppressive and can well be adapted to a small room. Our example room still appears very light while incorporating comparatively bold blue drapery. The accent pillows on the sofa pick up the color ensemble in a textured woven of blue and white. Brown pillows help to keep this scheme from becoming too fussy or feminine. There is no real need to shy away from wonderful colors and use of wallpaper pattern just because your area is small.
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Copyright © Copley News Service. Used with permission.
