O happy day!!!  O happy day!!!  Check this out!  OMG, I am having a blast playing around with my latest iphone app.  Paint selection just got a little easier thanks to Benjamin Moore.  That right.  You guessed it.  They have actually created an app that helps you select paints from their line to use in your home or next design project.  It’s super easy to use & best of all, wait for it…..  IT’S FREE!!!

There has been a bit of controversy surrounding the accuracy of the helpful paint selection tool.  The arguement is that the colors you see on your iphone screen or computer are not compatible to real life.  Thus, making it nearly impossible to select color correct hues for your project.

I’ve played around with it for a week or so now & I’d have to say that overall I’m really excited about it.  It sure beats flipping thru a paint deck.  I captured photos of a few fabrics with my iphone & then used them in the Benjamin Moore app to help select a few paint options.  I’m already pretty familiar with their line of paints, so choosing from their suggestions was not difficult for me.  Even with the app, I still feel strongly that you should ALWAYS sample at least 3 options.  Paint looks remarkably different in your room than it does on a paint chip, or in today’s technology advanced world ~ an iphone app.  My vote ~ thumbs up!!!

The Benjamin Moore iphone app ben® Color Capture™ is available in the itunes store.

Click Here to watch the segment

Could the way you place your furniture in your home really affect your productivity and emotional well being in life? Yes!  It can.  Think about it.  Would you be more excited to come home to a mish-moshed unorganized home, or a stylish, inviting & functional home?

When designing a room in our home, we should strive for furniture arrangements that are both aesthetically pleasing and functional.  Taking the time to do this will ultimately give you peace of mind as well as a beautiful retreat.

Follow these simple tips to help achieve harmony in your home.

1.  Clearly define your overall vision for the room and the activities that will take place there.

2.  Determine how many people you want the room to comfortably seat.

3.  Define the focal point for the room (i.e. TV hutch or armoire, or fireplace)

4.  Your furniture should be harmonious with your focal point. Most of your main seating should either face the focal point directly or be angled towards it.

5.  U-shaped arrangements work best for the majority of rooms.

6.  Try to avoid placing the furniture against the walls. “Floating” the furniture creates a more intimate and aesthetically pleasing atmosphere.

7.  If you are working with a very large room, create two or more separate and distinct areas within the room. Define each area with its own conversation grouping or groupings.

8.  Your largest piece of furniture (typically a sofa for living areas) should act as the anchor or grounding piece for the room. Start with this piece and arrange the rest of your items proportionally.

Mark your calendars!  Beginning Saturday, August 1st, IBB will start holding their famous warehouse sales the first Saturday of every month.  The sales will take place in Celina.  These are the sales that all of your friends & neighbors talk about!  Furniture, art, rugs, accessories & more with insanely cheap prices.  Everything is marked up to 90% off.  If you’re decorating on a tight budget, this is certainly a great way to get name brand furniture & accessories at amazing prices.

Details:
When:  Saturday, August 1, 2009
Where: IBB’s Celina Warehouse
200 S. Louisiana
Celina, TX 75009
Time:  10:00-4:00

I just had to share these funny quotations I came across today about furniture & decorating your home!  They gave me a little giggle.  I hope they will put a smile on your face as well.  Happy decorating!!!

“Toe: A part of the foot used to find furniture in the dark” ~ Anonymous

“Arguments with furniture are rarely productive.” ~ Kehlog Albran

“Shin: Device for finding furniture in the dark” ~ Anonymous

“No animal should ever jump up on the dining-room furniture unless absolutely certain that he can hold his own in the conversation.” ~ Fran Lebowitz

“My ideal relaxation is working on upholstry. I spend hours in junk shops buying furniture. I do all the upholstery work myself, and it’s like therapy.” ~ Pamela Anderson

Dear Designer Detective,

We are looking to purchase a new sofa for our family room.  My husband refuses to have anything but a leather sofa.  I really want the room to feel like we took the time to decorate it.  I have hit a wall on how to make a leather sofa look stylish.  Help!!!

- Katrina B.
Rockwall, TX

Dear Katrina,
No worries!!!  Leather furniture does not have to be boring.  In fact, you can find some of the swankiest & stylish furniture pieces crafted from leather.  It’s also four times more durable than most fabrics.  Your family room can & will look stylish.  There are a million different options other than just buying a brown leather sofa.  It’s all in knowing your options & how you put it together.  Take a look at few of these super stylish options for leather seating.

This sofa features a hair on hide and leather combination. What a statement piece!

I love the straight lines & the tall back of this tone on tone leather sofa. The pattern on the leather on the outside of the frame is to die for!

Hello gorgeous! Red plush coushions & a carved wood frame ~ yes please!

I am green with envy! So much style & the perfect shade of jade make this a real showstopper! Perfect for the more transitional or contemporary home.

Love the mustard gold color on this sofa. The cushions are so plush, inviting, & comfy. Nail head trim adds a nice decorative touch.

These are just a small sampling of the endless options you have when creating a fabulous leather sofa.  Of course, you can put just about any leather on any frame and truly customize it for your personal taste & needs.  Hope this helps.  Happy leather sofa shopping

- Shay Sampson, a.k.a. The Designer Detective

I recently featured a series on Good Morning Texas in helping viewers find their design style.  I decided to put this series together after seeing that 15% of the people polled on my blog had no clue what their design style was.  If you have no idea what your style is, how do you shop for your home?  You’ve got to know what your style is!  Otherwise, you will be making huge costly mistakes when making purchases in furniture & accessories for your home.

Click here to watch the GMT segment on Traditional Design.

If your design style is traditional, you will look for the following:

Characteristics of Traditional design:

• the largest of the style categories with a dozen or so sub-categories
• more conservative, sometimes more formal
• elegant details
• comfortable & classic
• graceful carved curves
• rich color palettes
• dark polished woods such as cherry or mahogany
• think wingback chairs, damask, paisley, or floral patterns
• A familiar look because it’s the most popular design style amongst Americans & Europeans

A few examples of Traditional style furniture & accessories:

Decorating your home is no longer contained to the interior.  During the spring & summer months, families spend more & more time outdoors & lounging by the pool.  Are you doing it in style?  Whether you are wanting to add a few fantastic pillows to your existing patio furniture or go for a complete outdoor makeover, you now have more options than ever.  Color, well known designer fabrics, patterns & durability to nature’s elements are the focus of many manufacturers these days.  Take a look at some outdoor options that will having you feeling cool in your own backyard.

Vibrant colors add life to an antique wood bench.

Spring green, butter yellow & neutral colors make for a calming serene poolside atmosphere.

Swimsuit themed prints & bright colors add a whimsical flair to this wooden chaise lounge.

Traditional blue prints by Laura Ashley add color to these weathered wood framed chaise lounges.

In my humble opinion, knick-knacks= trinkets, (a.ka. JUNK)!  Too many knick-knacks (or trinkets, or junk) can clutter a room and quickly ruin a beautiful design.  Your furniture will feel lost amongst the clutter.  Your guests and your family will become dizzy upon entering the room because their eyes will have trouble figuring out what to focus on.  Remember, size & scale are important not only when choosing furniture, but also when choosing accessories.  Forget the knick-knacks & be on the hunt for fabulous accessories for your home!  What’s the difference?  How can you tell?  Little items or smaller scaled items make little impact.  Consider where the accessories will be placed in your room.  Will it make an impact from across the room?  Will it show up or be mistaken for one of your child’s toys?  Still not sure what to look for?  Take a look at a few examples…

The lamp, floral, basket weave vase, & wood charger on a stand are all in scale with the large round bedside table.

A well done silk floral brings life and loads of color to this rich wood dining table

Colorful hand blown glass vases add drama to a rectangular glass cocktail table

An electic mix of accessories give style to this dark wood round coffee table

All accessories pictured above are available at IBB Design Furniture Showroom in Frisco, TX.  Shipping is available nationwide.

In case you haven’t heard, Kravet carries a fabulous line of fabrics from famed interior designer, Candice Olson.  You may recognize her from her hit HGTV show Divine Design.

Candice is probably my favorite tv interior designer.  I can really identify with her design style.  I don’t think I have ever seen a room of hers that I did not like.   So, needless to say, I am a HUGE fan of her fabric line!  The fabrics offer some really rich textures, detailing & even a few very cool & very well done metallics.  I am thinking about using a few in my master bedroom.  There are so many great coordinates that it’s so hard to decide!  I’m really drawn to the black, white & sea blue color palettes.  The line features several in this palette.  One even has tiny pearls sewn into the fabric.  I could totally see that on a few accent pillows to make a bed super luxurious.

Check some of them out & let me know what you think.