WITH FOUR CHILdren ranging in age from 4 to 13, the priorities of a north suburban family were focused at the back of their Colonial home-the kitchen and casual living spaces that open to the outdoors and suit their needs. The living room wasn`t decorated for 13 years.
When the homeowner finally tackled that project, she was glad she`d waited because her tastes had evolved to the point where she felt comfortable using strong color.
The key was the rug. ”If there`s to be any pattern, it`s easier to start with the rug,” explains interior designer Barbara Strauss Cowan, who had the floor covering fabricated at Edward Fields. ”The homeowner loves red and purple together. I introduced sharper, more intense colors-yellow, blue and green on an off-white ground.” The bold pattern, inspired by a design of Hans Hoffman, was woven to suggest sweeping brush strokes.
Instead of choosing off-white seating, Cowan recommended a soft hue complementary to the rug. The pale blue-violet, she says, ”becomes almost neutral” in the space.
The wool-upholstered pieces, Cowan says, are newer shapes-rounder, pouffier and, most important, comfortable. Glass-topped tables with Lucite bases were chosen so that the pattern of the rug shows through.
In the small bay is a card-table set of whitewashed maple designed by Joe Agati. The chairs are barrel-shaped but open, and the half circles are banded in blue to match the leather seats. Agati also designed a companion display cabinet to house a budding glass collection. It, too, is edged in blue accent stripes, a subtle but effective way to repeat one of the dominant colors in the space.
Artwork also is full of color; a painted chest of drawers is reminicent of a crazy quilt and a Jackson Pollock painting on wood.
”If we had done the room 10 years earlier, the homeowners wouldn`t have been ready for this,” Cowan says. ”But now they love it. It`s bright and upbeat.”
WHERE TO BUY
Rug-Edward Fields; sofas-Interior Crafts; upholstered fabric-Rancocas;
Lucite tables-Carmichael Designs, Wheeling; Petro table and chairs-Joe Agati, Agati Furniture; window fabric-Robert Allen; mobile sculpture (on back wall)
by Prescott.
