I love art. When I was in High School, I had a great art teacher. She was great because she gave us space to create and she opened the doors of possibility. She gave us just enough information to intrigue our imaginations and then showed us the tools. She also showed us images of the work of other artists and how they were using the medium. At first you copied the work and then as you worked through it you began to find your own voice in the work. While I don’t profess to be a hyperrealist, I do enjoy doing my work whether it is in pencil, watercolor, silver, wood, or on the potters wheel. There is just something about losing yourself and having time slip away in the creative process. I have these same feelings when I’m working on an interior design project. You have a bit of information from the client and you then begin the process of creating a space that speaks to who they are. Your tools are your pencil, the layout, the pieces of furniture, artwork, colors, textures, materials, light etc. It all begins to come together into a finished piece.

When I first started doing design, just as in High School, I looked at work that others were doing. One of my favorites was Axel Vervoordt. He is an antiques dealer, curator and interior designer who’s work is shown in the image above and below. He is from Antwerp, Belgium and has been an influential taste maker. His clients range from royalty to rock stars. They are drawn to the Belgian antiquaire’s cerebral good taste. One of the proponents of the WABI SABI movement he has a way of mixing antiques with contemporary art. I’ve admired his work for some time with its simplicity, rawness and penchant for the artful interior.

Another design team I have admired is Anne Marie Midi and Jorge Almada known as Casa Midi. They are based out of Bruxelles, Belgium and San Miguel de Allende Mexico. As you can see in the work below they have a way of mixing the old with the new, the artisanal with the found object d’art.

There are many others who’s work I’ve admired over the years and this post could go on forever showing examples of the spaces they have created but the point is that I’ve watched the way these designers have handled space and I’ve taken lessons from their usage of art in their work.

For example imagine what the room below by Sabine De Gunzberg would look like without all of that artwork. It is the cool greens and blues that play the foil to those popping fuchsias in the chairs and rug.

Or sometimes a piece of artwork can perfectly mirror the mood of the room. It can be the cornerstone piece that inspires an entire space. Dark, smokey, moody like the image below.

Maybe its something bright and balanced that perfectly creates a vignette of the owners lives and the objects they have collected along the way.

At the end of the day what is most important to me in my work is that every piece, I consider placing in a room is part of an overall story. The story that the client has told me. That each piece is considered a part of the canvas. Individual strokes of a brush that create a picture of their lives.

Images courtesy of Grahamandco.org, axel-vervoordt.com, elledecor.com, hickoryhill.tumblr.com, kinfolk.com