Tuesday, February 9, 2010

Decorating with warm/cool tones, oh, and introducing my Great Aunt flossy.


I've been thinking a lot about warm versus cool tones, lately. You might be thinking about Health Care, the Academy Awards noms, or last night's history making Bachelor - which was truly spectacular and quite psychologically overwhelming for some.  But, i've been pretty occupied with this questions:  If I like cool tones so much more than warm ones, then why do I love all of these rooms so much???  It's up there with 'purpose of life' stuff.   Here's what i've come up with:  I do in fact prefer cool tones EXCEPT, (can you even wait) when it comes to natural materials, a.k.a wood, leather, grasscloth, brass, sisal, etc, etc, etc, etc.

I particularly love the leather drum table top left, and the weird portrait of the old lady - it reminds me of my great aunt flossy, which for all of you who don't know me too well, she lived with my family from the age of 94-105.  She was completely senile, mostly blind, mostly deaf and had a beautiful beard.  She was overwhelmed by the concept of the remote control and once used the N word, in public, much to our horror and not in a racist way -  just wondering out loud where they all were  (small town Oregon wasn't exactly boasting of diversity). She was born in 1892 and lived through 5 wars, so she deserves a post-mortum blog post dedication at least, right?   This post's for you, flossy.
I digress.
All of these rooms feel warm to me without having any technically 'warm' colors (oranges, yellows, reds, browns), it's dominated by cooler colors  (blues, grays, whites, etc,) but accessorized with warm wood and beat-up brown leather,  and therein lies my perfect combination.


Here are a few warm/cool color charts, its funny how different they are, but you get the idea.



2 comments:

  1. Love that bathroom, such pretty blues!

    Your great aunt seemed like she was AWESOME, by the way!

    Caroline of Red Glasses

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  2. This is a fun post. I have pondered warm/ cool colors ever since I was 13 and introduced to phenomenal Carole Jackson's Color Me Beautiful (remember- "Seasons" based on skin tones?) That book gave me an excellent foundation on color theory. Anyway I think you are probably a "summer" and that is one of the reasons you love "cool" tones.

    http://www.carolejackson.com/html/Summer-Swatch-Packet.html
    Thanks for sharing your insights.
    - A spring

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