The Benefits of Creating a Home Where Nothing Matches
And why you should start embracing it.
Personal style isn’t something that can be found through a quiz or curated by a professional designer. Cultivating your own requires being curious about what you love—even the things that surprise you—and then experimenting. That's actually the point of true style, and the antidote for falling into the sameness trap in our own lives.
Our sense of personal style is mostly an amalgamation of a lifetime of influences. How do we define something that’s so unique to each of us? This summer, out of curiosity, I started to look more closely at the roots of my own design obsession.
My love for interiors started with Trading Spaces, my after-school show of choice in the ‘90s. I can also trace it to the fact that I spent my high school years hanging out at my boyfriend's house, a home that his mother was constantly redecorating. I watched wide-eyed as walls were demolished, custom sofas were carted in, and lavish curtains were hung. It was a life so far removed from the one I was experiencing at home it felt like I walked into a different dimension altogether. And while I ogled at the beauty of their home, I never quite felt at home or like I belonged in a place so pristine.
Yet I wanted to fit in among those gorgeous rooms. I tried my hand at painting my bedroom bright pink and bought a traditional wrought-iron bed with gold detailing. I visited TJ Maxx and Home Goods to collect wall accents like brass accessories and crystal lamps, all of which I wanted to scream "luxury." It still didn’t feel like home.
When I entered my early twenties, I found myself around creatives at the College of Design I attended. I spent time stretching creative muscles around stylish and unique people who showed me creation was far more alluring than copying what someone else was doing. My maternal and paternal grandmothers also had a massive influence on me around this time, in hindsight because they could not have been more different from each other. From the homes they kept to the political views that drove their votes, they lived on opposite poles.
My dad's mother famously ironed her sheets and stored them in a freezer (to keep them crisp!). Never was a hair out of place or a pantsuit uncoordinated with accessories. My mom's mom cut her own hair, reused bread bags for sack lunches, collected free furniture from the side of the road, and ran the local thrift store in her retirement years. My mom's mom felt most at home around academics, artists, and radical thinkers. My dad’s mother loved a creamy chardonnay and won the women's golf league year after year at her club. As I grew up, I came to admire them both for different reasons.
This foundation of opposites has been the strongest throughline in my creative life. My love for high design and quality craftsmanship sits right alongside my obsession with hunting bargain bins and picking up furniture from the side of the road. I love hockey games and a great manicure; McDonald’s a light-bodied pinot noir. Not much has changed.