Divine Design

What is the best piece of advice you could give a student when they are decorating their house or apartment?

When you are choosing to design something, you want to pick a concept and stick with it. Whether it has to do with the color, form or layout of your area.

How important is color?

Color is pretty important because it produces different emotions in you. For example red increases your appetite, which is why a lot of restaurants use red in it so people buy more food. Blue can be very somber. Yellow is very bad for your eyes. So when people design nursery rooms and paint it yellow it is really bad because it hurts the development psychologically of the baby. Green is always very uplifting. I guess any good color is just stay with a certain palate or stay within the range of it, whether it is one color or two colors.

What is a good way to save money but not sacrifice quality?

You can always look around at used vendors and see what they have to offer because they may have some really good retail value pieces that have either been gently used or sometimes not even used at all. Big manufacturer stores sometimes don’t have the best quality so usually the smaller stores have lower prices and better customer service and product quality.

Where should you shop?

There is Marquis furniture and a lot of places on main street. If you drive down Main Street there are a lot of furniture places. Whether you want really high end or college budget there is an option.

Deal with roommates?

Communication between the roommates to figure out what is not okay between the two of them and then they can work it out in an eclectic sense to where both of their stuff still works together but they have their own individual style. With the eclectic technique multiple elements can be brought in together and it still classifies as one.

What is the best way to hang things without damaging the walls?

Buy one strip of corkboard and nail it to the top of the wall. That way you only have one place where you have a hole in the wall and it is up high so people are less likely to see it. Then you can use fish wire to hang picrtures. Or you can use the scotch stuff that pulls right off.

What have you seen that you don’t like?

I don’t like clutter. I hate clutter. I am a neat freak. I like my shapes and I like my spaces really clean, so it irks me when people just have a lot of stuff cluttered together and it doesn’t match and it is completely different colors. It's just off-putting.

How do you avoid clutter?

Look for storage options that go under your bed or get the double set of hangers. If you only have one rack for hangers get the one that can hang down and create a whole other second rack so people have enough room for their clothes. Furniture that has multiple drawers and storage space is always underrated. Whether you realize it or not you can always use more storage space. If you have roommates try to coordinate so you can get one big thing for storage and not multiple smaller ones.

What have you seen that you really like?

I think the use of mirrors is really helpful to produce more light. If you have a space that doesn’t have enough windows and it is too dark for you, put more mirrors in so the light reflects back in a little more.

Rugs are underrated, they help frame a space. If you have a kitchen and a living room together get an individual rug for each of those. This helps individualize the areas and is very aesthetically pleasing.

Elements and principles of design

Elements:

• Space

• Line

• Color

• Shape

• Texture

• Form

• Value (tone)

Principles

• Unity

• Emphasis/focal point

• Balance

• Proportion/ scale

• Contrast

• Movement

• Rhythm/pattern

• Variety

• Harmony

Interior design student association president Kelly szatk

Interior design major

Architecture and business minor