pambo's Full Review: Darryl Carter and Trish Donnally - The New Traditi...
For those tired of having style imposed on them, “The New Traditional: Reinvent, Balance, Define Your Home,” could be the answer.
Author Darryl Carter, whose design work has been shown in many magazines, argues for a mix of old and new to achieve the real goal—comfort in your surroundings.
Everything in these pages speaks to calm. There are no sudden splashes of color that will smack you in the head when you turn the page or enter a room following Carter’s philosophy. There’s a subtle blending of colors and fabrics that certainly shift in color but gently.
Carter’s book, which is a handsome work with dozens of photos, first and most powerfully presents the case for doing what you want in your home and knowing how you’ll use it. If you don’t often host large dinner parties, why keep a huge dining room empty for that rare occasion when you do have such an event? (It’s a different matter, of course, if you have a big family that regularly eats together.)
The vast majority of the rooms have a tan/beige/ wood look to them, with carefully blended shades of brown, green, an occasional red and white. The colors provide the calm effect without being boring.
Carter’s book has one-word themes as chapters:
Adapt
Define
Envelop
Blend
Touch
Balance
Edit
Reinvent
Study
Light
Relate
Focus
Invite
Relax
Each has a particular idea, of course: Invite, for example, is about welcoming in children. Noting that when he was young, certain parts of the house were off-limits, Carter points out that things have changed. To make the kids feel comfortable but still protect your possessions, use synthetic fabrics, commercial-grade carpets and softly rounded corners so that both your young visitors (or your own kids) and your stuff survive each other. He recommends ultrasuedes and vinyls that can pass as genuine suede or leather, to preserve the look; linen and cotton can be vinylized to look like natural fabrics.
The text in this book consists of both anecdotes about homes he has redesigned as well as straightforward information about why he makes the choices he does and how to use his ideas. But he’s not big on the latter; it’s clear you’re your own boss in your own home.
Balance is another good chapter. Here he writes about how furniture has become increasingly outsized for the home, overcoming its function and utility. He’s not a fan of “furniture by the pound,” preferring to keep the user’s size in mind when selecting furniture and allowing the room and overall house to achieve a balance of scale. He also believes in pieces being in balance with other elements so that everything is in proportion; nothing dominates another piece.
His rooms are tasteful for reasons that might not seem immediately obvious—there’s geometry in the placement of furniture and other elements; the quality is understated but shines through. His mixture of old and new items is done with charm—there’s an antique wooden bench sitting in an entranceway; a modern painting is offset by an Italianate mantel around a fireplace.
I particularly like his attention to relatively small things —he has antique pewter plates and utensils in a kitchen; collectible walking sticks and canes in a hallway.
This is a graceful, attractive book even if the rooms seem a little masculine or spare for some tastes. You can always add your own clutter to make it your own.
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