~echoofformless

But how do you put together a decor for a room where you will be listening to hundreds of different styles of music and diverse TV and DVD programming? It has to be just as natural on the eyes while listening to Paganini as it does Drum N Bass. How do make an area that is equally functional as a place for light social gatherings and for deep, intimate experiences? A place where you can simply veg out eating junk food one night, but have a glass of wine the next? A place that houses very happy house plants and an aquarium but will also contain state of the art electronics; a place for home theater presentations but which also has a certain historical, olde worlde feel to it. Something that can be both organic but also somewhat aloof and cold. And it has to be able to show off a diversity of framed art from various periods and styles, including photography both color and black and white. It has to be lighthearted enough that it feels comfortable for casual visitors, but seductive enough that they will want to stay. It must be easy going enough for a good divertimento, but brooding and mysterious enough for those very haunting and saturnine journeys into the nether regions. It has to be both Romantic and restrained. Both refined and crude. Sacred and profane. It has to express me in so many ways all at once. It has to be a place for both all of my moods, all of my activities, all of many different friends and all of my different tastes and interests.

But the biggest challenge of all is that it has to be simple in order to work. Complicated rooms do less to inspire and more to distract.

Let's put something this way: if I had a huge house with many rooms, each one would be entirely different. I would be able to separate all of the moods, tastes, styles and purposes and adjourn to the appropriate room.

But I have only one room into which all of this must go. I feel my previous design was a good success but it's simply time for a change.