This week on THE WOOF! How to design a home you will love for 100 years

"I absolutely love the modern organic style with curved sofas, natural materials and lots of neutrals!" How many people who never knew rounded sofas existed all of a sudden define their interiors aesthetic around these with their cozy boucles and bear-hug armchairs? And now we're all attempting to balance hugely long branches of greenery in our vases that sit elegantly on our kitchen counter with the risk of a breeze knocking over the whole thing. There's no doubt we are all influenced by trendy styles that we may have started out finding ridiculous and then end up accepting and finding desirable. Just a few years back so many were committed to the hipster, industrial style with its retro Edison bulbs and cagey light fixtures. Or MCM, as it appeared to be the only thing available anywhere over a span of about 10+ years.

If you want to escape the claws of trendy interior design styles to build your own unique voice, this post is for you. Because you can design your own home in a way that you will love for years to come!

I drive my interior design work around the ambition that "in 100 years I will still love my home". Of course, I'll be long gone by then, but the idea is to create something that can evolve and be tweaked, but in essence will always be a space I love and gives me joy over many years. And most of all, I design homes that are an expression of who the owner is and the personal story they have built over the years.

And how in the world can we do this for our own home? How can I, a non-designer, design a home that I know I would love for a 100 years? My answer is take your time and learn, educate yourself beyond what on the surface are the beautiful homes we see everywhere.

My main tip for this are to look beyond social media, which is so fundamentally trend-driven. Go to design books by the many, many great interior designers, old and new. Robert Kime, Vicente Wolf, Kit Kemp, Tino Zervudachi, and Beata Heuman are just a few of my personal design heroes. Read their books and learn what they were or are doing and how they think about space and living surrounded by beauty.

Secondly, look at art, lots of art. Don't limit yourself to the trendy artists that you see everywhere, but look at the great artists that created masterpieces. Look at artists from different countries and eras. Look at artists that use different forms of expression and media to create. And listen to music of all sorts and read books: fiction, non-fiction, whatever you like. Notice what your heart becomes attached to and take note. Then pursue more of that! Fill your heart with all the beauty you discover in that particular form of expression and then go for more. In a future post I'll go deeper into the subject of art and how you can create great interiors using art as your best weapon.

All of this will help you break through the obvious and come to embrace what you truly love and want to see in your home for the long haul. You will see that your home becomes more sophisticated and interesting. And unique.

Finally, take your time. A home can take years to make into a space worthy of being loved for 100 years. Just don't take 100 years, because you won't get to enjoy it.... ;)