It’s design time! I recently had the privilege of judging a design contest for Home Hardware. There were three contestants who each decorated a room in their upstairs furniture department. These contestants did a fantastic job, and I loved seeing their creativity and ideas. My “judge’s critique” is below. Take a read, and feel free to comment below with your own encouraging ideas.

LIVING ROOM:

Nicely done! While I love the addition of the blue chair, I thought the scale was a bit small. A larger chair would add more balance.

WINDOW VIGNETTE:

Very well done. There is a nice flow from the living room. However, the tie backs on the curtains aren’t working well. When in doubt, it’s best to leave the curtains down. I also noticed that the corner shelf  is unfinished, and some of the shelves were left empty.

DINING ROOM:

Nice repetition of shape — repetition is very powerful. Unfortunately, we lost the flow here. The divider screen is quite dark compared to the light and airy décor used in the living room. I would have liked to see a screen more in keeping with the one used in the living room.

Adding some blue accessories on the table, would help to bring the colour flow from the living room.

Finally, there is competition between the light swags and the artwork. If using three light swags, I would recommend only one piece of art. If you have two pieces of art you would like to showcase, you can use just one light swag.

FIREPLACE:

Being that it is black, it is very heavy compared to the rest of the décor. This can work, but needs lots of bling to make it flow. The mirror clock and white vase are perfect; but some of the other accessories appear heavy. Overall, it needs more bling, bling, bling! The white and silver accessories used on the shelf would have worked well here.

Beautiful choice of art pieces and nice colour pallet.

SUGGESTIONS:

I had a little bit of fun myself, and took a look through the store. Here are a few accessories I found in the store that would help to pull everything in this contestant’s design together…

Again, well done! I hope the contestant who put this room together had fun with this contest. Don’t forget to check back tomorrow and Thursday to check out the next two contestants, and to see who the winner is!