STEP AWAY FROM THE NEUTRAL COLOURS
Step away from white and grey. Bold colours can sell a home too, writes Kylie Klein-Nixon.
White, grey and beige: These are the colours of the New Zealand housing market. Take a flick through the listings: neutral sells. In fact, some agents are so ‘‘personal decor’’ adverse, they don’t want Christmas ornaments up in December.
The trend towards quality, natural materials such as rattan, natural wood, slate, stone and marble – the hotel/spa look – may be about luxury, but it’s also a look that can be deliberately bland.
When Resene’s warm, chalky Black White, the queen of all neutrals, is the Kiwi paint company’s most popular colour, it’s clear the preference for blank slate homes sell is leeching into how we decorate even when we’re not selling. Compare that to the 70s and 80s when colours were vibrant and everywhere.
So what’s going on? Is it just that us Kiwis are a conservative bunch . . . or is the influence of the housing market putting the brakes on bold interior design?
‘‘I think it’s ingrained in us that we need to prepare for on sale,’’ says designer Alex Fulton.
‘‘I don’t know whether it’s a safety net people fall back on when they renovate, but I think it’s a bit of a myth.’’
Fulton should know, the last home she sold had an orange and peach kitchen with diagonal striped floor, and a black living room with an orange fireplace.
‘‘It sold no problem,’’ she says. ‘‘The people we sold to kept everything exactly how it was, because it was perfect for them. They just sold recently. Again, no problem.’’
Colour is emotive, says Fulton. You deserve to live in a home that speaks to your emotions, and you can trust that as much as someone might love grey or white, someone else will love orange and pink.
‘‘You only have to appeal to one person, at the end of the day. Yes, you probably will attract more buyers by having a neutral home, but if it’s done beautifully, if it’s thoughtful, if it’s considered, you’ll always attract a buyer.
‘‘Why can’t you live in a house with colours that complement your style, your aesthetic, and your values, rather than always thinking ahead to someone else’s style and values?’’
Colour has been proven to have a positive effect on our moods and mental wellbeing.
According to United States designer Ingrid Fetell Lee, bright pops of colour trigger something positive in the most primal parts of our brains and make us happy the way finding a tree full for bright, ripe fruit would have made our simian ancestors happy.
But bold design doesn’t have to mean bold colour and maximal pattern. It could mean making the choice to paint rather than stain or carpet your floors.
For the founder of the Father Rabbit design store, Claudia Zinzan, who did just that, it’s really about being honest and making a commitment to what you want your living space to look like and reflect about you.
‘‘It’s not that I don’t love a Liberty-esque interior with green walls and patterned wallpaper,’’ says the designer, whose home is a Scandi-inspired sea of white.
‘‘At home, I have quite a neutral sofa, but I can have fun with the cushions. I have white walls so that I can show off my art.
‘‘You have to be brave and really commit to where you’re going with your design and have a plan. Some people don’t care, that’s just not what floats their boat. But for me as a designer, my space really talks to me, it helps create my mood.’’
Designer Roz Scott, founder of home staging and styling business, Tickadeeboo, says no-one should be scared of putting their personal touch on a property, because there’s always something a professional stager can do to broaden the home’s appeal.
Besides, there’s little you can do to a home that can’t be changed by a lick of a more neutral paint later, when you’re ready to sell up.
Scott says she has asked for interiors to be painted if the colours make the room feel small or cold, but reckons neutral isn’t the only way to sell a home.
‘‘If it’s something like beautiful wallpaper, and the colour schemes are easy to work, you can harmonise with that.’’
Each property is different, however. Sometimes it’s white and grey that are wrong for the house, because they’re ‘‘so cold they put a shiver down your spine’’, and sometimes bold is more than merely beautiful – it’s perfect.
‘‘I did an apartment today on Cuba St [in Wellington] from the 2000s. The colours the architect used still worked.
‘‘It had pastel pink, a nice, pale forest green, some greys – it even had mustard carpet, which probably sounds quite frightening.
‘‘It just looked amazing and really funky, which really suited where it was. Everyone just loved it.’’
For Scott, bold design works best when it shows the property to its best advantage and when it’s considered and harmonious.
There’s a difference between a good, considered, planned design, and going with a trend, which folks often don’t get.
So put down the Black White (for now – it looks great on trim, no matter what colour is on the walls), and dive into Scrumptious, Turbo, or Adrenalin. Don’t be afraid to go big and bold.