When it comes to watching the seasons
change, it's hard to beat the view from Kim
and Michael Allen's home in Winona, Minnesota.
Perched high on a bluff in this Mississippi River town,
the house's open plan and floor-to-ceiling windows
offer unfettered views of acres and acres of trees.
Yet the view was less inspiring inside the Allens'
dining room, where bare walls and earth tones
masked the dramatic potential of the open space and
contemporary architecture. So Kim called on the
Creative Home Design Team to breathe some life
into the room.
But, could this neutral-loving family adjust to the
bright colors and bold design that editor Wanda
Ventling had planned? And would the design team
win its race with the clock to transform the room in
one short day?
Michael and Kim Allen's house was designed to
have a spectacular view from every room, and it does. But the open floor plan that allows the views also
presents a challenge: The design of any given room
has to work with all the surrounding spaces.
With the seeds of a plan for bringing in the colors
of the outdoors already sown in her mind, editor and
designer Wanda Ventling took stock of the dining
room and adjoining kitchen. Which elements of the
room should be nurtured and which pruned back?
"The open, airy floor plan and wood floors were
great starting points, but this room was crying out
for color," Wanda says. "Plus, we would need to
soften the hard lines of the walls and dining table
and do something to make a room that has 9-foot
ceilings feel more inviting."
Because the design team would have only one
day to give the Allens room the contemporary but
warm and comfortable look Kim wanted, good
planning would be crucial. Wanda aimed to have as
many of the design elements as possible ready
ahead of time. When the team was ready to load its
minivan and head north, the draperies, table runner,
and chair cushions had already been sewn; a new
dining table and sideboard bought, stripped, and
painted; and paint, accessories, and even fresh
flowers purchased. "I knew we would have no time
for shopping, so I thought through each task to be
sure we had all the tools and components we would
need to finish in one day," Wanda says. "And I
bought more accessories than I thought we would
need, just in case one piece didn't work."
It was 7:30 a.m. on a Wednesday when the
design team rolled up to the Allens house. They
took over the garage as a staging area, setting up
stations for paint supplies, shelving fabrication,
accessories, and flower arranging. The setup
helped the team stay organized for a day that would
require everybody to multitask.
Painting was the team s biggest project, and the
first one tackled; everything else would be worked
into the flow as the paint dried. Because Kim had
painted most of the home s main floor in a warm, creamy
neutral, Wanda chose to paint the window wall in the dining
room the same color to ensure that the made-over space
would flow seamlessly with the rest of the house.
The design team also called on paint to neutralize the
room s biggest design challenge: a 12-foot-long wall, half of
which juts back a scant 18 inches, while the other half has
unsightly air vents at top and bottom. With only two walls in
the room, this choppy wall had to become the focal point,
Wanda says. Hanging a dramatic piece of art wouldn t work;
it would fight for attention with the recessed part of the wall,
where Wanda planned to place a sideboard and some
floating shelves.
Dealing with this challenge, it turns out, would earn the
design team its stripes in four shades of green, plus
cream and brown. After base-coating the wall a light spring
green, associate art director Becky Lau-Ekstrand checked
to be sure the floor was level. Then, measuring up from the
floor, she taped off horizontal stripes of varying widths. A
wide swath of leaf green begins at the floor, followed by a
series of narrower pinkish-brown and cream stripes at
chair-rail height, and another wide, leaf-green stripe just
above eye level, making the ceiling seem lower and the
room cozier.
While they waited for the paint to dry between stripes,
team members moved on to other projects, such as painting
over the leopard-print border of the new sisal rug with black
paint mixed with fabric-paint medium, reupholstering the
dining chairs in a green linen-look fabric, putting together
the light fixture, making shelves, and hanging the draperies.
The drapery fabric has a scattering of embroidered
leaves on a light background that looks capricious enough,
but actually, this sprightly fabric is a design workhorse. Its
creamy ground helps it blend with the wall behind it so the
graphic of the leaves really pops without looking too busy.
The grassy spring green adds life and softness to the room,
and it's a nod to the colorful scenery outside the windows.
Plus the organic oval of the leaves mimics the shape of the
table. It's fabric that deserves to be nicely sewn, Wanda
says, so she had the straight panels lined and weighted and
the corners mitered for a high-quality finish.
With the paint dry, the team placed the dining table and
sideboard and hung the shelves. Finding a round pedestal
dining table had been one of the first items on Wanda s
agenda as she planned the room. A round table would
make the wide-open space feel more intimate than the
Allens rectangular one, and a pedestal table would seat
more people than one with four legs. She found a table a
4-foot round one that, with an 18-inch leaf, extends to an
oval but it was originally stained cherry. That wouldn't
work with the walnut finish on the Allens' Mission-style
chairs, which Wanda kept in the new design because their
crystals would be, this shapely fixture casts a soft, flattering
glow on diners, and its curves echo the gentle arch of the
chairs below.
"Your dining table doesn't have to be the same finish or
style as your chairs," Wanda assures. Combining a black
table and stained wood chairs gives a more casual,
everyday look. So does the clever light fixture: two white
lampshades, one nested inside the other and attached to
the ceiling with a brushed-nickel pole. Far more at home in
this contemporary space than a chandelier dripping with
crystals would be, this shapely fixture casts a soft, flattering
glow on diners, and its curves echo the gentle arch of the
chairs below.
Repeating the black of the table is the sideboard, a lucky
find because it fits a narrow space and, because it was
slightly damaged, it was a bargain at $350. Once repaired
and painted matte black, its chip is all but invisible.
As the design team sped toward a 10 p.m. finish, Kim
kept her eyes on the team's progress, especially on the
painting, cringing a bit as each brushstroke erased her
beloved neutrals. "The apple green is a little funky," she
says. It's not what I would have picked. I like warmer,
Tuscan colors, like reds and yellows, and I usually bring in
color with accessories. But it definitely makes the room
stand out, and that's why we entered the contest."
On the other hand, husband Michael, chief financial
officer at a local hospital, is sold. He's even brought
colleagues home to see the new look. The room is modern
and up-to-date, he says, and green seems to be a hip
color.
If the design team had told the Allens about all of their
plans ahead of time, Michael admits, the couple probably
would have lobbied for something a little less bold. After all,
they had shied away from color before. But to get a new
look, Michael says he's learned, you have to step out of
your color comfort zone. After living with the green and the
stripes in the dining room for a while, and getting the
thumbs up from sons Jacob, 9, and Caleb, 6, the Allens are
already planning ways to splash more color into adjacent
rooms.
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