Pattern – Love it or Hate It. And People Do.

As an interior designer, I believe my role first and foremost is to answer my clients’ design cravings as I steward their projects to and across the fabulous finish line every one of my clients wants, which is, “Holy smokes – this is gorgeous AND I get to live here!” SO instead of just throwing my design weight around, I listen, I ask and I dig. It always fascinates me to see how non-designers relate to pattern.

They:

• Love it or hate it.

• Love it but only very specific pattern. Either generally linear, curvilinear or thematic.

• Love it but can tolerate it in only in very specific places or very specific combination of places: Either on the floor or at the window in drapery or perhaps just pillows (what I call the horizontal plane). Sometimes it’s on a select piece of upholstery, possibly just accent upholstery. BUT, put a pattern on the floor for somebody who cannot tolerate pattern on the floor – even if it’s a pattern they love – and it will make them outstandingly uncomfortable and unhappy in a room. It’s fascinating.

Here’s an interesting table from a study recently published by Home Textiles Today in their September 16^th issue that tracks how pattern preferences fall across the US. They didn’t show a regional breakdown, but just as color preferences track regionally, I expect pattern to as well.

Think about your own pattern “fingerprint” – where do you think you fall into all of this? Where do you fall in and where do you like pattern placed in your rooms? Leave a comment – I’d love to hear from you on this interesting topic.