The ULTIMATE Team, from the left; Designers Munge Leung and client Charles Khabouth of INK Entertainment; Arren Williams, Designer; Architect Drew Mandel; Jason MacIsaac of Ministry of the Interior.
For this year’s IDS 10, coming up January 21st to January 24th, the theme is “The ULTIMATE”. Embodying the theme will be the show’s standing feature, Designer Spaces, in which four teams from Canada’s design community will share their own personal definition of the ULTIMATE space. These teams are of varied disciplines – architecture, décor and styling, retail and hospitality design and curatorial practice – and I caught up with them at an earlier media event to get a sneak preview on just how they all intend to go about this… Over the next little while, leading up to IDS10, I’ll be unveiling my interviews with the featured designers, beginning with today's headliner, Arren Williams.
Arren is a stylist, designer, and leading industry trend consultant whose work appears regularly in Canadian House & Home, Style at Home, Flare Magazine, Wish and the National Post.
Elana Safronsky: Can you give us a teaser of your designer space?
Arren Williams: Sophisticated, sexy, unusual and it’s actually inspired by a fragrance and that’s all I’m going to tell you.
ES: How do you realize a fragrance in tangible form?
AW: Really the inspiration can come from the scent itself, it can come from the bottle and the packaging or from the feeling that the scent evokes.
ES:What type of space is it?
AW: A bathroom
ES: Can you speak to green – the secondary theme of this year’s show?
AW: Green for me really means shopping thrift. Finding cool stuff, paying beans for it and making it look like a million dollars. You’re stopping things from ending up in a landfill, you’re buying good quality, for the most part, you’re saving beautiful things and you’re getting stuff that no one else has too. For me that’s green.
ES: What trends are you loving right now?
AW: Soft mid-tone metallics inspired by makeup trends that we’re seeing a lot of, I really like all of the patents coming back again inspired by fashion, love wallpaper and the soft greys and pinks that are a romantic palette, almost a Marie Antoinette kind of palette.
ES: Latest obsession?
AW: Because I see so much stuff I covet everything all the time! But lately it’s art. I love the Alexander Girard prints from Urban Outfitters.
ES: Biggest investment new homeowners should make?
AW: A good sofa. You’re going to be spending a lot of time on it, it has to be really comfy. Get out there and test drive them, or think about getting it custom made if you can afford it. Really the biggest splurge. Everything else should be a mix of pieces that you love, and pieces you know you can save money on because you’ll eventually cycle them out – trendy stuff. Hitting a place like IKEA for those things is perfect because they have something at every price point.
ES: General direction for décor in 2010?
AW: I think it’s still about eclecticism, personality, I’m worried about things getting too theme-ey, but I think people are learning how to do that collected look really well. If you can dress yourself you can dress a space – I really believe that.
ES: You'd be surprised...
Stay tuned for more!
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