We welcome New York designer, David Frazier, known for his warm modernist interiors and place-based architecture. Originally from West Point, Georgia, David attended Auburn School of Architecture before moving to New York, where he designed spaces for his clients in New York, the Hamptons, Connecticut, Colorado, and throughout the South.
David shares some great advice for using neutrals in a way that suits your aesthetic and design dreams. He talks about why he gravitates towards neutrals, some of his favorite shades to use to warm up a room, and how to give neutrals the same energy as colors and patterns.
What You’ll Hear This Episode:
- Neutrals don’t have to be boring!
- A neutral interior can give your mind and eyes a chance to rest.
- David shares some of his favorite neutral shades to work with.
- How to weave color in with neutrals while still keeping that calm and comforting tone.
- Using textures and layers to keep neutrals exciting.
- David’s love of playing with scale to add a bit of drama and excitement into spaces.
- How David’s background in architecture informs his design work.
- How to overcome the storing challenges that often come with art and antiques.
- The magical transformation of a laundry room in the Palm Beach showroom.
Decorating Dilemma:
Hi Caroline, Taryn, and Liz!
I have been listening to the How to Decorate podcast for three years, and I absolutely love it. Thank you for teaching me so much!
We just bought our first home (still in the process of moving), and now all of my great ideas feel paralyzed by reality. 🙂 I have so many decorating dilemmas that I want to ask y’all about, but I will start with our funny small living room. Our house is a 1977 Cape Cod, and it’s small. Our living room is 15’10” x 11’6”. It has a fireplace at one end, and a single large picture window. The primary dilemma is that if I center our small apartment sofa under the picture window, then it is not centered on the opposing wall. The edge of the picture window actually extends beyond the opposing wall into its hallway. Ideally we would like to arrange this room with two sofas facing each other, and I would like to get a larger sized 87” leather chesterfield sofa for the wall now that we aren’t apartment dwellers.
We have played with different furniture arrangements using what we have right now. I think if we used the small sofa with a cute club chair, we could center the small sofa on the window but the chair plus small sofa combo would be centered with a larger sofa if that makes sense. I would love your thoughts on how to arrange furniture in this room.
The only thing in the picture is that we want to stay is the small sofa, and ideally the ottoman that we are using as a coffee table. Please pardon the mess in the photos as these were hastily taken in the middle of moving today.
Thank you so much for your help! Fingers crossed this makes it onto the show!!!
-Caitlin
Hi Caitlin!
So, David likes the idea of just using one sofa. He would probably eliminate the apartment sofa. Great floor lamps on the table would serve as a great anchor between the sofa and two chairs. Then, he would do a club chair and an ottoman in the opposite corner. Ideally, the sofa would be about the length of that picture window, with the back of the sofa about the height of the windowsill.
You know we love playing with scale too, so you could use both online tools and move the furniture around to see how you like it and how it feels in the space. Best of luck and keep us updated!
– How to Decorate
Also Mentioned in This Episode:
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Happy Decorating!
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