Podcast, Ep. 27: interior designer Meg Braff

If you love color, then this is an episode you can’t miss. Interior designer Meg Braff injects vibrant hues into all of her spaces, but always in an elegant, tailored manner. She shares the process behind writing her new book, her love of color and pattern, her recent house renovation project, and gives us a little lamp shade lesson.

What You’ll Hear on this Episode:

• We all share our dream vacations
• Meg tells us about how she realized she loved decorating — it has to do with her dorm room at Vanderbilt
• She tells us about the process of writing her book which took three years
• She gives us a lesson in mixing patterns — where to use it and how to mix them together
• We talk about her love of color and how even though she uses a lot of color, white is the main color in many of her spaces
• Meg reveals her favorite color
• We talk about her use of color — using one really generously with teeny accents of something complementary
• We ask whether a house needs to have the same palette all the way through
• How a home’s location influences the color palette you should be working with
• We talk about treating fabrics to make them more stain resistant
• How she decorates her home with four boys
• How often she redecorates her own home
• Taryn mentions how often we’ve pulled her rooms as inspiration for building our seasonal rooms
• Meg talks about why she loves a dressing table so much
• Why editing is so crucial to creating a beautiful, comfortable home
• Of course, we ask Meg about her decorating pet peeve
• Meg gives us a little lesson on using lampshades and lighting
• Meg tells us about her recent home renovation
• She tells us about her wallpaper line and how it fell in her lap

Decorating Dilemmas:

Hello Ladies,

I really enjoy your podcast and love Ballard Designs! My decorating dilemma is that we’re moving to a new house where the living room area has floor to ceiling windows on two sides, attached photo of the north side (it’s an L-shaped room) which is all windows and a sliding door which will eventually be replaced. I absolutely love the windows and openness of the room but need some of your ideas as far as how to design so that we can enjoy the views and also have some functional living areas. Our style is a mix of rustic and modern, nothing too cluttered or overdone. Would love to get your thoughts on what I can do!

Thanks,

Violet

Violet, the room above from Meg’s book The Decorated Home is a dead ringer for yours! We suggest using this space as your inspiration. Meg used drapery panels to soften the hard edges of the window, but in a neutral fabric that doesn’t distract from the view. Float your furniture arrangement in the center of the room instead of against a wall. This will make traffic to the sliding doors a little easier. Another suggestion we have is for you to pull a color from your view (maybe it’s bright green, forest green, sky blue, etc) and then use that color as the palette for the inside of your space. That’ll keep the focus on your gorgeous view and tie the outside to your inside. Be sure to check out Meg’s book so you can copy her space!

Show Notes:

• Find Meg’s book here, follow her on Instagram, or browse her portfolio

Please send in your questions so we can answer them on our next episode! And of course, please subscribe to the podcast in iTunes so you never miss and episode. Of course, you can always check back here to see new episodes, but if you subscribe, it’ll automatically download to your phone.

Happy Decorating!

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