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RENO ADDICT

Shaynna Blaze’s 10 Commandments of Colour

Picking a colour to paint your home isn’t easy. In fact, for 70 percent of the nation it can be so daunting that they just choose white. Boring! But Taubmans want to change that so they’ve launched two new digital tools: the Paint Your Own Room tool and Shaynna Blaze’s 10 Commandments of Colour, in the hope that Australians will embrace adding that little splash of colour to their home.

Shaynna Blaze Blank Canvas

The 10 Commandments of Colour were created to help give consumers the confidence to get started on their DIY projects this Spring. Written by Taubmans brand ambassador and colour creative director Shaynna Blaze, it features the 10 tips that debunk common colour myths and arm consumers with the knowledge they need to get painting with colour right, every time!

“It always surprises me how many homeowners resort to painting with white despite the catalogue of over 5,500 Taubmans paint shades available,” explains Shaynna. “It’s obvious that, despite Australia’s vibrant culture, people lack the confidence to use colour in their homes. It’s my mission to provide DIY novices with a better understanding of how colour can transform a space. By breaking down the paint selection process into simple steps, my 10 Commandments of Colour help people to tackle their fear of colour head-on and feel empowered to choose the perfect colour for their home.”

The visual guide (see below) provides quick and easy rules to follow when selecting a paint colour. Colour theory is broken down into bite-sized tips, including how to manipulate a space with colour, getting the colour proportions right and choosing the correct colour combinations for your home.

Once consumers have narrowed their selection using the 10 Commandments of Colour, they can head to the Taubmans website to virtually test out colours in their room using the Paint Your Own Room tool. This allows users to upload an image of the room that they plan to paint and digitally re-colour the walls with the hue of their choice.

Taubmans is also offering personal colour consulting services on the weekends of the 4 and 11 of October at 50 Bunnings stores. Visit their website to find the dates and locations or to download the 10 Commandments of Colour, try out the Paint Your Own Room tool and discover more expert decorating tips and tricks.

Taubmans 10 Commandments of Colour Infographic

Categories
Designers Expert Tips The Block

Shaynna Blaze on how to use Pantone’s Radiant Orchid in your home

By Shaynna Blaze

Earlier this year, Radiant Orchid was named as the 2014 Pantone Colour of the Year and it certainly ruffled some feathers with many (including Interiors Addict’s Jen!) questioning the bold choice of colour. Whether you love it, or are yet to be convinced, here are my tips for confidently incorporating the bold shades of purple into your interior colour scheme.

Purple has always been a colour of contention as some love it and others really don’t. I’ve heard a lot of talk of people fearing this new colour direction or being lost for how to make this work in their home. With any new trend it takes a while for people to embrace it, so in the spirit of embracing change, here are some of my suggestions for how to incorporate the purple jewel tones into your interior palette.

Recently, I have been talking a lot about using ‘grown up’ pastels in interior colour schemes and purple provides the depth of colour required for such a scheme, as it’s dramatic and rich, which adds punch.

There are two ways to incorporate such a bold colour into your home. You can either use it as an accent/feature colour in a room or be brave and use it on your walls as a bold statement. I’ll demonstrate this by looking at the same room but using the colour in two different ways:

As an accent colour:

The introduction of a new trend colour doesn’t mean you have to redecorate a room from scratch. You can alter the look of a room by adding accessories in various purple colours. As you can see in the picture, the bottles and accents on the cushions are a purple colour, beautifully accompanying Taubmans Endure Bald Mountain on the walls. This is an easy way of leaning gently into a new trend.

As a bold wall colour:

If you’re feeling bold you can paint your walls in Taubmans Balloon Pop. The use of neutral white, black and charcoal in the furnishings such as the couch, rug and mirrored tables allows you to be more adventurous with your wall colour and accessories. With this bold wall colour, you may choose to remove the bottles and instead have a small vase of flowers and replace the patterned cushions for textured ones in more neutral tones.

In order to embrace a bold colour, you need to know which colours it complements. There are two ways to approach it:

Select colours of a similar hue:

The first way is to select a colour that is in a similar tone to your starting colour, such as Taubmans Ellie May Rose, Taubmans Leaden Sky and Taubmans Spring Mauve. Using these colours in a lower intensity makes them blend together, creating a more harmonious look.

Taubmans Ellie May Rose, Leaden Sky and Spring Mauve
Taubmans Ellie May Rose, Leaden Sky and Spring Mauve

Choose a cool colour:

For a more dramatic look, you can choose a cool colour like Taubmans Grand Gusto and Taubmans Blueberry Bush with accents in Taubmans Crisp White. This colour palette creates a fresh and impactful colour scheme for your interior.

Taubmans Grand Gusto, Blueberry Bush and Crisp White
Taubmans Grand Gusto, Blueberry Bush and Crisp White

When using complementary colours, the key to creating the perfect look is to use the colours in different proportions, so one colour is dominant and the other is an accent. For example, you may decide to have your walls in Taubmans Leaden Sky and then introduce the trend colour through painting a chair in Taubmans Balloon Pop.

Taubmans Balloon Pop
Taubmans Balloon Pop

For those who love a crisp look, you can paint your walls in Taubmans Crisp White and accent the room with artwork and cushions in different shades of purple.

The most important thing to remember is that trend colours are supposed to be a starting point for inspiration to bring to life your perfect interior scheme, not to create colour stress. Embrace it!

For more tips for using colour in your home visit Taubmans. Interior designer Shaynna is a judge on The Block, host of Selling Houses Australia and creative director for Taubmans.

 

Categories
Interiors Addict

Take the Taubmans decorating challenge and fall back in love with your home

Taubmans has uncovered that our nation is stuck deep in a home decorating rut. The vast majority of Australians (80%) would like to change their home’s appearance, and 57% don’t use certain rooms as much as they would like to as a result.

A before and after paint job
A before and after paint job

The study of 1,000 Australian homeowners found that a quarter (24%) of people try to hide rooms away behind closed doors when visitors arrive, and 31% claim that their spare room has become a useless dumping ground. It seems that our unsightly homes are dampening our mood, with more than two thirds (67%) confirming that having a room that needs redecorating has a negative impact on how they feel. The most common emotions dragging people down are frustration that they don’t use the room enough (40%) and embarrassment when guests see the offending space (23%).

To lift the nation out of this depressing rut, Taubmans and Shaynna Blaze are launching the Taubmans Endure Paint Challenge to encourage Australians to get off the couch and make the change they wish to see in their home. “Refreshing décor is a positive mood-lifter and gives people more pride in their home, as when it looks better, it inevitably feels better,” advises Shaynna, Taubmans’ creative director and brand ambassador.

“Redecorating can seem like a time-intensive and tedious task, but with just a lick of colourful paint you can quickly and easily give your home a much-needed facelift, without breaking the bank,” Shaynna adds.

The challenge aims to demystify home decoration and help Australians with the process of painting, from that initial spark of creativity to the final coat by providing everything they need – from inspiration and equipment, to fail safe colour palettes and expert tips.

Participation in the Taubmans Endure Paint Challenge involves a few simple steps:

  1. Register at www.taubmans.com.au to take part
  2. Buy a can of Taubmans Endure from Bunnings and keep your receipt
  3. Paint either an interior or exterior wall of your home, at least two square meters in size, using Taubmans Endure
  4. Upload a before and after photo of your painting project to complete your entry, by 26 April 2014.

As an added incentive to pick up the paint brush, there are over $150,000 in prizes to be won, including $500 Bunnings vouchers for the first 100 entries, major cash prizes of $12,500 each and a money-can’t-buy grand prize of a photoshoot and magazine spread, featuring the winning interior and exterior makeovers.

To find out more and for expert decorating tips and tricks, visit www.taubmans.com.au

Categories
Expert Tips

How to choose a painter and decorator

By Tony Isgrove

You’ve been through the process of designing your dream scheme, so now what? How do you engage a professional and reliable tradesman to bring your vision to life? Engaging a true painting and decorating professional can represent a bit of a minefield.

A paint job by Tony's team
A paint job by Tony’s team, working with Wendy Davey from Cranberry Design

Your first step is choosing who to invite in to your home to quote. There are two ways I recommend to narrow this down:

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Interiors Addict

Taubmans team up with Josh Goot for tee in a tin

In a seriously cool collaboration for a paint brand, Taubmans has partnered with Aussie fashion designer Josh Goot to create a limited edition T-shirt packaged in a paint tin.

Taubmans x Josh Goot T-shirt

Drawing inspiration from a beautiful palette of Taubmans paint colours, the T-shirt’s design is a fusion of interiors and fashion and a new interpretation of Josh’s signature style. Using white as a base, he created an eye-catching, digitally painted floral design, with his trademark whimsical use of colour. In keeping with Taubmans’ brand manifesto to inspire consumers with colour, Josh chose a palette that reflects the colours that inspire him this season, including Lavendula, Rouge Roi, Split Lime and Taffy Twist.

Taubmans x Josh Goot Tin

He says: “There is a natural connection between Taubmans and Josh Goot as we have a shared passion for colour and quality. I loved the idea of using a blank white T-shirt as a canvas, working with Taubmans to create a digitally painted orchid for this Summer 13/14 piece.”

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Interiors Addict

Shaynna Blaze on how to draw inspiration from everyday life to create an interior you love

Shaynna Blaze is passionate about colour and how it can transform the home. In her role with Taubmans, she is committed to helping Australians unlock their personal colour stories, by using inspiration from their day-to-day lives and creating interiors that reflect their personal style. Here, Shaynna shares her top 5 tips for drawing inspiration from everyday life — the colours you love, the places you go, the style of your home and the accessories you already own – to create a personalised interior colour scheme you love.

Be inspired by nature

Spring is a natural time to draw inspiration from the botanic world, but I’m encouraging people to look at the colours and textures of all the seasons and climates to get inspired and create a personal theme.

Tropical Dew

For this look I was inspired by the sense of calm and relaxation from holidaying in the tropics, and wanted to bring the same energy to the living space. Green is known for its relaxing qualities, and I layered the greens from a dark shade down to a light yellow to give the interior a feeling of summer and holiday. Using pops of bright yellow adds an extra layer of energy to a room, in contrast to the calming green.

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Interiors Addict

New York (and Hamptons!) state of mind with Shaynna Blaze

By Shaynna Blaze

Travelling the world via the web – trawling blogs, pinning images on Pinterest and saving endless images to style folders – is one way that I like to draw inspiration, but it’s my actual visits to far flung destinations that really ignite my senses and get my creative juices flowing. Recently I was lucky enough to travel to some notoriously stylish American destinations: New York City and its nearby beach town, The Hamptons.

Taking in the visual style of New York City I saw that light greys, raw concrete, battered timbers, contrasting black and whites and industrial lighting are indicative of the city’s décor palette. The overall lack of vibrant colour was noticeable throughout the borough of Manhattan and it became apparent that NYC tends to stay true to its traditional blend of raw material and simple white-on-white colour scheme.

taubmans Image One
Picture by Shaynna at Restoration Hardware

Categories
Interiors Addict

Got a colour question for Shaynna Blaze?

Hi folks. Next week I’m going to a special colour event with Taubmans and Shaynna Blaze. I have the opportunity to get Shaynna to help me with a colour conundrum in my home and, as I don’t really have one, I thought I’d  pass the opportunity to one of you! So, if you have a colour problem in your home you’d like some expert advice on, please comment below and I’ll pick one to take to her.

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Interiors Addict

All glamour at the Taubmans look book launch

Unfortunately I couldn’t make it along to the Taubmans look book launch in Sydney this week and it looks like I missed a great event. Isn’t that always the way? A fashion show featuring pieces from Australian and New Zealand designers, including Trelise Cooper, Alice McCall and Josh Goot, represented the 5 key interior schemes and colour palettes.

Created in collaboration with interior designer, TV personality and Taubmans Colour Ambassador, Shaynna Blaze, the Taubmans Look Books highlight five styles loved by Australians and provide the inspiration people are looking for when they decorate or redecorate their home this Spring. They are Classic Interiors, Retro Revival, Beach Lifestyle, Modern Living and Eclectic Mix – with each book providing tips and inspiration on how to select the right colour scheme to achieve your desired style throughout the whole house.

Shaynna (above, at the event), says the Look Books are designed to help consumers become colour confident and equip them with the expertise to take decoration into their own hands and create interiors that reflect their own personal taste and style, regardless of trends.

“As an interior designer, I am frequently asked how I manage to bring different colours and pieces together to create one holistic style and look – and while this is something that comes naturally with practice, identifying the style that suits you and your home and recreating it can be daunting at first. We have created these Looks Books to give people the tools to assist in identifying a style first, then working with the colour palette second.”

Each style was brought to life and personified by live models and an accompanying fashion runway. Australian fashion designer, Josh Goot, who was at the launch, said; “This Spring is all about colour, and what better way to celebrate the amazing colours on offer than experiencing this unique marriage between interiors and fashion?”

Stylist Lydia-Jane Saunders, fashion designer Josh Goot and Shaynna Blaze

You can pick up the Look Books in Bunnings stores from next month.

Categories
Interiors Addict

Shaynna Blaze on how to use paint colour

The Block judge and Selling Houses Australia co-host Shaynna Blaze is also colour consultant to Taubmans. I asked her some questions about using paint and colour in your home. She reveals how she once painted her living and dining rooms emerald green, that she hates painting ceilings (don’t we all?) and she’s currently loving grey walls with pops of colour.

What do you think are the biggest paint colour trends for 2012? Currently, I am loving greys and tinted neutrals such as Taubmans Abracadabra or Taubmans Silvertop and dark shades such as Taubmans Sheffield Grey and Taubmans Invincible. Teaming grey with hints of tangerines, limes and yellows is also very popular at the moment. As we move towards the end of the year and into 2013, ‘grown up’ pastels are becoming increasingly popular and introducing a dark grey to complement these will take the edge off. Accessories are still bold and exciting, with a few more neutrals sneaking in there to balance it out.

(Image: This room is painted in Taubmans’ Tightrope)