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Contained Chaos
12 home organization tips
I am an architectural design writer who often focuses on how environment can affect behavior. Before consulting privately, I received my MA in writing and ran a design boutique in Los Angeles.
I am an architectural design writer who often focuses on how environment... More »
I love order and am in fact a little neurotic. But I love to collect--things like vintage Es, antique white serving platters, books books BOOKS. I love order. I love things. I love order I love things.
It's like watching a match in the recent US Open. I try to find a happy medium in enjoying a pleasant amount of chaos by constraining and containing it. It's the visual idea of a clear-bordered bulletin board full of scraps and fabrics and notations: the chaos must be aesthetic (and useful if possible), and must have a clearly-defined end. Finding the right balance takes practice and intuition, but can add to a dwelling a pleasant aesthetic that suggests both conscientious and impulsive living.
At least that's what I tell myself when, say, I don't have the heart to move the growing stack of literature continually rising to the window in our library.
It's like watching a match in the recent US Open. I try to find a happy medium in enjoying a pleasant amount of chaos by constraining and containing it. It's the visual idea of a clear-bordered bulletin board full of scraps and fabrics and notations: the chaos must be aesthetic (and useful if possible), and must have a clearly-defined end. Finding the right balance takes practice and intuition, but can add to a dwelling a pleasant aesthetic that suggests both conscientious and impulsive living.
At least that's what I tell myself when, say, I don't have the heart to move the growing stack of literature continually rising to the window in our library.
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Keeping to all black frames and black-and-white art adds continuity while varied sizes, shapes, and placement creates an illusion of effortlessness and spontenaety.
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| An at-home workspace that I'm guessing is in at least partial view in the house. Its organic look encourages workability without spreading the busy look--it's kept centralized and looking finished with touches like the desktop design, the pillow and chair, and Anthropology initials mug. |
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I get too nervous about mixing the library-worthy order of my own library, but I love the color organization of this collection. The segmentation of this bookshelf helps visually separate the collection into bite-sized sections and allows for more filled shelves without overdoing the look.
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Though this room to the minimalist is perhaps too chaotic, it displays how a room can be filled and still keep order. Notice how the piles of pillows are similarly-sized and grouped together into the corner, the bookshelves are evenly spaced and evenly filled, and even the art spread throughout clusters at certain points.
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Cookbooks collection. Easily-accessible. Out of the way. Carefully-selected classics like MFK Fisher and Child and Brillat-Savarin add extra panache to your repertoire and your kitchen.
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| They key of this concept is to cluster objects into a deliberate collection, within distinguishable perimeters, and to balance with quieter and simpler space without of the perimeters. |
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These shelves are so beautifully organized, but would even work as a more bohemian set-up as the books more haphazardly situated. The rest of the room is so classic and organized (LOVE how the tv is sleekly integrated) and the shelves are so much darker and distinctly set apart from the room, order would still reign in this regal living area.
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| The filled and even topped-off book shelves give pleasant weight to this wall in this light room. The books and eclectic items still create cohesion because of their containment within the room. The frames above exhibit a balance between order and symmetry, and variety. |
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Pleasant and not-too-clean line-up of lighting, constrained by the thin hallway.
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The defining characteristic of this hallway is that is has no definition. While keeping overall to neutral palates, the small size of this hallway gives more freedom to vary its contents. The rooms it leads to give a clean balance.
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I adore this closet-cum-bar. Minimalist chair and art around it, allowing for a busy (but still organized, wow) collection of alcohol. The dark wood matching the floor and contrasting the white is brilliant.
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This mud room kind of area keeps to itself within a largely blank hallway, and creates continuity with color and clusters.
Comments
victoria_d I also love order... I also love things...I LOVE this ideabook!
4 years ago · Like
silver69 The color organization of the books is brilliant!
4 years ago · Like
rebelwarren I never in a million would have thought about organizing books by color, what a good idea plus it looks great!
4 years ago · Like
Margaret Everton Isn't that fun? You can also use color-scheming books to accentuate a single color in the room. Like pulling and grouping all of your green books. I love white/cream/gray books lined/piled together for that French-haute-intellectual-chez-moi look.
4 years ago · Like
Ideabook updated on Oct. 15, 2009.
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