It's interesting that at this moment, this post is directly above yours - [https://www.houzz.com/discussions/this-is-an-award-winning-designers-room-would-you-live-here-dsvw-vd~5454004?n=41[(https://www.houzz.com/discussions/this-is-an-award-winning-designers-room-would-you-live-here-dsvw-vd~5454004?n=41)

Look at the comments about it. I think that many people like to have neutral backgrounds so they can bring in accessories using their favorite colors, and the neutrals are calming. People may have jobs that keep them very busy, away from their homes, then they may have to pick up groceries on the way home, or take kids to school practice sessions, and their lives are so busy, they appreciate calm at home.

Thank you for the link-this lady articulated my thoughts, to a big degree

(obviously I also listened to some lectures and read some books and did some thinking before arriving to very similar conclusions)

As for why people decorate in neutrals-well they don't necessarily do. They do here. In this country. There are plenty of countries where they actually don't. They use a lot of colors-deep, bright, you name it..they use patterns as in wallpapers and/or tiles..they take cues from their surroundings a lot..climate and light and culture-will find reflection in how they use colors.

And maybe it's they in general worry less about what next owner of their house might think. Maybe they change their houses less often. They move less. Maybe they are less into plans. Here people often write "we plan to stay here 2-5 years" or "we plan to stay here 5-7 years" or something like that. I'm still adjusting to that because my initial reaction is a feeling of surprize, of "how do you know, so precisely?" Here people are very into plans..they plan parties, they plan events, to a big precision, they're very much into holidays(who's not, obviously-but it's also whole marketing machine that starts working months ahead of a holiday X)..there are lot of things that they want to know ahead of a time, and they feel comfortable sharing these things, ahead of a time. Something that I'd consider very personal is getting shared-and vice versa. They like to prepare. Maybe that resale thing that holds such a huge importance here-is a way of preparing.

It's a different culture here. I'm just sharing my impressions as a (very relative) newcomer.

And yes, there is less "living in the moment" feeling. People hurry a lot.

That's why I love going to art festivals..sometimes, bands are playing, and many things that are beautiful are around, and people are all very different but there is something that unifies them-their faces are relaxed, they seem like kids on a birthday party, they're joyful, they're closer to each other just because they're joyful. It gives me hope. It brings me joy.

Maybe the talker is right -and grown ups who express joy in a very obvious way take certain risks. I'd sing out loud when I was younger..even now where there's song I love and I'm in the store-I dance a bit to the rhythm while standing in the line. I can be very childish. It can be perceived as weird, and strange. Or amusing. It can be endearing. But it's not lady-like:)

I think the "joy" she speaks of is found more in happenstance than planned design. If I were walking in an unfamiliar city and came across a crosswalk painted in rainbow hues, or if I were in a public building and looked up to see a colorful glass art installation overhead, I would be delighted. That is not to say that I would care to live with such things. Seeing a riot of color in my home day after day would not continue to evoke that same sense of joyful discovery; in fact, it could easily become cloying and start to feel cheap and tacky. (I used to live in an old house that looked like a Crayola box exploded inside, so I'm quite confident in my assessment in this regard.)

I understand her point. I don't necessarily think that it can be extrapolated to apply to the sanctuaries of home that we create though. Those who choose to live in spaces dominated by neutrals or monochromatic palettes are not killing themselves and are not necessarily joyless individuals. Their choices don't have to mean they have no clue what they want or like either. When people do things differently than we might, we tend to want to assign judgment to why they do as they do. Maybe it's simply because their eyes see things in a unique way, and that's not a bad or wrong thing. Perhaps, after all, it is you or I that others consider to be "doing it all wrong." In the end, who gets to have that say?

I completely agree. I also see neutrals as colors. They're not mutually exclusive to me. I like to use all of them. All colors. How exactly-will depend on a house.

Many people do get this impression neutrals are easier to decorate with. They're very often not. They're complex, they change crazily with light, you need to think them through more if you're to get this feeling of depth and eye travelling around. They can be very complicated. Another reason why I love them. They might seem simple, they can signal this simplicity, either very refined, or wabi-sabi feel-but it doesn't mean everybody can get a good room by using neutrals. Same amount of thought behind it, often more.

I think the psychology behind interior design choices is fascinating, but quite complex I'm sure. Simple conclusions are not possible. Some people like neutrals because their mother decorated in neutrals, and some people like color because their mother decorated in neutrals.

Exactly that's why I love this topic. It's complex. And it's fascinating.

I didn't pick up any judgement from this talk. I sure hope no one picked jugdement from me. It's very interesting, to compare things, and try to understand them

I agree on the main point she makes: colors signal of life to us. Actually all of them can signal life. And they can signal death if situation changes..if we perceive there's no escape. Whatever was calming might seem fatal. Whatever seemed cheerful might drive crazy. It's relatively rare I guess that it happens-but it's the context we percieve a color in that will dictate our reaction.

And that would obviously depend on many things..regional differences, historical, cultural, individual of course.and sometimes they all might get overthrown because the context changes

hi, i found that room in the first comment and i was surprised out of those 122(?) pics, i would say 3/4 were white walls.

So I watched the talk and didn't hear anything about neutrals. If I were to describe this talk to someone I would say it was about intentional interior design and institutional interior design. If you look at a well off institution you will see it decorated well- like the nursing home with the colorful chairs and balls suspended from the ceiling and if you go to a nursing home that is not well off, you will find it decorated in mismatched shades of beige and off-green and gray.

In other parts of the world, say France, you will see more color and intention at lower socio-economic levels for schools, nursing homes, and the like, but I assure you their low income housing is just as horribly designed as ours is.

As for how all this translates to people's houses, that's a very long story that mixes culture and socio-economics.

Neutrals however ARE a colour. And they can be full of complexity and surprise. If they were not, no one would hem and haw for days over just what white or gray to pick for their walls or regret the white they painted their walls with is not what they thought they were getting!

I have white walls and plenty of neutrals in my home. But that white never looks the same from hour to hour or room to room, and even changes if I move a foot over. It moves from bright white to warm pink, to a soft gray. But, it also works as a wonderful backdrop to other things that bring me joy like my art or furniture. Is the pleasure I get from seeing how my walls change with a shift in the sun, or is the happiness I feel in the cozy warmth of the neutrals that carry through my home, of less value because I am not observing or living amongst bold bright colours?

Like IdaClaire, if bold colours are everywhere, I start to feel overwhelmed. I don’t want that feeling in my home, my sanctuary. I have also lived in an older home (a rental) with bold colours throughout and for me it was fitting with the style of the home but for me too visually stimulating. I also love to visit such bold and bright homes, but living in them is not for me. It does not mean I am joyless, it just means my joy derived from different things. I much prefer the unexpected surprise of colour amongst a neutral backdrop - like in a wonderful painting.

That nursing home shown in the TED talk is bright and cheerful - but the colours are contrasted against white; and I would be very curious to see if all the clients’s rooms were as bold. Because if not I would say that can be why that common spaces could work for me - they differ and offer a different “feel” than the private spaces.

Yes. Exactly what Rai Kai said.

And regarding judgments, I did pick up on them in the talk. Didn't she allege that neutral environments are "killing" us? (She almost lost me with that one; I mean, talk about a stretch.) There is also a good deal of judgment in the comments up thread. We really have no idea why others choose the colors or styles they do, but our natural tendency is to assume and invent possibilities so that the "unknown" becomes something that we feel we understand. That doesn't mean we assume accurately. I'm not convinced the woman in the Ted Talk assumed accurately about a few things as well. It was interesting to hear though, and obviously thought provoking.

I agree with my3dogs. Our lives are so stimulating that when we come home, we just want to relax and let our brains rest. That and neutrals hide dog hair and I don't have to vacuum so often. That brings me joy.

"our natural tendency is to assume and invent possibilities so that the "unknown" becomes something that we feel we understand."-that's very true, couldn't agree more

our minds also work in contexts. and put together stories using cetrain elements..like we choose certain bricks to build an imaginary house. We tend to disregard other bricks-they lie down right there, yet we somehow pick up bricks that fit our story, to us, the most

it's also very hard to imagine something you never saw or experienced

I died many times in my dreams-sometimes in very cruel awful ways-yet I always woke up a second before really dying, you know?

because I can't imagine something I never really went through))

that's why I try to figure out -what's my context?how it came to be? how it might differ from other people context? what's theirs? what are possible explanations-I can only assume there are many, many of them..more than I can imagine.

So no, we don't always assume accurately. Sometimes we shouldn't assume at all))

We are wired to explore, however. To try to figure out.

To see that there are many bricks around. Different stories. Different types of beauty. Even ugly ones. Decaying ones. I don't know.

Ha tozmo1, it is not purely coincidence that the flooring I chose works with my neutral coloured cat. The Roomba also helps!

IdaClaire, I think she referenced a couple others (a poet and an architect maybe?) who said that they were “killing us”, so not her words but ones she references in support of her own theories I suppose.

Yeah, that's more along the lines of how the "killing us" assertion came out.

Thanks for the wonderful discussion. I love aprilneverends comment that this is probably an American culture thing. I hadn't thought about that.

I had to ask the question because I'm a color based person. I recently finished redecorating my bathroom in a deep moody green, with rust, charcoal and a few grey highlights. I tend to love rich colors. I'm not so fond of pastels or primary colors. I'm more of a jewel tone ("summer?") or "fall" color person. But I have to admit I visited a show home one time where they made a bedroom crimson and I had to ask how someone could sleep with that color.

well it's a huge country here. Built by folks with different traditions. Having totally different climates, landscapes, whatnot. Architectural influences from many countries. It's amazingly diverse..or should be?

It might be a timing thing. Socio-economic thing.

there's some global tendencies too I see right now as I'm checking real estate abroad. That make me a bit sad.

less to do with colors, more with strange remodels, but still))

I agree with Rita-in places where I come from(it so happenned that I don't come from one place, but two-and very different, both of them), there's lot of these suburbs that were built out of neccessity in certain time, and frankly-of course they reflect certain geographical differences, in materials used, details, etc-but no, they're not the best examples of great architecture. Lets put it this way. The timing was such that they built a lot of samey umm..not very beautiful stuff to somehow place people

Now they try to improve, renovate these buildings, or when they build new they try to do better job, etc

But I won't take offence if somebody'd point out to me, like my husband did "listen, this neighborhood here, it's kinda..asking for improvement"

yeah..it does))

but I can still love it though. I understand how it came to be like that. It signals home.

When one first arrives to NY...it's overwhelming. Huge. There's a feeling the city will crush you.

It's like a dinosaur, and you're about to be swallowed by it.

Yet time passes and you're swept by crazy energy of the city and its uniqueness..it's not neccessarily beautiful, yet you're in love. You can be madly in love even. I was.

There's more to what we find lovable than some universal standards of beauty. (I'm leaving aside that there are many things about beauty that are not universal at all. That's why I get a bit upset when somebody from obviously different culture posts-and the answers are "it's soo tacky!" I can also perceive some as tacky btw-but I realize it's my context, my perception, which I shouldn't neccessarily put on other people that have totally different cultural associations, personal connection, etc. )

Maybe we're after imperfections too. Imperfections signal of life, after all. Imperfections signal of life just like colors do.

That's more to things that bring us joy too, I guess.

It's interesting indeed that I concentrated on "life" in the talk...the "killing" part went past me, not completely, but most of it

Maybe because that's what I was looking for. Death takes too much space in my thoughts anyway.

No, I didn't like many places she showed either. Lol. I less prefer primary colors etc. I love them just not neccessarily in my place. Small quantities, yes. I love all colors, it'll be about combos,and on what surface and how much. I love scarlet though, a lot. Jewel tones. Murky colors. I do love neutrals-like a lot! I like beige and greige and taupe and you name it.

I perceived this discussion as theoretical, mostly. What moves us? Why? Is it universal, indeed? When it changes to be so?

Because again-depending on a context-it might change. Our perception.

Thank you, Mary, for this thread, indeed.

great discussion.

Of course it makes me a bit more emotional that I wanted to initially, lol-well, that's the nature of a journey.

This relates in a way to another thread from a few months ago, which was more directly about "neutrals."

https://www.gardenweb.com/discussions/5294301/so-so-tired-of-neutral-rooms

What I took from that discussion, and what I take from this talk as well, is that we need to define what we mean by "neutral". A house with all white, grey or beige walls is not necessarily neutral: if the walls are the backdrop for art, oriental rugs, lots of textures and shapes, the effect can have all the joyful impact of a room with a scarlet feature wall - perhaps more so.

I certainly don't agree that having neutral walls means one is necessarily afraid of colour. My red and blue oriental carpets would certainly differ with that opinion :) And I'm not sure I buy the argument that color is joyful because we associate it with nature and life. There's plenty of nature that is grey, white, brown, beige - the red bird stands out, but the little grey/brown bird is ubiquitous.

I find many neutral rooms very overstimulating because people think everything that's neutral goes together and they ignore content, textures and accents, and they overdo.

I am sure people have seen when I post a brightly colored room vs a neutral room both in black and white and the neutral room is actually much more active.

jmm, I can't speak for the speaker. I see it like this: every color, be it color or neutral(which is also a color) can be joyful and signal of life-or can stop being that and start signifying the opposite

I don't remember this quotation exactly-but sometimes people will scream with joy "Tierra! Tierra!" and sometimes they'll scream with joy "Thalassa! Thallassa!"

Tierra can be brown and gray,and thalassa will be green and blue-it'll matter less, at the moment. what will matter-under circumstances such and such, they'll be overjoyed with any color that will tell them about their chance of arrival somewhere they'd rather be.

It's amazing looking at how fire burns, when it's a source of heat and all

I guess-when it's a fire that's all around you-that red, it'll be perceived differently.

Every color is beautiful. Every color signals of life. All of them can be deadly.

We usually go by what we used to see-and we're fine

There are plenty people that find deserts beautiful. Including me. It's just a very different type of beauty.

Or black sky. Incredibly beautiful. Evokes different things in us, different thoughts. Not always joyful-but one doesn't neccesarily have to be joyful all the time. Thoughtful is fine.

When whatever color surrounds us turns to be something very overwhelming-we're less fine.

And we won't always know what it will be that will overwhelm us.

And we won't always predict that something that we might not personally associate with joy-can suddenly become "wow I love it because I made it to here..or at least I hope so"

I am ssure this does not relate, but to me it does to much what is said. first i hope that noone in america called somebody tacky, i would say at least 3/4 of our country is tacky homes. I am sure noone will ever say i lived in great homes. probably all would be considered tacky. but each provided me with beautiful experiences that i would not trade for anything. and many had neutral paints that i did not choose and would not have kept but life was always so busy.

Everything is this kitchen is "neutral" and yet visually I find this not at all restful

And while I don't find bright yellow restful, this scheme is less distracting to me than the "neutral" one above:

The "neutral" kitchen above is a riot of pattern and movement and angles, seemingly without thought to how all those prominent elements relate to one another. It is design confusion. I don't see the colors themselves so much as neutral, but brown and black and dark shades that wouldn't necessarily act as a dispassionate backdrop for other colors.

I dislike the intensity of the yellow room, but agree that it's more visually pleasing than the commotion of browns.

I think palimpsesthas caught some of what I'm trying to convey. I like modern, mostly because it is less "busy". And yet I love fairly large blocks of color (jewel or autumn-like). I'd have to say the "neutrals" that I gravitate to are more grey and black. However, I will use white if the room is too dark. However, I'm not a beige, tan, yellow or whatever color person and many of the yellow-trending neutrals are what I'm trying to remove as I remodel. My house will probably not be an easy sell when it goes on the market, but the way I see it, that's my daughter's problem... when I'm gone. I'm doing this place for me.