Beige is Beautiful (No I haven’t been drinking.)

As I have discussed multiple times now, I am obsessed with color. It energizes me and excites me.  I love to be surrounded by healthy doses of it. I know it’s current, super chic and trends point to white everything right now.  I’ve tried, sometimes desperately, to embrace the neutral life in my home, but it always leaves me empty and longing for something to bring the room back to life.

In addition to my love of color, I also have a habit of searching for beauty around me. It’s almost like a dare. I like to look at the ordinary and try to find something about it that makes it beautiful or special.  It helps me, particularly during the dregs of winter, to look for beauty where seemingly there is none.  I visited a friend’s farm a few towns over with my family. It’s the dead of winter here in Northern Virginia which means that nearly all of nature has been robbed of it’s spring or summer vibrancy and has been reduced to, well, beige. (Mother Nature’s version of the Restoration Hardware catalog.  Ugh.  Oops.  Did I say that out loud?)  With my surroundings being so devoid of color, I started to take in everything and began the search to find something lovely.  It’s my way of coping with the drab.

I was delighted to find that this exercise was surprisingly simple! Since my natural draw to a pop of color was missing, I found myself utterly fascinated and completely captivated by the unending display of textures. Whether is was the ruggedness of a hand-stacked stone wall, or the smoothness of the glassy surface of the pond, there was a compelling little treasure around every twist of the thoughtfully laid mulched path.

And just as I was relaxing into the textural symphony that was playing around me, I would be rewarded with a lovely shock of red here and there, just to tease me and remind me of the pending promise of the change of season.

For me, I’ll just continue to hold my breath until Mother Nature wakes up and graces us with the fireworks of spring flowers. But I will no longer take for granted the beauty of texture. I’ll appreciate the winter drives through the lovely country roads of Loudoun County, Virginia, with its rolling hills of beige grasses, peppered here and there with the occasional tonal hay bales and civil war-esque stone fences. Even though it’s missing the splashes of color that energize me, there is still a grace and beauty to be found.

So if you are not a lover of neutrals, but long to be, either to create a timeless space in your home, or a more peaceful atmosphere for an over-stimulated family, try layering on different textures in one color family to keep your room fresh and interesting. If you stick with organic materials, it’s almost foolproof. Consider the combination of warm wood accent tables and smooth leather armchairs, layered with a dreamy, creamy alpaca throw. It won’t have the energy of a colorful palette, but I think that just might be the point.