There are a lot of major principles of design. They can include scale, composition, pattern, rhythm, repetition, contrast, white space, texture, balance, color and many more. Like many of you, I spend a lot of time looking at real estate listings. But I don’t look at them dreaming about what my life would be like if I lived in the house listed. Instead I am looking for mistakes, or wins in every room in terms of design and home staging. Did the stager do it well, or did they miss the mark? What could they have done better that would have made the room look more appealing to a buyer. Today we are going to talk about one of the most important design principles we use on a daily basis in our home staging in both Portland and Seattle, and that is color.

First off, let's define what color is and even more importantly, what it is not. Colors are found in the rainbow like red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet. Neutrals are not found in the rainbow like black, gray, brown, tan, cream and white. Gold is to color like the letter “y” is to vowels, you know AEIOU and sometimes “Y”. Gold can be considered both a neutral and a color. These two different categories of colors vs. neutrals it is very important to separate.

We use color for home staging in a very precise and calculated way. We generally stage public areas like living rooms, dining rooms and kitchens with almost all neutrals. The bedrooms and offices, however, are staged with color. Each one having their own single bold color to identify it differently from the next.

The tradition of labeling rooms based on their color came from the Victorian era. They would say things like, “William and Anna will be staying in the blue room while Gilbert and Besse will be staying in the red room.” We continue this tradition by providing our buyers with a subliminal labeling system using colors. We will stage a room in completely neutral furniture and then add a layer of color with pillows, linen, art and accessories of just one color. As an example we will make the primary bedroom a blue room, the queen bedroom in pink, the twins in green, the full in orange… you get the picture.

When a couple tours homes they might see upward of 7 houses in a day, with each house having 10 rooms. That is 70 rooms in one day. The average person can hold 5 bits of information in their head at one time. When the modern day phone number was being developed it was discovered that by breaking down a 10 digit number into three groups of three-three-four digits, it could be more easily remembered. We use this knowledge to our advantage by giving each room a distinct color label for the couple to discuss our staged rooms more than the other listings they saw that day.

Take, for instance, theoretical home buyers Jill and Andy. They have been looking at houses all day long. Jill says to Andy “Remember the house that had the wood floors and the white walls, and quartz countertops?”

Andy replies, “The one with a garage?”

Jill says, “No, the other one.”

Andy thinks for a moment and can’t recall which house Jill is thinking of, but goes along with the rest of the conversation. Then Jill says “Remember the one with the pink twin bedroom?”

Andy says, “Yes I remember that one.” Feeling a bit proud that he was paying attention.

“I think my office should be in the blue bedroom.” Jill thinks out loud.

Andy considers for a moment that perhaps he might like the blue bedroom, but decides against starting an argument over it and simply nods his head ‘yes’ to validate Jill’s musings.

In the parable above Jill and Andy could be any couple looking for real estate in Portland or Seattle. They struggled to discuss the house that was not properly staged, but had an easy go at mentally moving into a house staged by Spade and Archer, using our Victorian color blocking theory. The big lesson here is to remember that it does not matter if you, as the seller, like a color or don’t like a color, the matter is moot. What it really comes down to is will your buyer be able to easily recall and discuss your house with their partner? If so, then color has been used correctly to stage your property. What’s your favorite color? What’s your favorite neutral?

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