Designing With Color and Texture: Balance and Your Comfort Level
Comfort Level
The colors and textures you choose have an inherent comfort level. Extremely bright and contrasting colors can result in visual fatigue over time. Very bright reflective surfaces near sources of natural light can mean harsh glare on sunny days. Dark surfaces with inadequate, poorly targeted task lighting can mean eye strain. Tile or stone floors are fatiguing to stand on for long periods and an abundance of stone and metal can contribute to a high noise factor.
These problems are design challenges that can often be countered by using their opposites. Soothing walls can counteract intensely colored counters. Reflections can be controlled with blinds. Lighting covers a multitude of sins, especially if you provide a wide range of choices. Natural or rubber floor mats at busy areas relieve fatigue and a carpeted area or upholstered furnishings will absorb sound.
Balance
The key to good visual and tactile design is balance. Hard and soft, bright and muted, angular and round all represent balanced mixtures. A minimal approach may call for at least one intensely design-oriented object or artwork to focus one’s attention on. A very busy design (a Victorian kitchen for instance) may be balanced by a view outdoors into a simple garden or austere landscape.
Problem solving in the design stage is an interesting process based on finding solutions that counteract and balance each other. Problem solving after construction is underway is expensive and frustrating as you start redoing costly work or designing by trial an error. Develop a color and texture palette as a guide and then use balance and restraint to resolve problems before you begin to build.
