Portland designers Ramona Ramos (left) and Allison Smith adjust a mirror in a client's house. The team's magic act with the homeowner's furnishings begins with a blank canvas.The hosts of
on HGTV in Canada have seen their share of clutter. Just check out the "before" and "after" photos on their show's website. (There's a sort of train-wreck fascination to the "befores," while some of the "afters" look as if they were designed for some entirely different people from the ones who lived in the "befores.")
In their column in the Vancouver Sun, Colin McAllister and Justin Ryan explain how they dealt with the case of Canadian film and TV actor Frank Ruffo, who'd been "lost in his own home" and unable to figure out how or where to begin dealing with his clutter.
They started by giving him a clean slate in his home office. The pair writes:
When purging any desolate scene, you have to be ruthless. Don't incorporate previously negative elements into your new design; be thorough and remove all that's bad. Losing piles of rubbish, broken furniture and decades of dust will provide a blank canvas for you to move forward.
They set up boxes in three categories: for basement storage, for the Dumpster and for display.
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and check out the before and after of Ruffo's home office. He even claims the transformation has helped revitalize his career -- his clutter had been making him feel out of control, and that feeling affected his auditions.
A Portland team of designers,
and her daughter, Ramona Ramos, make a specialty of bringing order and beauty to rooms using the homeowner's own furnishings. Their first step, too, is to clear the room. Completely.
The Oregonian's Bridget Otto wrote about a project they took on several years ago:
"It's not a fine science," Smith says, "but there is a process." Stripping the room down is time-consuming, but it's necessary to get a clean slate. You can't just do one corner, says Smith. The room needs to work as a whole.
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