60-30-10

So, if you Google “home decorating” and “color” you will be inundated with the 60-30-10 rule (I love rules). Apparently, you “cannot go wrong” if you utilize this method of color coordination. Apparently, I utilized that method in my living room without even realizing I was doing it. Let me say that this method is much easier to employ by sheer accident than it is by design.

60% of your room is typically going to be the walls. So, for us, that is mid-century Venetian pink. We braved the holiday shoppers at a triple-decker Metro Detroit Macy’s for linens and bought a set of “primrose” towels that are a lovely compliment. I’m rolling them up in the 60%. Because if I don’t it screws up my proportions and I really want to feel like I learned something and applied it and got Fabulous, Bold results.

30% of the room is going to be a claret. Mom rocked the house and did a JC Penny’s run after we found something at their online branch that we thought would work. She got accent towels and rugs. Apparently, you put dark colors on the floor. I learned this both from a Macy’s home goods employee and on the Internet (where they said this imitates the earth) so even though it feels wrong to me, i’m in double-confirmation territory and probably shouldn’t wander too far astray.

10% of the room will be black. According to more brilliant Internet sources I googled, if you put something black in a room it makes all the other colors more pronounced. That sounds like one of those rules that might be more true for people who are not-me.

I’ve decided white is not a color.

Aunt Charlotte says I don’t have to take decorating rules literally. In my own defense I would like to point out that I have measured nothing in the bathroom despite hours spent shopping and buying to put things in it, literally, and despite being advised to do so by every level-headed person who has advised me. See? I’m not being narrow! Progress!