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Six simple steps that'll make your rooms shine
HGTV's Design Star champ tells you
how to make your place look like
a million —for far less.
WHEN YOU FLIP through glossy
home and lifestyle magazines, you
may get inspired to make your house
look like a million dollars. But there’s
a problem: You don’t have a million-dollar budget.
Fortunately, you don’t need one. You only need a
sense of style and creativity, says Kim Myles, the
reigning champ of HGTV’s Design Star, a reality
show that focuses on decorating challenges. Myles
specializes in tiny touches that elevate
a home’s interior look often on a i
tight budget She can look around jg
a room and immediately see how
lamps, wall color, furnishings and
use of space can be easily up- 'fit
graded to eye-catching levels on £m
the cheap. X
Design Star is a
reality show in which
the contenders take
part in weekly chal- m
lenges, after which ■
they’re voted off in 5?
turn by judges and w
viewers until only one is
left standing. The grand
prize is a weekly design
show for the winner, and
Myles will now host Myles
of Style on HGTV, starting
this week (March 16 at 10 pjn.
ET). She’ll also appear this A
season on Design Star, M
which launches in June.
She spoke with
USA WEEKEND
Magazine about
six things you
Kim Myles offers ideas
on winning decor in a new
show starting this week.
can do to make your
house look like a
seven-figure home.
22
USA WEEKEND-March 14-16,2008
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I Start with something simple, like your cof
fee table —seriously. “People don’t realize
how a coffee table can make all the difference in
the world. Most of these have basic wood finishes.
But if you focus on the legs and base, say, and
paint it a high-gloss black, you provide a sense
of elegance for less than $lO. As for the surface?
Find a design or pattern online that you find ap
pealing, then print it out and reproduce it on the
table with something decorative. I like taking
simple gold thumbtacks and then pushing them
into the top of the table in a damask pattern. It’s
very baroque-looking.”
- Expand your space. “Ever notice how
five-star hotel lobbies seem so luxuri
ous? It’s because there’s so much open
space. I urge people to invite a friend
over for an afternoon in which you both
remove furniture and items in a room.
But I’m not talking about putting im
portant pieces of furniture on the curb.
Get rid of anything that you don’t love
dearly or doesn’t serve a clear purpose.
Unload that magazine rack from
fc. Aunt Lillie that you never
use. When you’ve done
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■ sarv items that take
fygtlX up 20% or 30% of the
available space, you’ve
opened up the room.”
W , Don’t blow your bud-
W * get on wall hangings.
W “For many homeowners, their
7 greatest dilemma is what to
do with the walls. How do you
fill them up? Don’t spend a bunch
of money for paintings. I like to
take inexpensive but artful fab
rics. You stretch them out, then
frame and hang them. You can
cover a lot of space with this,
and it looks classy.”
- Light up the room. “Everyone forgets about
the ceiling, but the central light there can
be a great source of inspiration. Take a piece of
string and tie one end to a pencil and the other
to the center mount of the lighting hardware.
Then, extend the string and use it with the pen
cil as a way to draw a perfect circle around the
light fixture. Fill in that circle with a metallic kind
of paint. I like gold or silver. It’s elegant, and, be
cause it’s metallic, the light bounces off of it to
create the effect of greater light in the room. This
turns a simple fixture into a great feature.”
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_ Add floral life to your look. “Many people
have trouble with flowers, so they buy silk
ones instead. I say stick with living plants to cre
ate natural energy. If you get them at your gro
cery l’ll buy African violets there for $3.99
you can make a big difference while not spending
much. The key to making them last is to repot
them after buying. By the time they get to your
grocery store, their roots have already reached
the pot’s limit, and that’s why the plants start
dying. Get a bigger pot and put the plant in that,
and it will last a good, long time.”
- Use spring’s hottest hue. “It sounds counter
° intuitive, but gray is really in. It looks very
stately and retro, a color conducive to a ’4os style
of glamour. It’s a neutral color, so it works well
with anything else you do in the room. IVy buy
ing some old black-and-white movie posters, fram
ing them yourself and putting them in the room.
That goes very well with gray.” ca