Email this page  Print this page  del.icio.us  digg

Homes with Character

Looking to decorate your new home,or freshen up your interiors?

THE LATINO INFLUENCE
Award-winning Hispanic designer draws on cultural background for interior touches

In the frenetic housing market called Arizona, Latinos who have been fortunate enough to trade up and purchase the house of their dreams are facing a new challenge: how to decorate their new home in a contemporary style that still reflects their cultural tastes.

For many, consulting a professional is the best way to get great home decor advice.

Award-winning designer Ernesto Garcia shared some suggestions on how new homeowners might approach this challenge. Garcia works for Carlson Design Group and is a member of the American Society of Interior Designers, North Arizona Chapter. His recent work, in a Santa Barbara-style custom home in Scottsdale, recently was featured in ASID's Winter Home Tour.

Born and raised in Argentina, Garcia takes intuitive skills from his Latino background and uses them when he starts working with clients.

"A house has to make you feel all the good things your husband or wife makes you feel on a good day," Garcia says. From there, he says, "I create a language with textures, colors, furnishings and fabrics that will evoke those feelings."

Having a degree in architecture helps, as he often literally begins designing custom homes from the ground up, designating where major furniture pieces will be positioned, or where electrical outlets should be put in a floor. He selects tile, flooring and stone work, from which paint and accent colors will be derived.

The bulk of his work, he says, "starts after the sheet rock."

CHECK YOUR HEART

Garcia says homeowners must consider their emotions when it comes to deciding what style they want to use.

"There are all these metaphors for what is important to familia," he says. As an example, he singles out the round table where everyone gathers around: "The distressed wood reflects daily life.

"The way that Hispanics entertain, I have to create spaces that are capable of having multiple functions, because we have a greater sense of extended family. And in Hispanic families, children are incorporated in the entertaining of the family, so that's an important factor as well."

Latinos also tend to be more uninhibited and daring in their use of color. But what happens when clients want to go a little over the top, maybe paint every wall a different color or use serapes as curtains, bedspreads and couch throws?

"Yo soy el editor!" declares Garcia.

Garcia says homeowners can choose among essential design elements to imprint their rooms with Latino style.

"If you want to give a hacienda look, use false beams or vigas," he says. Or, use tile in a very decorative manner, like  a beautiful wainscoting of rustic, handmade tiles. Check out decorative wrought iron for window treatments and light fixtures, such as chandeliers or wall sconces. Also distressed woods, and rich, dark, highly carved pieces, as in an armoire. In the kitchen, consider painting the cabinetry a bright color.

INESCAPABLE CULTURE

Garcia says technology and travel have made the world smaller, making us more eclectic in our tastes. And because Latinos occupy a large part of the planet, it's hard to escape the culture's decorative influence, especially because it reflects a global eclecticism.

"This is what I've noticed," Garcia says. "There is a value about our way of living that is becoming more cherished by everybody else. The value of family and the importance of spontaneous communication. Then, there's that passionate and arbitrary quality about so many of the things we do in art -- these imponderables (are) so appealing to people. One way of capturing that is through style."

Garcia also points to the Southwestern region as highly desirable to new home-buyers.

"There is something about the language, the message, that Southwestern homes have
that new transplants want to get hold of, a desire to share our concept of familia, an uncomplicated quality, a sense of belonging to something Latino."