Step 3: Execute

This is the fun part!

It’s time to start adding in all of the layers and details that make your vision come together. 

When you’ve gone through steps 1 & 2, you’re ready to pull the trigger on some big design decisions.  It could be

  • a new paint color

  • an investment piece of furniture

  • the most expensive piece of art you’ve bought to date. 

  • or, it could be on smaller things if it turns out all of your placeholders are working well! 

For each room in your home, I’d like you to think about how your passions, personality, and values are going to show up (or how you’d like them to).  I want anyone coming into your home to look around and say “wow… this is so YOU.” 

Why? This is how your style becomes a signature style, rather than a generic representation of a typical style category. This is how you get that one-of-a-kind, “effortlessly” collected home that you’ve been dreaming about!

This is also where the “slow” part of Slow Style might kick in. You don’t have to do everything at once.

Take your time to find what really makes your heart zingy. Be disciplined in terms of not falling for fads or choosing something simply because you’re exhausted from hours of searching online. (And remember that you deserve to truly love every aspect of your home and feel delighted by the smallest of details throughout you day-to-day).

The pace of the execution depends on your personality, preferences and budget. But aim to have at least one detail or layer in place as soon as possible, so that your design direction feels intentional right away.

How We Get There

  1. Look around at what you already have in terms of objects that might reveal to someone what you’re passionate about and use these as artwork (anything can be hung on a wall), vignettes on the tops of surfaces, books and records for your shelves, and other ways of displaying collections. When you go looking for more layers to add to your home, remembering your passions is a good place to start.

  2. As for your personality, that often comes out through your furniture.  Think about how you arrange it and the types of materials and colors you choose. You want the ways in which you go about your daily life inside your home to support your lifestyle and how you approach the day-to-day. Specifically, your furniture should aid you in what you want to do in that particular room, based on your vision statement from Step 1.

  3. How do our values show up in our homes? Often without us realizing it! Values can encompass the religious or spiritual aspects of who we are; how we feel about others, especially those that’ll be coming into our space; and what part our design and decor choices play in the larger world of production, shipping and procurement of the things we own. You may want to take into consideration your health and possibly the health of the planet and the socio-economic consequences of the products you’re going to buy. Another thing you may want to consider is how you’ll honor design coming from cultures other than your own.

  4. You start your search (in person at thrift stores, antiques fairs, regular furniture stores, etc) and maybe a little research online (warning: this can easily lead to overshelm) to find the sources that meet your passion, personality, and value-based criteria, and then go back to your mood board. 

  5. Add in photos of actual products, or photos of similar products if you’re shopping for antiques or one-of-a-kind things. Order online, in shops, or go thrifting and antiquing.  Most likely you’ll do a combination of all of the above. 


And then, enjoy the experience of living inside the beautiful vision you’ve created!