Be your own interior designer
However, for many of us, going it alone and integrating our own accumulated ideas is a far more appealing path to creating a truly original living space.
It takes time to build the confidence to trust your highly individual eye, but with a good library of advice and the ability to plan effectively, designing for yourself could provide a whole new adventure at home.
Planning is key. Get your imagination in trim and conquer the art of pre-visualisation to reach the result you want to achieve.
Interior designers use a number of methods to "storyboard" their ideas and hone their plans for the style, colours and textures in any room.
First, draw out a simple room plan to help you place furniture and lighting fixtures. Include radiators, windows, access areas, ceiling height, electrical and plumbing points, doorways and the direction in which they swing as this can radically affect the amount of useable floor space you have to work with.
If you are starting out and are terrified by the idea of putting pencil to graph paper, invest in two books that contain almost everything you need to know: "The Essential House Book" by style guru Terence Conran (Conran Octopus) is an inspiring primer for all home decorators and designers. Mary Galliant has dozens of books and a lifetime of experience to her name. Galliant's highly popular "Interior Design Course" (Conran Octopus) is another practical and friendly read and a superb present for anyone embarking on a creative wrestle with a new home.
Refine your room plan to scale and don't forget to include any architectural features from dado rails to fireplaces that will impact on your final design. Is there a sloping ceiling for example or an especially lovely south facing window? You should start to think about the positive architectural elements of the room and its proportions. How can you accentuate these qualities?
If you know what furnishings you are keeping in the room, measure them up and cut out scale models you can move around your floor plan.
Draw up elevations of each wall to scale to address any storage or display ideas you might have. If storage is an issue, pick up a copy of "Storage" by Dinah Hall and Barbara Weiss (DK Publications), a fabulous book for making efficient use of space in a comfortable living space.
Remember that accurate room measurements will allow retail staff to calculate your requirements for wall coverings with ease, saving you time and money.
There is a visual banquet of samples and swatches available for the asking, so if you like something ask for a little taster to slip into your bag.
Carry the dimensions of all the rooms you are doing up with you every time you go anywhere, together with examples of any important colour decisions you have already made and a tape-measure. Keep the samples in clear plastic folders marked with their price per metre and where they might go in your scheme.
A good array of samples will allow you to juxtaposition various colours and textures against each other and pare your ideas down as you grow more confident in the direction of your ideas.
Try to analyze just why you like a particular thing or room. This kind of planning will also allow you to place your aspirations against your budget. Aim to buy the best quality you can afford.
Hold fabric samples up to the light if you intend to use them as curtains and observe their appearance in daylight and artificial illumination. For more ideas on the latent and beautifying power of fabric take a look at Collins' "Complete Book of Soft Furnishing" by Jane Churchill (Collins).
You will probably have seen mood boards used on television make-over programmes but they are greatly under-rated by amateur's designers.
Buy yourself some A2 mounting board from Easons or any good stationer's and start accumulating a story-board of your every idea and whim you have for the rooms or areas you intend to tackle.
Collect samples of fabrics, wallpapers and paint colours that appeal to you and assemble them on your board. Include pictures pulled out of magazines from whole areas to small accessories which touch on the feel and finish you want to achieve in your project. Place flooring samples close to the bottom of the board, paint cards a little higher and otherwise group your ideas in a way your eye can easily read.
Make a start by choosing colours for large areas like walls and floors and then work your way down to smaller ones like cushions and curtains.
Judith Miller's "Colour Confidence" from Marshall Publishing is a highly entertaining guide to the many ages of colour and the mysterious visual science of the colour wheel. Once you get your mind around this spectrum of possibilities you can explore the idea of having a harmonious, a contrasting, a neutral or a monochromatic colour scheme.
If you don't know what colours you favour, look in your wardrobe!
Don't rush into a choice of colour for any large area. Many of us have picked 15 litres of paint from a colour card only to be disappointed with the results. Large areas of colour look quite different from a square inch patch, so take the time to buy a sample pot or two. Paint the sample onto lining paper and move it in and out of the light to see the look of the colour throughout the day and under different lighting arrangements.
A key ingredient in almost every successful colour scheme is the inclusion of just two main colours and an accent colour, so be disciplined in your choices. There are well known rules in interior decorating that can only be broken if you really know what you are doing.
Another frequent mistake is the inclusion of too many patterns, colours and styles all hopelessly vying for attention in one room.
For a quick start add pattern to a neutral background rather than a patterned one. Vary the scale of the pattern throughout the room. The popular make-over programmes from RTE's "Beyond the Hall Door" to the BBC's "Changing Rooms" might create the impression that professional interior designers riotously mix their decorating palette with gay abandon. The reality is that they have a trained eye which can expertly balance divergent elements in a complete scheme.
For the rest of us, a pared down harmonious choice with a firm choice of styling and where there are any patterns include one of your three key colours as a much safer bet. Katherine Sorrell's "Texture and Colours" is a lovely book to teach you the sensual possibilities of such tactile surfaces as chenille, leather and suede.
Don't underestimate the possibilities of what you already have on hand. Consider the possibilities of reupholstering, repainting, stripping and dying furniture, fabrics and even accessories. If you need to seriously de-clutter your home, pick up a copy of Dawn Walter's "Life Laundry-How to de-junk your life" from BBC's publications and give yourself a clean canvas on which to create!
Would you like to take your interest in interior design or decoration one step further? Here's a list of some Interior Design Courses available by night or by post nationwide.
National College of Communications, Cabinteely, D.18 01-2850157.
Beginners and Advanced Interior Design- Diploma (Distance learning or on site). Hyperlink: natcom.com@aol.com.
Dublin CDVEC. Marino College, Fairview. D.3 01-8332100. Interior Design. Ten weeks.
Portobello School. Lower Dominic St, Dublin 1 01-8721277. Residential and Commercial Design. Ten Weeks.
Greenhills College, Walkinstown, D.12 01-4507779. General introduction to interior design. Eight weeks.
Malahide Community College, Malahide, Co. Dublin 01-8463244. Interior Design and Decoration. Ten weeks by night.
FAS Waterford. Training Services Unit, Cork Road, Waterford 051-301500. Interior Design/Decorating practical and theory.
Kilmuckridge Vocational, Co. College, Wexford 053-30118. Interior Design. Eight weeks.
Ashton School, Blackrock Rd., Cork 021-4322382. Interior Design. Eight weeks.
St. John's Central College, Sawmill St, Cork 021-4276410. Interior Design/Interior Decorating.
Cork College of Commerce, Morrison's Island, Cork 021-4270777. Interior Design and Decorating (Introductory Course).
Villiers School, North Circular Road, Limerick. 061-451447. Interior Design. Ten weeks (20 hours). Decorating on a budget.
Limerick Senior College, Mulgrave St., Limerick. 061-414344. Interior Design. Ten weeks.
The Open University has a vast range of distant learning courses which include interior design training to a professional level. Call the UK number at 01908-653231 or go on-line at www.open.ac.uk.
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