Poor Jan, it seems like you have a tiger by the tail. Ooopps, my mistake, I think this entire post is about avoiding the cliche. Ha!Ha! Anyway, for your own sake, take a moment to do some slow breathing. Perhaps the 2000 mile distance is good, as it will keep you out of prison-ha!ha! I have a feeling you will manage this well and have a good outcome. I hope that things smooth out quickly for you on this one.

Timeless is the word on these posts that make me chuckle. Change will happen, trends will come and go. Good design will feel like good design for a very long time. New marketed trends fall away quickly. Good design encompasses so many things, but you feel it, when you see it. I can appreciate many different styles, when the design works.

Color drench doesn't bother me so much, but some people hate the word moist too. I think it is a descriptive term, but perhaps overused in the design world, just like the list that Diana made up above. I think that so much of our culture is about marketing, that promises so much more than it actually delivers (at least most of the time).

I think that Diana has a style that works for her. She has developed and grown it over time, and she doesn't need the flashy language. Why? Because the design speaks for itself. Good design is good art. It will resonate with many people for reasons known and unknown. Often words are inadequate in describing the feeling of a good design. There are principles that guide a good design, but then there is the execution. If it's truly good, it will feel like more than the sum of its individual parts. (I might just be making that up. I think I am a big feeler, so it feels that way to me.)

I think the mono conversation is funny too, as if mono is a negative term in and of itself, where actually it means one. Just FYI: most of the major religions of our time are monotheistic.

The walls and ceiliings in my house are monochromatic white, (which apparently is not color drenched-LOL), although aka boring and overdone according to many people on this site. My house would also be hard to sell according to some of the commenters on Houzz, because I don't have white or wood cabinets. And finally I have those fake, plastic quartz countertops that are so ugly and trendy, when "real" granite is the only way to go. (But if you can't afford granite, then get laminate or Corian, because those are somehow more "real" than quartz?) Opinions all, and people have a right to have them.

And yet, I am not concerned about those statements, because they are broad strokes that don't encompass the reality or specifics of what is my home. The design of our home is beautiful and it works, despite someone else thinking white is boring, or colored cabinets are trendy. We made design choices that not only please us, but that actually look beautiful together, and are so much more than white walls or colored cabinets. Our home takes consideration of it's surroundings, and light and shadow, etc. We have been away for a few weeks, and when I got home, it felt soooo wonderful to be here.

As Dorothy said, "There's no place like home."

The AI rendering of Delft is not very accurate. It actually has a bit of gray and green in it. My laundry cabinets are Delft