Nancy Lancaster - Design Theory

Design Theory

Lancaster's innate taste was only complimented by John Fowler's (her decorator partner) sense of color and knowledge of historic interiors. Although she always believed that a room should never look "decorated', she created this list of 7 rules to follow to make a room look "comfortable": 1- In restoring a house, one must first realize its period, feel its personality, and try to bring out its good points; 2- Decorating must be appropriate; 3- Scale is of prime importance, and I think that oversized scale is better than undersized scale; 4- In choosing a color,one must remember that it changes in different aspects; 5- Understatement is extremely important, and crossing too many t's and dotting too many i's make a room look overdone and tiresome. One should create something that fires the imagination without overemphasis; 6- I never think that sticking slavishly to one period is successful; a touch of nostalgia adds charm. One needs light and shade, because if every piece is perfect, the room becomes a museum and lifeless; 7- A gentle mixture of furniture expresses life and continuity, but it must be a delicious mixture that flows and mixes well. It is a bit like mixing a salad. I am better at mixing rooms than salads.

To these guidelines, Lancaster always added her magic ingredients: open fires, candle lights, and masses of flowers. She also included antiques into each of her comfortable rooms, a love of which descended from her grandparents. While she was married to Ronald Tree, he helped her decorate their house. He was mainly in charge of major pieces of furniture and paintings, but Lancaster was in complete charge of the way their house actually looked- the choice of fabrics and the arrangement of furniture. The house was covered in hundreds of yards of fabrics, which included silks, velvets, damasks, and brocades. Lancaster wanted the fabrics to get worn from the sun and obtain a life of their own.