Soulful Maximalism with Amber Guyton

Welcome back. If you love all things design like I do, this is a segment you want to stick around for. So we're joined live by, with Amber Guyton, an interior designer who's known all around Atlanta. And she's here to share some tips and tricks and then also a book that she has out too. But before we get to the book, we got to talk a little bit about soulful maximalism. Tell me about that. So soulful maximalism is a phrase I coined because I was having a hard time describing my design style people are like it's colorful it's a little boho it's glam but what is it and so to me soulful maximalism is all about making your home feel like a celebration of who you are and what you love and there are four principles for that so it starts with joy because you should feel joyful at home culture celebrating who you are layers because it's all about pattern mixing different colors and then intention because people think maximalism they think it's a dirty word it's about stuff and clutter oh no but it's really about intention and constraint and um I think everything that's in your home should have a purpose yeah whenever I hear the word maximalism because I have a bit of the same design style right too but the thing about it is I think of it as creativity right taking patterns and textures and so you already went over the four principles now how does this tie into your book okay so for example I know you know what the green room looked like before but i brought in some colors some patterns and things so this coffee table there was nothing on it there's things like the rules of three so you see a tray you see a candle you see these beautiful florals that i got from Trader Joe's, there's things like that that are in the book, a lot of the chapters break down like some basic principles like the color wheel how to mix patterns but there's also things like how big your rug should be for what size bed you have How can you mix different colors and make sure they don't clash? And so going back to the principle of layers, this sofa had nothing on it, so I layered it with pillows. I added some art back here. Going back to culture and joy, my family gives me joy. It's important to take those pictures out of your phone and print them. Put them on the wall. Different artwork. I'm from South Carolina, so the beach makes me happy, Charleston area. And then just art. Art is inspirational, and it just makes me happy. So I know that it'll bring joy to your home, too. And I know you mentioned, you know, in the book you have tips, right? And so one thing I see often on social media when people do share, you know, they're designing, no shade to some people. But they'll have a rug that's too small in a space or a rug that's too big. We don't like stingy rugs. I'd rather it be too big. The rule of thumb is you want the front feet of the furniture to all fit. So, like, if we had a rug here, we would want this chair to be on the rug. We would want at least the front of the sofa to be on the rug. so yeah size does matter, scale matters and that's detailed in the book too and you got some stuff over here too yeah so these are two wallpaper rolls from my collection with Mitchell Black I brought in the Sherwin-Williams paint fan because sometimes people are afraid of color even if it's just a pop of color I talk about that in the book in chapter three and then of course the book is out, it came out last Tuesday, two years in the making, I'm leaving some copies with you and your your team and crew but um it's exciting i'm also having my first book tour stop here in Atlanta tomorrow okay so at Village Books in south downtown um super excited to have a talk with Fee and um we're going to have a live podcast recording but at 4 30 we're going to be signing books so excited to meet everyone um that's available to come all right and then if anyone wants to come or get involved because this is a book tour right yeah yeah tell them how they can do it for the folks at home. We are starting in Atlanta. So tomorrow at Village Books starting at 430. And then I'm actually going to High Point Market this weekend in North Carolina. I'll be in D.C., New York, Brooklyn, Chicago. It's a full fall. And then I'm hoping to end it back in Atlanta before the holidays. So if you can't make it tomorrow, hopefully I'll see you later in a few months. All right. Well, thank you so much for joining us. Let's get a shot of this book before we head out. Thank you so much, Amber.