LYNBA’S LAW

Color: What miy
look great ina friend's
home won't necessarily
work in yours because
color is a personal thing,
Having a hard time pin-
ning down a color scheme?
Look in’ your wardrobe,
“Chances are chose cotors
are already around you."
says MacLachlan.
2? Seale: If it’s a sinall
room, people feel they
have to have snail pieces,
bur the opposite can be the
case. says MacLachlan,
“Oversize pieces that are
well chosen can make a
small room cosy.”
Windows: The harsh
lines of mini-blinds
can be softened by adding
a valance. This can height-
en the window, add charuc-
ter and tie in the rest of the
room. On a budget? Paint a
length of doweling and
drape it with cheesecloth.
Floors: When deco-
rating from seratch,
area Carpets can be a good
place to start. They can
help coordinate the leak of
the room and pult colors
together.
rnd Furniture: Don't get
«4 locked into the specif:
ic use of a piece. A low
dresser can double as a
sofa table or sideboard, for
exuniple.
< Indoor lighting:
5 Arrange light sources
at different heights. A
spotlight that shines up
through a floor plant can
cast an interesting shadow
on walls. Dimmer switches
soften overhead light.
| Qutdoor lighting:
You should see the
shadows not the light
source.
Renovations: When
undertaking = major
home renovations. it's
worth it to pay a profes-
sional, says MacLachlan.
{t's better to pay for a
one-hour — consultation
than the cost of any num-
ber of mistakes should
you blaze ahead without a
toad map.
— Layne Christensen

4™.| NV designer shares expertise

pasar ears ‘ *
, Renovations

Inter

jor Desig

BY LAYNE CHRISTENSEN

Community Reporter

LYNDA Macl achlin
launched = Creatif Design
Resouree six. years ago to
offer an interior decorating
service with a difference:
work with the client's own
possessions and provide sim-
ple design solutions at mini-
mum expense,

For $55 an hour, MacLachlan
will cast her expert eye on your
abode. Though she has undertaken
complele home renovations and
decorated: roums from the floor-
boards up. her specialty is (o fing
tune whal's already there and
build an environment that suits her
client's persanility.

That can be as simple as elimi-
nating clutter and rearranging fur-
niture. Or in the case of our three-
bedroom character apartment,
which she toured recently, a fresh
coat of paint,

“Paint is a really good way of
freshening everything up and giv-
ing it anew took.” she say's.

Jn the bathroom: Her sofution
for the °70s orange and brown
floor tiles is to paint over them in
a neutral colur like taupe and use a

MacLachlan is pushing — for
mauve, “Yellow is best used for
transitional spaces.” she advises.
As for the green, “you have to
really like thet color and be willing
to live with it,” she says. A safer
het is to keep trendy colors to
accessories — decorative pillows
and drapes, for example.

In the bedroom: A stencilled
border treatment on the wall,
snappier bed linens and a simple
canopy at the head of the bed
would do much to improve the
look of the room.

MacLachlan casts a critical
eye over our newly purchased
denim throw pillows from Eddie
Bauer. An old pair of jeans, cut up
and sewn over the pillow forms
would have done just as nicely
and looked more “lived in” she
tells me.

“Money cannot buy creation
and some of the best designs arise
out of necessity.” says MacLachlan,
whose color and design sense
was honed through studies at the
Ontario College of An.

As for the living roam, we have
some good pieces, — says
MacLachlan, but it looks as
though we've taken all our furni-
ture and lined it up around the
walls. She’s itching to coll up her
sleeves and move things around,

dry-cleaning bag to “swoosh” — but that will have to wait dil the
with glaze for a more organic — next consultation.

effect.

For more information contact

In the kitchen: We like apple MacLachlan at Creatif Design
green for the wails, or yellow but — Resource: 986-9859. ;

ieasu res reca:

eT

Photo submitted

SURF’S up and schou!'s in at Coffs Harbour, Australia. Travel writer David Wishart
discovers a surfing school, wonderful beaches, game-fishing and the best fish ‘n’
chips this side of the Equator at the Australian resort.

COOK made two big
mistakes. One was
going ashore on Hawaii
when the locals were in
a bad mood. The other
was sailing past Sydney
harbor.

Fair enough, the good
captain bad a lor of ground
tc cover in his 1770 voyage
of discovery, but after
exploring Botany Bay he

LYNDA MacLachlan (far left} of Creatif
Design Resource offers cheap and chic
solutions to simple design problems. The
kitchen nook (above) was transformed
into a cosy breakfast nook with the addi-
tion of a valance, a brightly colored table-
cloth, sunny floral arrangement and some
well-placed artwork and curics (left).

land around a magnificent
harbor in which “a thousand
ships of the line could ride in
pertect safety.”

Sydney was born, ‘Today it
is one of the great port cities
of the world, rivaling Rio,
Cape ‘Town, Hong Kong, San
Francisco and, of course,
Vancouver.

travel in fact, sitting ata Sydney
waterfront restaurant with a
talk ghiss of wine and listening lo

simply noted the sheer cliffs

and narrow entrance of another bay a lide
to the north, and steered Endeaveur for
home, pausing ater at Cape York to fire a
musket salute which added Australia to the
British Empire.

Bighteen years later, when the first Peet
of TL vessels with [030 people, —- a cargo
of 348 male and [X88 female convicts —-
made it te Botany Bay via Rio and Cape
‘Town, the contmander. Captain Arthur

Phillip, found the place quite unsuitable for

setdement.

He recatled Cook's mention of the other
bay and sailed up the coastan a small boat.
What Captain Phillip found was the nest
thing to paradise -- [resh water and arable

the locals Complaining about
airpost noise it seems just like home.

Don't they remember that the first fleet
was 252 days getting here, and 50 years
later the fastest ship still took three months
from Wapping? These days Qantas leaves
Los Angeles at lunchtime and lands in
Sydney just before bedtime. Which way da
they want it?

Visiting Canadians get the best of both
worlds, swapping winter gloom for summer
sunshine aid enjoying Sydacy old and new.
They can stroll around the Rocks where the
city began with simple shacks, grog shops
and carefully tended gardens. Some fine

See Eaptaring page U6