November 3, 2024 • 31 mins
When it comes to your home, details matter. Small things can make a BIG difference without breaking your budget. Paint, light fixtures, lamp replacement cords, flowers, cabinet pulls, area rugs, even simple furniture changes can transform a room easily without costing you a lot of money.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
KF I am six forty.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
You're listening to Dean Sharp the House Whisperer on demand
on the iHeart Radio app. Welcome to home Where. Every
week we help you better understand that place where you live.
I am Dean Sharp, the House Whisperer, custom home Builder,
custom home Designer. Most importantly, today though your guide to
(00:24):
turning your ordinary house into something truly extraordinary. We're getting
a little late start today, I'm telling you. Sometimes I'm
just saying, Jesus, sometimes he just runs a little long.
That's all I'm saying. That's all I'm saying. Don't look
at me that way.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
No, I'm up. I'm up exactly. Let the fan you
understand what I'm saying. All right.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
Anyhow, we're talking about a really cool subject today. I
think you'll find it very useful. Today's show is about
details that matter, or just the fact that details matter.
Now here's the thing. Details are often overlooked in our
day and age, just about everywhere, and when it comes
(01:12):
to your home, this can be different. You can make
a different decision about that, and the quality of details
in your home can make a massive difference. And that's
why it's so great because details small things do not
by definition break the budget. And so this is an
(01:35):
enabling conversation that we're having this morning so that you
can make some big changes on some small cash for
your home, really really important things. And of course we're
going to take some calls as we do. Let me
give you the number eight three to three two. Ask
Dean A three three the numeral two. Ask Dean eight
three to three two, ask Dean. And as always, when
(01:59):
it comes to calls, anything you want to talk about,
you set the agenda for the calls. Construction design, DIY,
what have you A three three two asked in The
phone lines are opened, ye, yes, yes, they are open
now and you can call in talk to producer Michelle Cube,
who is standing by to take your calls this morning.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
If we do this all right today, we're.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Gonna bring some light into your morning and make you
feel glad that you were here.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
The team is here for you.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
As always, Elmer is on the board. Good morning, Elmer,
Good morning, Los Angeles. There he is Elmer, as I said,
producer Michelle standing by right now to take your calls.
Eileen Gonzalez back at the news desk this morning, two
days in a row.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
Good morning, Eileen, Good morning. How's it going.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
You know what I'm I was exhausted yesterday for yesterday's show.
I just very little sleep, had some troubles on my mind.
But I got a good night's sleep last night and
we fell back. So we got the bonus out right.
Speaker 1 (03:01):
Love the Bonus hour.
Speaker 2 (03:02):
Loves the Bonus Hour, so forward, so much. Yeah, exactly, exactly. Yeah,
Spring is overrated. Hey and look at her. Look at her.
Oh my gosh, sitting across the table from me. Clearly
anybody who has met us, clearly my better half, uh
(03:24):
and my design partner, the co owner and co founder
of House Whisper, and most importantly, my best buddy in
all the world. Tina is here. Oh that's a That
was a loud elephant. That was hello, Tina's uh. Tina's
(03:45):
spirit animal is h is the elephant, her favorite animal
in the world. That's why there's an elephant sound in
the back. Just to be clear, Tina in no way
looks like an elephant at all, But.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
It would be cute.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
You will look more like a squirrel, wouldn't it be awesome?
I mean, what would it be like if you could
get like a like a beagle? Sized elephant.
Speaker 1 (04:11):
Maxim My gosh, it would be so cute just.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
To have it your little elephant right, slightly larger than
a cat, like a small dog. Elephant the size of
a small dog. Fun, how about it? Science, Let's get
to work, all right. Speaking of getting to work, we
should probably do exactly that. We've got some calls that
are starting to pop up on the board. Here. I'm
(04:34):
going to give you the number one more time, eight
three three two. Ask Dean.
Speaker 4 (04:40):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
I am here to help you take it to the
next level, and today especially that applies to everybody from
castle to condo and everything in between, because we're talking
about details that matter, and details so so very much matter. Also,
we're going to be taking calls. Let me give you
out the number, you give me out, you could let
(05:09):
me get Here's the number. I've only been doing this
eight years. Okay, here's the number. Eight three three two.
Ask Dean eight three three two, Ask Dean A three
three the numeral two peep, ask Dean.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
There you go? All right? Oh.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
Also, I'm not gonna spend any time talking about it.
This segment, But next segment, just just just know it's November.
Guess what's happening right before Thanksgiving this month? The House
Whisper Live audience holiday home show returning to KFI Studios
(05:54):
yet again. It's going to be a great event. We'll
be talking about that a little later in the show.
So hang tai and we will give you details on
how you can win a seat to this live audience
event in just a bit. All right, let's dive in.
You have heard it said, undoubtedly, don't sweat the small stuff.
Somebody has said that in your life at some point,
(06:16):
and you know that it's probably a really good advice
in a lot of areas, but not when it comes
to making an ordinary house truly extraordinary. When it comes
to that, God is always in the details, as they
would say, which is great news because it means you
can move the needle quite a bit, even with limited resources.
(06:39):
So this is a massive, massive list, by the way,
and we're just going to move through what we can
today and hopefully inspire you to figure out your own
details as well, even if the ar ones that were
not mentioning first thing I want you to understand about
details in a home is how to build a room
(07:02):
without building walls. And this is just a this is
a design truth that not as many people utilize when
they're laying out their furniture in their house that as
as should. Okay, we have over the last few years
gone open concept open concept. A lot of houses now
(07:24):
have been remodeled or built brand new with this open concept,
which means that we have at least one kind of
supersized room in the house, the combo kitchen, family dining
ish living area, and it's nice, big and open, no walls.
(07:44):
Some of them have gone too open, but you know,
we're not going to get into that today. But the
point is this when we've got a larger space like that.
And by the way, this applies even to small spaces
that are open concept, like an apartment, okay, because you know,
you walk in here, you walk in the door and boom,
you're right there in the seating area or the living room,
(08:05):
and there's the kitchen, and you know, it's all sort
of this one main area other than the bedrooms are
all just sort of right there in one open space.
So when it comes to this particular detail, it is
understanding that walls walls that we think of as the
things that define a room. Walls are really a story
(08:29):
of sorts. They are essentially a construct of our imagination.
Now I'm not saying that your walls are imaginary. If
you've got walls, they're real. But the point is this,
a lot of folks think, well, if we're really gonna
define a space better, then we got to do construction,
and we got to You don't put up wall. No, no, no,
(08:50):
not necessarily the case at all, because a wall can
be many many things. We do this a lot when
we talk about exterior landscape design. A wall can be
so many things. Specifically, in this case, what I'm alluding
to is that a wall can be a properly placed
piece of furniture. So let's say we have an open
(09:13):
space and we've got a sofa or a little sectional
l sofa. The backside of that sofa as it stretches
out into the room is essentially a wall because you're
on the back side of the sofa. So aligning it
in a room along the path of a hallway out
(09:33):
of the main hallway, or aligning it with its back
or its edge leading edge away from the front door
can create.
Speaker 1 (09:44):
A space.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Actually, by definition, creating two spaces where before there was
just one. Okay, so understand that the arrangement of furniture
in a room is a detail that, when done properly,
can create rooms within the technical, physical structural room. Okay,
(10:05):
a lot of you suffer from not having really much
of an entryway, and entryways are important. That's a detail
that I like to draw attention to as much as possible.
But maybe you don't have an entryway in a structural
technical sense. You open up the door and you're standing
in a larger room. The reason why that is not
(10:26):
the greatest thing in the world is simply because entryways,
just like hallways and front porches and back decks, they
are transitional spaces. They are kind of emotional airlocks, as
it were. They're not quite out, they're not quite in.
They give you that moment of pause. You can call
(10:46):
them a punctuation in a sentence. They give you that
moment of pause where you can reorient yourself and say, okay,
all right, now I'm entering into this situation instead of
just being thrown right into it. So instead of walking
through the front door and just stepping into your living room,
you step into an entryway. And you're like, Okay, I'm
(11:08):
I'm not outside anymore, but I'm not actually completely in
the house, right.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
I'm not intruding on anyone.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
I'm not in anybody's space yet, because this is the entryway.
So entryways that don't have walls around them can be
created with small details. The properly sized area rug laying
in front of an entryway. It defines a certain amount
of floor space and says, while you're standing on this rug,
(11:39):
you're not in the rest of the room. You understand
what I'm saying. The lines of a rug create and
of a psychological perimeter. Now, if you can emphasize that
even more with the line of a sofa floating free
floating in a room, not so that it's destroying usable
space in the room, but so that it's clan a
(12:00):
space unto itself. A sofa and a couple of chairs,
or an L shaped sofa connected to a coffee table,
all touching one area. Rug that combines those elements together.
That's room with walls. There's a clear psychological sense in
(12:22):
which you are either in that room or you are
not in that room. You're on the other side of
those edges. And because you're on the other side of
the edges. You don't have to think of that space
as being all a part of the greater, massive space
that it finds itself in. You understand what I'm saying,
And again I keep saying the word larger space as
(12:44):
if I'm alluding to like a super big room. It's
absolutely critical in super big rooms, but it's just as
critical in smaller spaces like apartments and condos, where there
aren't a lot of defining structural features. There's not oh,
a dining room, clearly, that's the dining room. Clearly this
is a living room, and there's the kitchen. It's all
(13:05):
sort of you know, most apartment in condos, it's all
sort of an amorphous one sort of open space, and
that puts it upon you to carefully design the details
of where the furniture sits so that we get entry away,
a free passage to other rooms, other spaces like the kitchen,
(13:26):
a place to eat, a place to sit, and so on.
I think you get the point there, all right. So
first tip of the day, building a room using the
details of furniture and things like area, rugs, lamps, all
that to create rooms without building walls, and in that
(13:48):
Chiching money saved along the way. All right, so much
more when we come back. Let's talk about controlling the
size of a room with the detail of color, and
integrating some of that old furniture that you inherited then
and like but.
Speaker 1 (14:05):
Doesn't really feel one hundred percent of yours.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
How do you integrate that truly into your stuff and
own it for yourself? All of that and more when
we return your Home Dean Sharp the House Whisper.
Speaker 4 (14:18):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
Hey, welcome to Home with Dean Sharp, the House Whisper.
That's me.
Speaker 2 (14:29):
We are talking about details that matter this morning, and
we're going to continue to do so. But first let
me give you the phone number to call us, because
in just a bit we're gonna be going to the
phones and talk about anything that is got you scratching
your head about your house. Eight three three two. Ask
Dean eight three three the numeral two. Ask Dean eight
(14:53):
three three two Ask Dean. Producer Michelle is standing by
ready to take your calls. She'll tell everything you need
to know. Pop you into the queue. You can listen
to the show while you wait, and then who knows
you and I will put our heads together and we
will figure it out. I promise you. Eight three three
two ask Dean go into the phones in just a bit,
(15:14):
all right, back to it. Right before the break, I
alluded to the fact that I would tell you how
to control the size of a room with color. This
is a detail that you know, some people would say, well, listen,
Dean color in a room, painting on the paint on
the walls. That's not a small detail. No, it's not
(15:38):
a small detail. But it is a detail, and it's
an inexpensive way of radically changing a space. And so
I just want you to be aware of this one thing,
just this one simple thing. I shared this with the
Conway on Thursday night in our normal like six twenty
bit that we do. And it's this warm colors. If
(15:59):
you're a human being, warm colors meaning anything on the
warm side of the spectrum, they tend to come toward us.
And I think you understand what I'm saying when I
use that language, that they come toward us. Warm colors
embrace us. They kind of approach us and wrap themselves
(16:19):
around us. That's that warmth they are cozy, all right.
Warmth radiates at us. Maybe that's the tie into nature, right,
it comes at us. And therefore a warm color on
the walls of a room, and warm color in terms
of furnishings, accents, all of that. These are things that
(16:41):
come at us and as a result make a room
feel smaller, okay, more comfortable, cozier, more homey in that side.
In that sense, cool colors the inverse of that, anything
on the cool side of the spectrums, the blues, the greens,
and so on. These colors tend to move away from us.
(17:03):
They recede from us sort of psychologically, emotionally, the sides
of the vastness of the ocean, the blueness of the
sky above us, the height of trees. Cool moves away
from us. Warm comes toward us. So in this case,
how do you apply this, Well, let's say you've got
(17:24):
a small room. You've got a small space, and you
don't want it to get any smaller because it's already
maybe smaller than you want.
Speaker 1 (17:33):
It to be.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
Then favor cool colors, especially when it comes to the
walls and furnishings and accents, and that room will be
as roomy and open feeling as it can be without
actually physically moving the walls. And the inverse of this,
of course, is we've got a large space, and I
(17:56):
actually deal with this a lot. You know, we have
clients well with very large spaces, very large homes, and
sometimes some of these large spaces really need to be
made more intimate because they get away from you after
a while. All of the pomp and circumstance of having,
you know, big cavernous space doesn't always feel great. In fact,
(18:19):
it rarely feels great in terms of making people feel
good about being in the space. And so we want
warmer colors there in spaces like that that sort of
reach out and embrace you, draw you in, and make
you feel more comfortable about being in that larger space.
So warm colors come at you and shrink the size
(18:42):
of rooms. Cool colors move away from you and expand
the size of the room, all of which happens without
actually moving walls.
Speaker 1 (18:52):
Got it all right.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
One aspect of a rustic or a vintage item something
that you have inherited that can be changed, is its color.
But we very very rarely recommend changing the color of
something entirely, unless you're just convinced. You know, you're all
(19:17):
into that. But changing the color of a thing is
a way emotionally of taking ownership of it from a
decore sense. I'm interesting to think about that for a second.
Let's say you've inherited this, this grand old dining room
table from great grandma, and you love it. You love
(19:39):
the table, and you want to honor her and the heritage.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
You don't.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
You're not going to give it away. You're going to
keep this item. But here's the thing. It doesn't quite
tie in with everything else you got going on that's
yours around it. You can see the dining room table
from the living room and it just seems a little loft,
It seems a little out of your color scheme or
what have you. So here's the thing that we have
(20:06):
often seen can be a relatively small detail that can
make a big difference. Most tables, and I'm just talking
tables right now. Apply this theory to any piece of
furniture that you've got. But you know tables, right below
the table top, there's a skirt underneath that table. Unless
it's a glass top table, if it's wood, there's a
(20:27):
skirt of some sort underneath it. You know, relatively small,
you know, three four inch skirt from which the legs
are extending down to the floor. That skirt is not
a huge, glaring detail, but it is something that's visible
from the room, from other rooms when you're room adjacent
(20:48):
to it. And to take that skirt and make the bold,
sexy jougi decision, you know what we're gonna do, just
the skirt. We're not gonna touch Grandma's table any other way.
Just the skirt underneath the tabletop. We are going to
take some paint, the same kind of paint that we
used on these other items in this room, or matching
(21:12):
the color of some of these accent items in the
other room, and we're going to put that accent color
on just the skirt or just the legs. Or you're
getting what I'm saying. By putting just that element of
color onto that table, you have owned it, You've integrated
it into the decor complement of everything else in the room,
(21:35):
and suddenly you're doing both the best of both worlds.
You're honoring this great piece from your great grandma, and
also it now belongs in your space. It's a detail
that matters. Tina, and I did it a while back.
We have had a grandfather clock. It's not a great grandfather,
(21:55):
great grandma. It's not a super awesome, fancy grandfather clock.
It's kind of early nineteen eighties, a grandfather clock that
Tina's grandparents bought, and it was always a part of
their home and it was always something that she loved seeing,
I mean, just reminds her of them. And we've had
it in various places in the house for a number
(22:18):
of years, and finally Tina said, you know what, I
really really want that clock to be theirs and ours both,
and so she decided to paint several of the elements
of that clock the exact same color that we used
to paint the walls of our dining room, because the
clock is not in the dining room, but it is
(22:38):
sitting right across a walk path from the dining room.
And man, did it make a massive difference. That clock
now belongs with us and it belonged to them, And
it's a great way of kind of straddling the historical
fence there, So a detail that matters, just a little
(22:59):
bit of paint, kind of paint on the right aspect
of a piece of furniture can take those older, out
of date, used to belong to somebody else things and
make them yours. All right, when we come back, let's
talk about not neglecting utilitarian fixtures and how important is
that in terms of details and what I mean by
(23:21):
that light switches, lamp chords, outlets, even heating and air
conditioning vents.
Speaker 1 (23:26):
What can you do with those?
Speaker 4 (23:28):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
Hey, thanks for joining us on the program today. We
are approaching the top of the hour. Did you turn
your clock back last night or did it do it
by itself most of the time. You know, we kind
of run our lives off of our phones, and so
we don't worry about setting our clocks back. But we
have some like the grandfather clock I was talking about
in the last segment. You know, those things have to
be turned back, but we don't really rely on them
(23:58):
too much other than their beauty. So I hope you
turned your clock back last night and got an extra
hour of sleep. I'm glad you're here with us now.
We're talking about details that matter, and I'm gonna let
you know next segment. Right after the next news break,
we are going to the phones, and so I will
(24:18):
give you our number once again, eight three to three two.
Ask dean eight three to three the numeral two. Ask
dean eight three three two, Ask dean. Producer Michelle standing
by ready to take your call. She'll tell you everything
you need to know. Pop you into the queue, and
then we will get to that thing that you've been
scratching your head about and we will get it solved.
(24:41):
That coming up right after the next news break. All right,
back to the deats, the details that matter. Where are
we at on our list here? What did I say?
We're oh to not neglect extending your design efforts to
often overlooked utilitarian fixed Oh that's a mouthful, right, What
(25:03):
do I mean by that? I mean, what is the
utilitarian fixture? It's stuff that just got to be there, right,
It's got to be there, and we kind of take
it for granted, and it's often overlooked. Light switches, outlets,
chords coming from lamps, those kinds of things. And so
(25:23):
here's the thing. I know somebody's listening right now saying,
you know, can we get the major changes that make
a difference. And I'm just going to underscore this one
more time. Sure, we talk about the major changes all
the time, but today we're talking about details that not
in and of themselves just one of these changes. But
(25:44):
if you start really kind of obsessing over the details
in your home, layer after layer after layer, pretty soon
what you've got is something that everywhere somebody turns, they
see caring inserted in. And that's really what the details
really provide. There's this underscoring of the care with which
(26:09):
you are designing your home. Details matter. You know, we
always say when we go to a restaurant, right, oh,
the service was wonderful. Detail that matters, you know, in
a hotel, you stay in a hotel, hospitality industry in general,
whether it's food or overnight stays in places, it's the
little details that matter. Fresh flowers in a room, if
(26:33):
you've ever stayed in a room in which after housekeeping
has been through they've left behind fresh flowers, or the
mint on your pillow, that kind of thing.
Speaker 1 (26:40):
You know, it's a mint.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
It costs like a penny, all right, It's not like, wow,
these guys are breaking the bank for us, but just
the idea, Hey, somebody took the time. Somebody took the time,
and you know, we are an emotional people, and so
when somebody takes the time for us, those things have
an impact. Details matter, So that's the idea. So we
(27:04):
obsess over lights in our home, lights and recess can lights,
way too many of them.
Speaker 1 (27:10):
We'll talk about that in a bit.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
But lamps, right, And you get this great lamp and
it's got this really utilitarian chord, you know, the either
the black or brown, you know, rubberized plastic key cord.
And that's fine if the lamp cord isn't going to
show based on the way that you are setting the
(27:33):
lamp up in the room. But let's say it is
going to show. Let's say that you can see the cord.
I've got a lamp, a free standing lamp in my
living room that there's no way to not see the cord.
It's kind of just tossed and spooled down around the
base of the lamp. And in those cases, if you're
serious about getting the details right, then you think about, well,
(27:58):
what can we do to that cord? What can we
do to the chord? And so you start looking and
you suddenly you realize there's a whole world. You look
on Amazon and find there's a whole world of lamp
replacement cords out there, And if you don't want to
wire in a new replacement cord, and by that I
mean fabricy chords, velvety chords, chords of every imaginable color, beautiful,
(28:24):
lovely chords that nobody is offended by seeing. And is
anybody ever going to walk into your home and say, hey,
nice chord. Chances are no. But does that mean that
you shouldn't do it? No, not at all, because what
they'll see is they'll see a beautiful lamp and nothing
(28:45):
will distract them from it, including the whole effect of
the chord finding its way over to the plug and
so on. If you don't want to rewire a light
on what I was about to say, is that a lamp,
then there are sheaths, sheaths trying to make that sound
right in my ears. There are cord sheaths that you
(29:06):
can purchase for cheap that just slide over, kind of
like scrunchies, that slide over an existing cord in order
to make it far more attractive. And there are ways
and places in a house where you're wanting to plug
something in and you just can't avoid the cord. And
(29:27):
in those situations, you take the extra effort and you
change it out. Okay, the same is true with switches
and outlets again, do they matter? Yeah, they do matter.
They're right there on the wall. So you're trying to
go for this effect, this vintage, look this old house,
look this, whatever the case may be, and then you
(29:49):
just got the plane old. There they are the plain
old white outlet, the plain old white you know light switch,
the plain old plate that everybody else has in the universe. Well,
if you want to stand out, if you want to
make a difference, then there are a billion plates and switches.
Speaker 1 (30:08):
Now.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
Again, just to use our little place as an example,
Tina and I went with an early kind of early
nineteen hundred's of nineteen twenty esque French American motif throughing
our home. It looks dated. We actually went out to
did we get them at restoration Hardware or I don't
remember exactly where, but to the website. We actually bought
(30:31):
the old style push button light switches. Okay, not fancy.
What was that house of antique hardware? There it is
and these are like the ones that you would find
in one hundred year old home, but they're brand new.
They're totally code compliant, brand new, wonderful, gonna last forever.
Light switches and they just add that little and do
(30:52):
people notice those?
Speaker 1 (30:53):
Oh yeah they do.
Speaker 2 (30:54):
People are like, whoa, I love that light switch in
the bathroom, thank you. Yeah, just details matter, all right?
There you go so much more to talk about. We're
gonna pick up this conversation, uh in just a bit.
But when we return, we're gonna go to the phones.
Your home Dean Sharp the House Whisper on KFI. This
has been Home with Dean Sharp, the House Whisper. Tune
(31:17):
into the live broadcast on KFI AM six forty every
Saturday morning from six to eight Pacific time and every
Sunday morning from nine to noon Pacific time, or anytime
on demand on the iHeartRadio app
KF I am six forty.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
You're listening to Dean Sharp the House Whisperer on demand
on the iHeart Radio app. Welcome to home Where. Every
week we help you better understand that place where you live.
I am Dean Sharp, the House Whisperer, custom home Builder,
custom home Designer. Most importantly, today though your guide to
(00:24):
turning your ordinary house into something truly extraordinary. We're getting
a little late start today, I'm telling you. Sometimes I'm
just saying, Jesus, sometimes he just runs a little long.
That's all I'm saying. That's all I'm saying. Don't look
at me that way.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
No, I'm up. I'm up exactly. Let the fan you
understand what I'm saying. All right.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
Anyhow, we're talking about a really cool subject today. I
think you'll find it very useful. Today's show is about
details that matter, or just the fact that details matter.
Now here's the thing. Details are often overlooked in our
day and age, just about everywhere, and when it comes
(01:12):
to your home, this can be different. You can make
a different decision about that, and the quality of details
in your home can make a massive difference. And that's
why it's so great because details small things do not
by definition break the budget. And so this is an
(01:35):
enabling conversation that we're having this morning so that you
can make some big changes on some small cash for
your home, really really important things. And of course we're
going to take some calls as we do. Let me
give you the number eight three to three two. Ask
Dean A three three the numeral two. Ask Dean eight
three to three two, ask Dean. And as always, when
(01:59):
it comes to calls, anything you want to talk about,
you set the agenda for the calls. Construction design, DIY,
what have you A three three two asked in The
phone lines are opened, ye, yes, yes, they are open
now and you can call in talk to producer Michelle Cube,
who is standing by to take your calls this morning.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
If we do this all right today, we're.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Gonna bring some light into your morning and make you
feel glad that you were here.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
The team is here for you.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
As always, Elmer is on the board. Good morning, Elmer,
Good morning, Los Angeles. There he is Elmer, as I said,
producer Michelle standing by right now to take your calls.
Eileen Gonzalez back at the news desk this morning, two
days in a row.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
Good morning, Eileen, Good morning. How's it going.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
You know what I'm I was exhausted yesterday for yesterday's show.
I just very little sleep, had some troubles on my mind.
But I got a good night's sleep last night and
we fell back. So we got the bonus out right.
Speaker 1 (03:01):
Love the Bonus hour.
Speaker 2 (03:02):
Loves the Bonus Hour, so forward, so much. Yeah, exactly, exactly. Yeah,
Spring is overrated. Hey and look at her. Look at her.
Oh my gosh, sitting across the table from me. Clearly
anybody who has met us, clearly my better half, uh
(03:24):
and my design partner, the co owner and co founder
of House Whisper, and most importantly, my best buddy in
all the world. Tina is here. Oh that's a That
was a loud elephant. That was hello, Tina's uh. Tina's
(03:45):
spirit animal is h is the elephant, her favorite animal
in the world. That's why there's an elephant sound in
the back. Just to be clear, Tina in no way
looks like an elephant at all, But.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
It would be cute.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
You will look more like a squirrel, wouldn't it be awesome?
I mean, what would it be like if you could
get like a like a beagle? Sized elephant.
Speaker 1 (04:11):
Maxim My gosh, it would be so cute just.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
To have it your little elephant right, slightly larger than
a cat, like a small dog. Elephant the size of
a small dog. Fun, how about it? Science, Let's get
to work, all right. Speaking of getting to work, we
should probably do exactly that. We've got some calls that
are starting to pop up on the board. Here. I'm
(04:34):
going to give you the number one more time, eight
three three two. Ask Dean.
Speaker 4 (04:40):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
I am here to help you take it to the
next level, and today especially that applies to everybody from
castle to condo and everything in between, because we're talking
about details that matter, and details so so very much matter. Also,
we're going to be taking calls. Let me give you
out the number, you give me out, you could let
(05:09):
me get Here's the number. I've only been doing this
eight years. Okay, here's the number. Eight three three two.
Ask Dean eight three three two, Ask Dean A three
three the numeral two peep, ask Dean.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
There you go? All right? Oh.
Speaker 2 (05:31):
Also, I'm not gonna spend any time talking about it.
This segment, But next segment, just just just know it's November.
Guess what's happening right before Thanksgiving this month? The House
Whisper Live audience holiday home show returning to KFI Studios
(05:54):
yet again. It's going to be a great event. We'll
be talking about that a little later in the show.
So hang tai and we will give you details on
how you can win a seat to this live audience
event in just a bit. All right, let's dive in.
You have heard it said, undoubtedly, don't sweat the small stuff.
Somebody has said that in your life at some point,
(06:16):
and you know that it's probably a really good advice
in a lot of areas, but not when it comes
to making an ordinary house truly extraordinary. When it comes
to that, God is always in the details, as they
would say, which is great news because it means you
can move the needle quite a bit, even with limited resources.
(06:39):
So this is a massive, massive list, by the way,
and we're just going to move through what we can
today and hopefully inspire you to figure out your own
details as well, even if the ar ones that were
not mentioning first thing I want you to understand about
details in a home is how to build a room
(07:02):
without building walls. And this is just a this is
a design truth that not as many people utilize when
they're laying out their furniture in their house that as
as should. Okay, we have over the last few years
gone open concept open concept. A lot of houses now
(07:24):
have been remodeled or built brand new with this open concept,
which means that we have at least one kind of
supersized room in the house, the combo kitchen, family dining
ish living area, and it's nice, big and open, no walls.
(07:44):
Some of them have gone too open, but you know,
we're not going to get into that today. But the
point is this when we've got a larger space like that.
And by the way, this applies even to small spaces
that are open concept, like an apartment, okay, because you know,
you walk in here, you walk in the door and boom,
you're right there in the seating area or the living room,
(08:05):
and there's the kitchen, and you know, it's all sort
of this one main area other than the bedrooms are
all just sort of right there in one open space.
So when it comes to this particular detail, it is
understanding that walls walls that we think of as the
things that define a room. Walls are really a story
(08:29):
of sorts. They are essentially a construct of our imagination.
Now I'm not saying that your walls are imaginary. If
you've got walls, they're real. But the point is this,
a lot of folks think, well, if we're really gonna
define a space better, then we got to do construction,
and we got to You don't put up wall. No, no, no,
(08:50):
not necessarily the case at all, because a wall can
be many many things. We do this a lot when
we talk about exterior landscape design. A wall can be
so many things. Specifically, in this case, what I'm alluding
to is that a wall can be a properly placed
piece of furniture. So let's say we have an open
(09:13):
space and we've got a sofa or a little sectional
l sofa. The backside of that sofa as it stretches
out into the room is essentially a wall because you're
on the back side of the sofa. So aligning it
in a room along the path of a hallway out
(09:33):
of the main hallway, or aligning it with its back
or its edge leading edge away from the front door
can create.
Speaker 1 (09:44):
A space.
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Actually, by definition, creating two spaces where before there was
just one. Okay, so understand that the arrangement of furniture
in a room is a detail that, when done properly,
can create rooms within the technical, physical structural room. Okay,
(10:05):
a lot of you suffer from not having really much
of an entryway, and entryways are important. That's a detail
that I like to draw attention to as much as possible.
But maybe you don't have an entryway in a structural
technical sense. You open up the door and you're standing
in a larger room. The reason why that is not
(10:26):
the greatest thing in the world is simply because entryways,
just like hallways and front porches and back decks, they
are transitional spaces. They are kind of emotional airlocks, as
it were. They're not quite out, they're not quite in.
They give you that moment of pause. You can call
(10:46):
them a punctuation in a sentence. They give you that
moment of pause where you can reorient yourself and say, okay,
all right, now I'm entering into this situation instead of
just being thrown right into it. So instead of walking
through the front door and just stepping into your living room,
you step into an entryway. And you're like, Okay, I'm
(11:08):
I'm not outside anymore, but I'm not actually completely in
the house, right.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
I'm not intruding on anyone.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
I'm not in anybody's space yet, because this is the entryway.
So entryways that don't have walls around them can be
created with small details. The properly sized area rug laying
in front of an entryway. It defines a certain amount
of floor space and says, while you're standing on this rug,
(11:39):
you're not in the rest of the room. You understand
what I'm saying. The lines of a rug create and
of a psychological perimeter. Now, if you can emphasize that
even more with the line of a sofa floating free
floating in a room, not so that it's destroying usable
space in the room, but so that it's clan a
(12:00):
space unto itself. A sofa and a couple of chairs,
or an L shaped sofa connected to a coffee table,
all touching one area. Rug that combines those elements together.
That's room with walls. There's a clear psychological sense in
(12:22):
which you are either in that room or you are
not in that room. You're on the other side of
those edges. And because you're on the other side of
the edges. You don't have to think of that space
as being all a part of the greater, massive space
that it finds itself in. You understand what I'm saying,
And again I keep saying the word larger space as
(12:44):
if I'm alluding to like a super big room. It's
absolutely critical in super big rooms, but it's just as
critical in smaller spaces like apartments and condos, where there
aren't a lot of defining structural features. There's not oh,
a dining room, clearly, that's the dining room. Clearly this
is a living room, and there's the kitchen. It's all
(13:05):
sort of you know, most apartment in condos, it's all
sort of an amorphous one sort of open space, and
that puts it upon you to carefully design the details
of where the furniture sits so that we get entry away,
a free passage to other rooms, other spaces like the kitchen,
(13:26):
a place to eat, a place to sit, and so on.
I think you get the point there, all right. So
first tip of the day, building a room using the
details of furniture and things like area, rugs, lamps, all
that to create rooms without building walls, and in that
(13:48):
Chiching money saved along the way. All right, so much
more when we come back. Let's talk about controlling the
size of a room with the detail of color, and
integrating some of that old furniture that you inherited then
and like but.
Speaker 1 (14:05):
Doesn't really feel one hundred percent of yours.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
How do you integrate that truly into your stuff and
own it for yourself? All of that and more when
we return your Home Dean Sharp the House Whisper.
Speaker 4 (14:18):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
Hey, welcome to Home with Dean Sharp, the House Whisper.
That's me.
Speaker 2 (14:29):
We are talking about details that matter this morning, and
we're going to continue to do so. But first let
me give you the phone number to call us, because
in just a bit we're gonna be going to the
phones and talk about anything that is got you scratching
your head about your house. Eight three three two. Ask
Dean eight three three the numeral two. Ask Dean eight
(14:53):
three three two Ask Dean. Producer Michelle is standing by
ready to take your calls. She'll tell everything you need
to know. Pop you into the queue. You can listen
to the show while you wait, and then who knows
you and I will put our heads together and we
will figure it out. I promise you. Eight three three
two ask Dean go into the phones in just a bit,
(15:14):
all right, back to it. Right before the break, I
alluded to the fact that I would tell you how
to control the size of a room with color. This
is a detail that you know, some people would say, well, listen,
Dean color in a room, painting on the paint on
the walls. That's not a small detail. No, it's not
(15:38):
a small detail. But it is a detail, and it's
an inexpensive way of radically changing a space. And so
I just want you to be aware of this one thing,
just this one simple thing. I shared this with the
Conway on Thursday night in our normal like six twenty
bit that we do. And it's this warm colors. If
(15:59):
you're a human being, warm colors meaning anything on the
warm side of the spectrum, they tend to come toward us.
And I think you understand what I'm saying when I
use that language, that they come toward us. Warm colors
embrace us. They kind of approach us and wrap themselves
(16:19):
around us. That's that warmth they are cozy, all right.
Warmth radiates at us. Maybe that's the tie into nature, right,
it comes at us. And therefore a warm color on
the walls of a room, and warm color in terms
of furnishings, accents, all of that. These are things that
(16:41):
come at us and as a result make a room
feel smaller, okay, more comfortable, cozier, more homey in that side.
In that sense, cool colors the inverse of that, anything
on the cool side of the spectrums, the blues, the greens,
and so on. These colors tend to move away from us.
(17:03):
They recede from us sort of psychologically, emotionally, the sides
of the vastness of the ocean, the blueness of the
sky above us, the height of trees. Cool moves away
from us. Warm comes toward us. So in this case,
how do you apply this, Well, let's say you've got
(17:24):
a small room. You've got a small space, and you
don't want it to get any smaller because it's already
maybe smaller than you want.
Speaker 1 (17:33):
It to be.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
Then favor cool colors, especially when it comes to the
walls and furnishings and accents, and that room will be
as roomy and open feeling as it can be without
actually physically moving the walls. And the inverse of this,
of course, is we've got a large space, and I
(17:56):
actually deal with this a lot. You know, we have
clients well with very large spaces, very large homes, and
sometimes some of these large spaces really need to be
made more intimate because they get away from you after
a while. All of the pomp and circumstance of having,
you know, big cavernous space doesn't always feel great. In fact,
(18:19):
it rarely feels great in terms of making people feel
good about being in the space. And so we want
warmer colors there in spaces like that that sort of
reach out and embrace you, draw you in, and make
you feel more comfortable about being in that larger space.
So warm colors come at you and shrink the size
(18:42):
of rooms. Cool colors move away from you and expand
the size of the room, all of which happens without
actually moving walls.
Speaker 1 (18:52):
Got it all right.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
One aspect of a rustic or a vintage item something
that you have inherited that can be changed, is its color.
But we very very rarely recommend changing the color of
something entirely, unless you're just convinced. You know, you're all
(19:17):
into that. But changing the color of a thing is
a way emotionally of taking ownership of it from a
decore sense. I'm interesting to think about that for a second.
Let's say you've inherited this, this grand old dining room
table from great grandma, and you love it. You love
(19:39):
the table, and you want to honor her and the heritage.
Speaker 1 (19:44):
You don't.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
You're not going to give it away. You're going to
keep this item. But here's the thing. It doesn't quite
tie in with everything else you got going on that's
yours around it. You can see the dining room table
from the living room and it just seems a little loft,
It seems a little out of your color scheme or
what have you. So here's the thing that we have
(20:06):
often seen can be a relatively small detail that can
make a big difference. Most tables, and I'm just talking
tables right now. Apply this theory to any piece of
furniture that you've got. But you know tables, right below
the table top, there's a skirt underneath that table. Unless
it's a glass top table, if it's wood, there's a
(20:27):
skirt of some sort underneath it. You know, relatively small,
you know, three four inch skirt from which the legs
are extending down to the floor. That skirt is not
a huge, glaring detail, but it is something that's visible
from the room, from other rooms when you're room adjacent
(20:48):
to it. And to take that skirt and make the bold,
sexy jougi decision, you know what we're gonna do, just
the skirt. We're not gonna touch Grandma's table any other way.
Just the skirt underneath the tabletop. We are going to
take some paint, the same kind of paint that we
used on these other items in this room, or matching
(21:12):
the color of some of these accent items in the
other room, and we're going to put that accent color
on just the skirt or just the legs. Or you're
getting what I'm saying. By putting just that element of
color onto that table, you have owned it, You've integrated
it into the decor complement of everything else in the room,
(21:35):
and suddenly you're doing both the best of both worlds.
You're honoring this great piece from your great grandma, and
also it now belongs in your space. It's a detail
that matters. Tina, and I did it a while back.
We have had a grandfather clock. It's not a great grandfather,
(21:55):
great grandma. It's not a super awesome, fancy grandfather clock.
It's kind of early nineteen eighties, a grandfather clock that
Tina's grandparents bought, and it was always a part of
their home and it was always something that she loved seeing,
I mean, just reminds her of them. And we've had
it in various places in the house for a number
(22:18):
of years, and finally Tina said, you know what, I
really really want that clock to be theirs and ours both,
and so she decided to paint several of the elements
of that clock the exact same color that we used
to paint the walls of our dining room, because the
clock is not in the dining room, but it is
(22:38):
sitting right across a walk path from the dining room.
And man, did it make a massive difference. That clock
now belongs with us and it belonged to them, And
it's a great way of kind of straddling the historical
fence there, So a detail that matters, just a little
(22:59):
bit of paint, kind of paint on the right aspect
of a piece of furniture can take those older, out
of date, used to belong to somebody else things and
make them yours. All right, when we come back, let's
talk about not neglecting utilitarian fixtures and how important is
that in terms of details and what I mean by
(23:21):
that light switches, lamp chords, outlets, even heating and air
conditioning vents.
Speaker 1 (23:26):
What can you do with those?
Speaker 4 (23:28):
You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
Hey, thanks for joining us on the program today. We
are approaching the top of the hour. Did you turn
your clock back last night or did it do it
by itself most of the time. You know, we kind
of run our lives off of our phones, and so
we don't worry about setting our clocks back. But we
have some like the grandfather clock I was talking about
in the last segment. You know, those things have to
be turned back, but we don't really rely on them
(23:58):
too much other than their beauty. So I hope you
turned your clock back last night and got an extra
hour of sleep. I'm glad you're here with us now.
We're talking about details that matter, and I'm gonna let
you know next segment. Right after the next news break,
we are going to the phones, and so I will
(24:18):
give you our number once again, eight three to three two.
Ask dean eight three to three the numeral two. Ask
dean eight three three two, Ask dean. Producer Michelle standing
by ready to take your call. She'll tell you everything
you need to know. Pop you into the queue, and
then we will get to that thing that you've been
scratching your head about and we will get it solved.
(24:41):
That coming up right after the next news break. All right,
back to the deats, the details that matter. Where are
we at on our list here? What did I say?
We're oh to not neglect extending your design efforts to
often overlooked utilitarian fixed Oh that's a mouthful, right, What
(25:03):
do I mean by that? I mean, what is the
utilitarian fixture? It's stuff that just got to be there, right,
It's got to be there, and we kind of take
it for granted, and it's often overlooked. Light switches, outlets,
chords coming from lamps, those kinds of things. And so
(25:23):
here's the thing. I know somebody's listening right now saying,
you know, can we get the major changes that make
a difference. And I'm just going to underscore this one
more time. Sure, we talk about the major changes all
the time, but today we're talking about details that not
in and of themselves just one of these changes. But
(25:44):
if you start really kind of obsessing over the details
in your home, layer after layer after layer, pretty soon
what you've got is something that everywhere somebody turns, they
see caring inserted in. And that's really what the details
really provide. There's this underscoring of the care with which
(26:09):
you are designing your home. Details matter. You know, we
always say when we go to a restaurant, right, oh,
the service was wonderful. Detail that matters, you know, in
a hotel, you stay in a hotel, hospitality industry in general,
whether it's food or overnight stays in places, it's the
little details that matter. Fresh flowers in a room, if
(26:33):
you've ever stayed in a room in which after housekeeping
has been through they've left behind fresh flowers, or the
mint on your pillow, that kind of thing.
Speaker 1 (26:40):
You know, it's a mint.
Speaker 2 (26:42):
It costs like a penny, all right, It's not like, wow,
these guys are breaking the bank for us, but just
the idea, Hey, somebody took the time. Somebody took the time,
and you know, we are an emotional people, and so
when somebody takes the time for us, those things have
an impact. Details matter, So that's the idea. So we
(27:04):
obsess over lights in our home, lights and recess can lights,
way too many of them.
Speaker 1 (27:10):
We'll talk about that in a bit.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
But lamps, right, And you get this great lamp and
it's got this really utilitarian chord, you know, the either
the black or brown, you know, rubberized plastic key cord.
And that's fine if the lamp cord isn't going to
show based on the way that you are setting the
(27:33):
lamp up in the room. But let's say it is
going to show. Let's say that you can see the cord.
I've got a lamp, a free standing lamp in my
living room that there's no way to not see the cord.
It's kind of just tossed and spooled down around the
base of the lamp. And in those cases, if you're
serious about getting the details right, then you think about, well,
(27:58):
what can we do to that cord? What can we
do to the chord? And so you start looking and
you suddenly you realize there's a whole world. You look
on Amazon and find there's a whole world of lamp
replacement cords out there, And if you don't want to
wire in a new replacement cord, and by that I
mean fabricy chords, velvety chords, chords of every imaginable color, beautiful,
(28:24):
lovely chords that nobody is offended by seeing. And is
anybody ever going to walk into your home and say, hey,
nice chord. Chances are no. But does that mean that
you shouldn't do it? No, not at all, because what
they'll see is they'll see a beautiful lamp and nothing
(28:45):
will distract them from it, including the whole effect of
the chord finding its way over to the plug and
so on. If you don't want to rewire a light
on what I was about to say, is that a lamp,
then there are sheaths, sheaths trying to make that sound
right in my ears. There are cord sheaths that you
(29:06):
can purchase for cheap that just slide over, kind of
like scrunchies, that slide over an existing cord in order
to make it far more attractive. And there are ways
and places in a house where you're wanting to plug
something in and you just can't avoid the cord. And
(29:27):
in those situations, you take the extra effort and you
change it out. Okay, the same is true with switches
and outlets again, do they matter? Yeah, they do matter.
They're right there on the wall. So you're trying to
go for this effect, this vintage, look this old house,
look this, whatever the case may be, and then you
(29:49):
just got the plane old. There they are the plain
old white outlet, the plain old white you know light switch,
the plain old plate that everybody else has in the universe. Well,
if you want to stand out, if you want to
make a difference, then there are a billion plates and switches.
Speaker 1 (30:08):
Now.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
Again, just to use our little place as an example,
Tina and I went with an early kind of early
nineteen hundred's of nineteen twenty esque French American motif throughing
our home. It looks dated. We actually went out to
did we get them at restoration Hardware or I don't
remember exactly where, but to the website. We actually bought
(30:31):
the old style push button light switches. Okay, not fancy.
What was that house of antique hardware? There it is
and these are like the ones that you would find
in one hundred year old home, but they're brand new.
They're totally code compliant, brand new, wonderful, gonna last forever.
Light switches and they just add that little and do
(30:52):
people notice those?
Speaker 1 (30:53):
Oh yeah they do.
Speaker 2 (30:54):
People are like, whoa, I love that light switch in
the bathroom, thank you. Yeah, just details matter, all right?
There you go so much more to talk about. We're
gonna pick up this conversation, uh in just a bit.
But when we return, we're gonna go to the phones.
Your home Dean Sharp the House Whisper on KFI. This
has been Home with Dean Sharp, the House Whisper. Tune
(31:17):
into the live broadcast on KFI AM six forty every
Saturday morning from six to eight Pacific time and every
Sunday morning from nine to noon Pacific time, or anytime
on demand on the iHeartRadio app
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Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
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