|
What Makes a Home Look Canadian?
MONTREAL, CANADA
From the Montreal Gazette Until about five years ago, one of the few unifying Canadian decorating hallmarks was, ironically, Swedish. But if IKEA gave us the Allen key to the design kingdom, the U.S. invasion of home stores is what's now helping furnish it. The October 6 opening of Pottery Barn in Edmonton - the brand's sixth location in Canada - reflects a nationwide trend toward American home-furnishings retailers putting down roots in Canuck soil. From Restoration Hardware to West Elm, Crate & Barrel and Williams-Sonoma, the recent frenzy over star-spangled stores further highlights the question of what makes a home interior look uniquely Canadian. "This is something I've been thinking about for almost my entire career," says Toronto designer Tommy Smythe, an HGTV personality and columnist for House & Home magazine. Though Canadian decor isn't as instantly identifiable as African, French, Asian or Scandinavian - all of which Smythe said, "instantly conjure an image" - he believes there does exist a "quasi-formula" - a little French, a little English, a touch of frontier, and a dash of European contemporary (he cites Michael Angus as a designer proficient in this look). "If you can translate your cultural heritage into art and objects and furniture, your environment will feel Canadian," says Smythe. Statistics Canada pegs the home-furnishing industry's worth at $15.5 billion, with operating revenues having grown an average 3.6 percent every year since 2001. But market researcher Euromonitor reports that the increasing dominance of IKEA and American brands - many of them attracted by the relatively stable economy and banking system - is cutting into the Canadian market. 
Pottery Barn's Leigh Oshirak, however, contends that more choices mean greater democratization. "Good design should be accessible to everyone," says Oshirak, the brand's vice-president of public relations. "(Pottery Barn) isn't a stuffy place; it's about inclusion. We're trying to make it easy for everybody to learn how to decorate." Julie Okamura and Gord Hill, both of Calgary-based pop design group, say the result of so many outside influences - no matter their provenance - is that it's hard to nail down a distinct Canadian look that varies from other countries. "The breadth of style runs from coastal cottage to European flair, through industrial influences to homestead simplicity, (with) rugged and traditional mountain living next to urban environmental style," they write in an email. That said, Canada is rapidly gaining a reputation for Green design and the incorporation of natural resources. So says Karen Dalton, executive director of the Canadian Decorators Association, who points to such examples as "west coast modern," wherein the living space is extended into the environment. In Alberta, Dalton says decorators trend toward deeper colors that can absorb the sun; in Northern Ontario, her members find a prevailing interest in oak and mahogany; the Toronto area trends toward urban-modern, while Quebec is characterized by vibrant color and sleek design. Indeed, the confluence of the multicultural population, the international retail invasion, and social media influences such as Pinterest and Instagram are contributing to an ethos where anything goes - and, as HGTV Decked Out stylist Heidi Richter observes, Canadian decorating style "may be difficult to identify." House & Home's Smythe says an additional challenge is that locally-made product is almost always costlier than something from a Big Box American retailer or flat-packed from Sweden. But "as consumers and patriots," he believes Canadians are starting to make peace with that. "You know you're getting something special when it comes from your own country," says Smythe. | 
Restoration