Black & White....milkshakes, photography, home decor, fashion, weddings, Hollywood movies, nature, drawings...it's a new love/obsession of mine...and the inspiration is all around us. Okay, I've always loved black and white milkshakes...but from a decorative standpoint, the old "go to" of black and white has really been catching my eye lately. I think it's the perfect combination of sophisticated/classic/soothing/modern....if done the right way. Acclaimed interior designer Celerie Kemble shows exactly how it should be done in her book Black & White (and a bit in between). She says it perfectly in her introduction..."In The Wizard of Oz, after Dorothy falls asleep in black-and-white Kansas and wakes in the multicolor fairyland of Oz, she exults, 'We must be over the rainbow!' In writing this book, I found the same spirit of exultation by traveling in the reverse direction, from profusion to simplicity-away from the rainbow. This book invites you to see that this palette can be freeing instead of limiting."
Of course I also have to look at the spiritual side and ask...Are you a black and white thinker? Do you approach a situation from a very literal point of view or are you somewhere in between in a grey area? Last week in yoga, my teacher D made the following statement...."Every day we choose light or dark (white or black in a spiritual sense)." We are faced with temptation day in and day out to make the right choices, whether it's at work, with our children, a conversation with a friend...and we have a choice to make it a "light" day or a "dark" day. Something to think about the next time you find yourself in a complicated scenario.....
I'd have to say that I am a pretty black-and-white thinker. My new favorite mantra to get me through the day sometimes is...."It is what it is!"
Here is to getting black-and-white inspired!
