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How to Decorate

Ep. 339: Grand Millenial Decorating with Emma Bazilian and Stephanie Diaz

How to Decorate

Caroline McDonald

Arts, Business, Design

4.4838 Ratings

🗓️ 12 December 2023

⏱️ 57 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Our guests this week are Emma Bazilian and Stephanie Diaz, the authors of Charm School: The Schumacher Guide to Traditional Decorating for Today. Emma is a designer, writer, editor, and content director at F. Schumacher & Co. Stephanie is the art director at F. Schumacher & Co. In our chat, they talk about the path that led them to work together and the research and organization that went into Charm School. We discuss the balance between traditional and modern elements and the fun of identifying and incorporating small touches of traditional decorating throughout the design process. What You’ll Hear On This Episode: The origins of the “grand millennial” movement. How Emma and Stephanie learned to appreciate different styles yet still focus on their individual strengths. The process of how Charm School mixes archival images with present-day designers and how they found a balance to showcase both the traditional and modern. We take a trip down memory lane and remember some of our favorite memories of childhood bedrooms. Why it’s cool to embrace the “uncool” elements of design, such as matching, but not to go too overboard. The appeal of canopy beds and bed skirts. A special bonus? When your home decor can help you hide something. The doll collection that is still very much remembered in the present day. Tips for bringing in handmade and bespoke design elements that tell a story and reflect your personal touch. Emma and Stephanie’s predictions for the future of design trends. Also Mentioned This Episode: Ballard Designs Charm School (Full Book) Schumacher Nancy Braithwaite article where she used matelasse fabric to cover chairs in her living room.  Please send in your questions and decorating dilemmas to podcast@ballarddesigns.net so we can answer them on our next episode! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

Welcome to How to Decorate from Ballard Designs, a podcast all about the trials and triumphs of decorating and redecorating your home.

0:08.9

Each week will help you unleash your inner decorator.

0:11.6

I'm Caroline, and I'm on the marketing team.

0:14.0

And I'm Taryn and I'm a product designer.

0:16.0

And I'm Liz.

0:16.8

I head up the Ballard creative team.

0:18.4

We're your host.

0:19.9

Join the expert team at Ballard Designs for tips, tricks, and tales from interior designers, stylists, and other talents in the design world.

0:26.1

Plus, we'll answer our listener question at the end of each show.

0:29.0

So don't forget to send them to podcast of Ballarddesigns.net.

0:32.1

Yes, we love answering them.

0:33.8

Now on with the show. Our guest today are the authors of Charm School, the Schumacher Guide to Traditional Decorating for today.

0:42.2

Emma Bazillion and Stephanie Diaz.

0:44.1

Emma is a design writer, editor, and content director at Frederick Magazine, as well as a former editor at House Beautiful.

0:51.6

Stephanie is the art director at Frederick Magazine.

0:55.1

Before that, she was an art director at Frederick Magazine. Before that,

1:00.3

she was an art director at Schumacher. So Emma and Stephanie, welcome to the show. So glad to have you.

1:06.1

Hi. Thank you so much for having us. Yes, we're so excited. We have been trying to schedule this episode for many months. So I'm glad we finally get to chat about it and share the book with our listeners

1:13.5

because I know many of them are fans of the grand millennial style. So before we get too much

1:20.8

into that, I was hoping that y'all could start off by telling everyone a little bit about Charm School

1:25.8

and how the idea and the project came about.

1:30.9

So I guess it started, if you really want to go all the way back to 2019,

...

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