The Secrets of "Ish” | Hour 2

with Dean is the handle for them all. You can also subscribe to the House Whisper podcast and listen anytime, anywhere on demand hundreds of episodes, all searchable by topic. It's your home improvement reference library on the free iHeartRadio app or wherever your favorite podcasts are found. And now by popular demand, I'm going to include this in our shows.

If your home is in need of some personal house Whisperer attention, then you can book a three hour in home design consult with me and t All you have to do is go to house Whisperer dot Design. You will find the contact form there house Whisper dot Design. All right, we're talking about the secrets of ish, the right way to do eclectic decor, to pull it off so that it doesn't just feel mishmashed. And chaotic and

cluttered and themeless. We're going to get back to that topic in a bit, but it's the top of the hour, and you know what that means. It means it's time to go to the phones. So let's talk to uh. Let's talk to Deborah. Hey, Deborah, welcome home.

to shatter. And then now I'm noticing in up above that the room up above, that there's some sagging in the floor, and the contractor has a sham name that the integrity of the game and the post that they put in is fine, and that it's no big deal. But I'm not real comfortable with that sewing. Looking for some important advice.

above it. That thousand and this arbitrary math I'm doing here for the sake of the example. But that thousand pounds is spread out over the length of that fifteen

foot wall. So if we're going to take that wall away, which we can, we've got to number one, put in a beam that is strong enough to hold that weight all by itself, and then transfer that weight down instead of the length of a fifteen foot wall, just on two points, one post on one end and one post on the other, which is more than the concrete foundation that was there ahead of time was designed to support.

And that's why we cut open the concrete and create these larger pad footings underneath to distribute and handle all of that weight. Now just coming on to two positions. Now, if all of that was calculated properly, if the beam is sized properly, and the work was done cleanly, then we shouldn't have any major disruption of the house. I mean, we switched these things out all the time, and we don't end up with, Oh, now there's a bunch of doors upstairs that are out of square, or the floor

is sagging somewhere. That's not a thing that happens when you take out a bearing wall properly. So I'm I'm a little concerned about as you are, about why is this happening. Is the floor sagging where it has now connected, or is being supported by the new beam, or is it sagging in some other area that previously, you know, was untouched by.

the floor. Maybe the floor sagged some. Maybe they didn't embrace the walls or the floor sufficiently while they remove the old wall, and it all dropped a little bit, and therefore when they put the new beam in, the beam got set at a lower level and that's why the floor is sagging. Or maybe the engineer and this happens sometimes. I mean they've technically specked a beam. Maybe it's at the low end of its weight specification and as a result, it's actually sagging a little bit, or

what we call deflecting because of the large span. I don't know which of those things it is, but we need to get some professional eyes on it. For you. Somebody needs to get up there with a laser and or a stringline and take a look to see whether the new beam is kind of deflecting or sagging in the center from end to end, and if so, how much we need to get to the bottom of it. Because I'll tell you you are not You're not over

reacting to this. That's what I'm saying. That we switch out bearing walls with beams all the time and it doesn't rack up, change, sag, or cause all sorts of ramifications to the rest of the house. Ninety nine times out of one hundred, there is absolutely literally no change to anything whatsoever when we replace a bearing wall with a beam in post scenario in order to open up

an area downstairs. So I'm concerned, like you're concerned, and I think maybe our first step would be to call the engineer and say, I need you to come out here and take a look at this. I need a kind of forensic investigation of this scenario so that you can tell me why these things are now happening.

I want you to get them out there to take a look and check on the contractor's work to make sure that things were done the way they were supposed to be done and that that beam is doing the job as intended. I just we got to get it all double checked, and now is the time, because these other things have happened, to run it all back through analysis by all people involved, not just the contractor. But I'm going to talk to the engineer who specified that

beam that size, who put that in the plans. The city just signed off on it and inspected to see that it was built according to the plans. But sometimes the plans, you know, something slips through and it's not exactly what it should be. So I want to talk to the engineer. You want your structural engineer, the one who did the plans, back out on site checking it

through Debrah. I wish I'd had more time, but unfortunately I'm probably out of my advice for you, because that's the next step and then let me know how that happens and what they said, and maybe we can help you with the next step after that. All right, y'all, when we come back more of your calls. You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp, the House whisper Kyfi, Dean Sharp, the House Whisper at your service, answering our last question and went a little long, So this is going to

be a little bit shorter of a segment. So I want to get right back to the phones. Let's talk to Spencer. Hey, Spencer, welcome home. Hello.

I'm thinking I want a rug down there. But my wife is Chinese and she hates things that have to be cleaned, and she's like, oh, the floor is great, I can clean it I can bop it, and I'm looking for like maybe is something like I hate by ten rug or so, but like what are the qualities of a rug that I could use to try and convince my life to let me buy a rug? And so I of course an option another options that we can sell on the floor and it won't be cold.

doesn't positively attached down. It lays there once it's all built out, kind of like a carpet, right, it's attached to the edges, and it's floating across the room, which means that a luxury finy vinyl floor could be temporarily removed. It could be peeled back, pulled back, deplanked as it were set aside, and you could if you wanted to lay down a you know, a radiant electric a heating system grid along the living room floor and then put the in that takes out about an eighth of an

inch of space most of them. Uh, And then build that into the house and then lay the luxury vinyl plank back down and what you have then is a worn radiant heat floor. I mean, you won't any longer have to even run the heater in that area of the house because the floor itself will radiate heat right down where you are not going to be hot. It's just going to be warm and cozy and comfy and lovely. And it's the kind of floor that everybody will want to jump off the couch and actually lay down on

because it's so great. And so there are two kinds of radiant floors. One or hydronic meaning you know tubes, fluid flowing through tubes, and that takes up a lot more space. That's the kind of thing that you would want to do when you're building a house and you integrate it in. But electric pads or electric grids, they take up very very little space. They can be easily retrofit into a room. We do it. We retrofit them into bathrooms all the time. So that would be one option.

Now that's priceier, that's an investment, but you know, then no rugs and a warm floor bottom line, no rugg fifteen feet. If we were to do the whole house, oh, you know what, you'd have to price it out because there are various systems out there. So but you know you, but it's worth it's worth checking out. It's worth checking out. Now the other option, back to the simplest option, Okay,

that that. I don't know if this is going to satisfy your wife or not, but I have been very impressed Tina and I have been very impressed with the company called Ruggables. Okay, Ruggables you should look into, honestly.

back down onto the floor. So It solves a lot of concerns about Oh, I would love an area rug here, but it's gonna get all gross, and I don't want to have to take it to special cleaning all the time.

And it's you know, in just a hassle. Tina and I, we've got a ruggable runner in our hallway, we've got one under our living room table, we've got one next to our sliding glass doors, and we have found them to be sufficiently lovely and imminently practical when it comes to having an area rug that you can just you know, you don't have to treat it like some Persian treasure. M okay.

deco in your home. You're listening to Home with Dean Sharp on demand from KFI AM six forty five AM six forty live streaming and HD everywhere on the iHeart Radio app. You are Home with Dean Sharp. The house whisper why am I holding this basketball? Just a fun

thing to kind of play the drums on. We are talking about home decor today, not holiday decor, home decor, eclectic home decor and how difficult that is to pull off, but it's doable and I'm trying to give you pearls here the rules for doing ish on your house and that in other words, you know, you got a farmhouse. You like this idea of farmhouse decor, but in the real world, your decor is going to be farmhouse ish, right, because they are just always other things. There's always other

things that enter into it. How can you maintain that sense of real flow and feel and live in the real world where stuff comes in that doesn't match up

era style, color, all of that kind of thing. So when last I left you on this topic before we went to the phones, I alluded to the idea that you have a lot of freedom if number one, you begin with the neutral canvas, meaning your walls are relatively bright and neutral, like a gallery as it were, and your floor, your flooring choice is not trying to steal attention away. It's lovely, it's beautiful, it's fantastic, but it's

not trying to compete attention wise. Your floor grounds your decor, the walls unite the decor, and then if you can embrace the eighty twenty rule, you are going to be

well on your way to getting this done. Right now, what is the eighty twenty rule brought it up when we did the live audience show, and because we were on stage decorating a Christmas tree, the people from Aldick were decorating a Christmas tree beautiful, I mean just stunning Christmas tree designs from Aldick, right, But somebody raised the question, Well, Okay, I love that department store s Christmas tree just so

sophisticated and adorable and wonderful. But I've got ornaments from my childhood, and I've got ornaments that people have given me, I mean, things that really mean something to us. And so how do I maintain that sense of like, this is a gorgeous theme and still have these meaningful things attached to the tree? Well that really, if you can picture that, and I know you've encountered that issue before yourself.

If you can picture that, that's a microcosm of the decor problem with your home as a whole, right, or any space as a whole. There's this theme you'd like to establish, but what do you do with the real world stuff. It's why things go ish, farmhouse ish, arts and crafts, Ish, Spanish Ish, right. So the eighty twenty rule is a massive step towards solving that problem and

what is it? It's very simply this. You pick your theme, you pick this direction you'd like to head in, and as you look around the spaces and pieces and masses in a space, like let's just pick the living room, the larger masses would be you know, sofas, coffee tables, those kinds of things, bookshelves, if there are those things there. You're talking about the things that take up space in

a room. If we can achieve theme consistency with eighty percent of what's in that room and eighty percent of the larger masses of the room, then then and theme consistency meaning okay, well the sofa is going to be leather, or it's going to be this color, and then this color accent pillows across the sofa, and the area rug underneath the coffee table also working in that color and stylistic theme. Maybe the blind's cooperating with the wall color

as well. Maybe we've introduced to end tables or coffee tables or a lamp, maybe these things, and we just start counting it out. If we can get to basically eighty percent of the room working with that theme, then here's the truth. The other twenty percent can be all sorts of nick knack and off brand things, if you want to call it that peppered in and you'll you

still don't just do this randomly. But the fact of the matter is a room that is eighty percent there to a strong theme can handle twenty percent, the other twenty percent being diverse. Because the competition tilt has already happened. The room is eighty percent, I mean, it is well on its way, and that last twenty percent is not going to take it back. And so when you walk into a room that has those elements going for it, then nobody says, oh, well, this room is just sort

of a mishmash of things. No, it has a strong direction. Now does it have to be eighty percent? Well, yeah, that's the preference. Is this a law of design, No, it's not. But it is a rule based on just usefulness and proof of concept. Okay, And that's why in the core world, eighty twenty is a significant marker that we aim for. Okay, So right now, that's not the

end of the story. I've got a long list of rules and tips for you, most of which we're going to cover tomorrow, but I still have some for you today. But the idea is this, If you can set that in your head as a foundation for your new approach to this space, bedroom, living room, bathroom, whatever the case may be, eighty twenty, the eighty twenty rule, you're going to be ahead of the game, all right, more specifics on that, cay Fie, Jean Sharp, the house Whisper, Welcome home.

Thanks for joining me on the program today. It turns out like it's going to be a pretty beautiful day here in southern California. I know it's not the same elsewhere across the country where you may be listening to it, but you know what, I'm guessing it's going to be lovely in its own right. We've got a sunny day in the sixties ahead of us today, and you may have snow or whatever the case may be, and we're

probably both longing for the other's condition. Right the grass is greener, the snow is whiter on the other side of the fence, Okay, whatever the case may be. Yeah, we miss snowy winters here in southern California, although we've got plenty of mountains with it in but down here where we are, especially where Tina and I are in eastern Ventura County. You know, just lovely. It's just nice and lovely. I hope you're having a great weekend start

and hope it works for you. Don't miss tomorrow's show as well, where we are going to continue this conversation about eclectic decor and how to weave it properly into your home. I've got one more for you here, I got time for one more before we're done today, and then we'll pick up this list in the next episode of the podcast and or our next broadcast, which will be tomorrow morning from nine to noon. And that is this.

We've started out with the neutral canvas of the walls, we've grounded the floor for our collection of stuff, and we've embraced color and texture. In the eighty twenty rule, eighty percent of what we're doing in this space is going to be pushing strongly toward whatever our theme or style is, and that allows the other twenty percent to kind of deviate from that without being a contradiction or

a distraction. Now, this is really critical though. Okay, a colectic design, I said it at the top of the show is not clutter and it's not chaos. And so you've got to get rid of the clutter. And it is the hardest thing for anyone to hear me say, because we all just have too much stuff. But I'm telling you, I'm telling you, if you want to master a great design, then you've got to got to get rid of the clutter. There's too many things, too many

things to focus on. Human minds visually are relatively lazy, they really are. And so if you overwhelm me with too many things to look at, I just won't look at any of them. And you know that that's the case for you as well. Okay, So a beautifully designed space has enough stuff but not too much stuff, and it embraces here's the rule, embrace negative space. Negative space is immensely powerful. In fact, this is such a big rule that I'm going to start tomorrow's show off with

it as well. Negative space has a power to draw attention to the thing that it is pointing to you. And you're like, well, isn't negative space just nothing? Yeah? In a sense, it really is, and yet it has a gravity to it. Imagine this, Imagine that we just put a big white framed panel up on a wall, nothing nothing but white. It's just white, like you know, framed inside a frame, nothing but white. What is that? That's not negative space, that's blank. Okay, that's just a

blank wall. Negative space is the space around a thing. Now. Okay, imagine that big white framed panel up on the wall and there's nothing in it that is blank, not negative. Now, I'm going to take a beautiful image of a bird, a bird in flight, and I'm going to take that bird and put it way down in the kind of the lower right corner of that white framed panel. Now, that white frame panel is not blank. Now, it is

the negative space around that bird. It's the it's the space, it's the air that the bird is about to fly into. It's poised with all sorts of tension. Now it's giving that bird all sorts of gravitational attention from your eyes because you see this blank space and your eyes zip down to the one thing that's there. And now that tiny little bird in flight is the star of an amazing show set on an amazing stage. Okay, think about that. I want you to process that, because that's the power

of negative space in art and in design. And if you're gonna pull off an eclectic design, you're gonna need a good amount of negative space around the things that you've got, and that means you got to get rid of some stuff you really do all right. There is a whole lot more to my list of the secrets of Ish that we will continue with tomorrow the big show Sunday morning from nine to noon. Thanks again for spending this time with me. It is a privilege, it

always is. Follow us on social media Instagram, TikTok, Facebook x Home with Dean the same handle for all of them. You know, the house Whisper podcast is everywhere your favorite podcasts are found, and if your home is in need of some personal house Whisper attention, you can book a three hour in home design console with us at house Whisper dot Design. We're going to be back here tomorrow nine to noon. Until then, get out there, get busy

building yourself a beautiful life. We'll see tomorrow. This has been Home with Dean Sharp the House Whisper. Tune 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