Using colour to transform a room

One of the surest ways to add character to a bland space is to fill it with colour and texture. Yet when Priya Mitrovic of Studio P Interiors first saw this bright but somewhat featureless nineties-era suite, in the St. Clair-Yonge neighbourhood, it didn’t really have much of either. 

The clients had recently returned to Toronto after 12 years in New York and were eager to put their own personal stamp on their home. The new condo wasn’t without some genuine assets — notably, floor-to-ceiling windows on two sides, overlooking a leafy ravine. But there were walls in the wrong places and storage was limited. Most importantly, like a lot of condos its age, it was boring — not at all reflective of the couple’s outgoing personalities.  

The transformation began in the front entry, where a new ceiling-height closet and adjoining console table, framed in walnut with dusty rose insets, provides a place to put coats and boots. The addition of a teal-blue upholstered stool is practical and adds a bright note. 

In the main living area, the first order was to open things up and let sunshine and lovely green views flood into the space. The original galley-style kitchen had been marooned in a separate room; Mitrovic “liberated” it by removing the walls and adding a generously sized island, with utility storage and dishwasher on its inner side and seating for four on the outer face.  

After that came the first real injection of drama: Mitrovic clothed the kitchen, from tray ceiling to kickplates, in a rich, matte blue-purple.  

Inspiration, she explains, came in the form of a slab of quartzite with a vivid swirl of purple and grey veining that she had spotted at the stone dealer. This remarkable piece of stone became the counter, backsplash and surrounding shroud at the rear of the kitchen, and a paint colour was chosen to match its veining. 

To keep things from getting too kaleidoscopic, Mitrovic tempered these bold moves with the calmer supporting notes of soft white quartz for the island counter, paired with simple stools with woven rush seats. 

A side wall of shelves above a trio of grooved panels (actually, a discreet cover for the air system) also acts as a palate-cleanser between the assertive blue of the kitchen and another injection of colour, in the dining area. “The idea is that with such strong colours, you have to have just the right amount to keep it from being overwhelming,” she notes.  

Where to put the dining room was a bit of a puzzle in the relatively small space, Mitrovic says. The clients are frequent and enthusiastic entertainers and wanted to be free to invite as many as eight to 10 people for dinner at once. But a regular dining table — especially once you started adding chairs — would have been a squeeze. 

Instead, she opted for a built-in banquette upholstered in terracotta leather in the bay window, surrounding a custom white oak dining table with a reeded base. The lower section of the banquette was left open to maximize light and the view of the greenery beyond, and gives the area a relaxed, café-style feel. 

Even with the adjacent kitchen wall removed, the living room is still a fairly compact space. Again, inspiration struck in the form of another stone slab: this time, a showy marble with vibrant white, green and black veining. The piece became the surround for a new, more compact fireplace, beneath deep terracotta shelves that display books and favourite objects. Lit by big windows on both the south and east exposure is a cozily overstuffed sofa, upholstered in velvet the colour of aged burgundy. 

As in the kitchen, scene-stealers like the sofa and the marble fireplace surround work because the other players in the room — clean white walls, a neutral carpet, white linen armchairs with curved wooden frames — are comparatively quiet. “Natural textures and creamy whites are very important in a setting like this, to keep things from going overboard,” Mitrovic points out. 

The lighting — as is often the case, especially in older condos — also required careful planning. “You’re restricted to wherever the wiring is, due to the concrete ceilings in most condos,” she says; it’s installed at the discretion of the original builder and not always in the logical spot. In this case, there wasn’t a single overhead receptacle in the unit. So Mitrovic made use of wall sconces and hanging pendants. In the bulkhead in the kitchen area, wiring installed within the dropped ceiling accommodates a pair of directional lights facing the mint green display shelves, along with a slatted wood pendant above the dining table. 

Over in the primary suite, the main issue was the lack of all but the most basic storage, and a space-wasting slanted entryway. Squaring this off and then stealing a little extra space from the bedroom allowed Mitrovic to create a short hallway leading to the ensuite with enough room for generous floor-to-ceiling closets on either side, more than enough for the couple’s needs. 

Here, the use of colour was tempered just a bit, to keep things restful. A soft red velvet headboard extends wall to wall, and sky-blue draperies (also used in the living room) brighten things up. A touch of sky blue appears again in the woodwork surrounding the entrance to the ensuite, where it becomes an accent: fluted royal-blue ceramic tile lines the shower, and there are light blue insets in the faucet handles, made by the Canadian maker Vogt. 

The same dusty rose used in the front entry makes an encore in the vanity and open shelving of the ensuite, bringing the colour story full circle. 

“Our goal was for the couple to wake up happy and feel good to be at home,” says Mitrovic. “We were able to take a dated, dysfunctional layout and make it work, and to connect the people who live here to their space. And it does — it perfectly reflects the people they are.”