Home Sweet Home.  Our homes are one of the most personal statements about ourselves.  It is the haven we retreat to–our shelter from the big, wide world.  Ideally, your home is the place where you are the most authentic version of yourself, where you can let your hair down and relax.

When your home houses not only you but your mate or your children, there can be conflict over the home decor.   While stereotypes tell us that home is the province of the female and that only women care about home decor, experience tells us that men have very strong opinions too about what goes into a home and especially where money is spent.  Some of the common tensions found between men and women when it comes to home decoration are:

1. Masculine versus feminine designs.
2. Traditional versus modern.
3. Color.
4. Money.  Men and women have different ideas about what is worth spending money on.  While a woman might love an investment in expensive draperies, for example, a man might prefer to spend that money on a surround sound system for the TV or an automated sprinkler system.

This music video captures the universal male-female dynamic in a brilliant and humorous way.  My favorite line is, “So if relationship conversation slips into a discussion about silicone caulk,  that’s ok, it’s just the way that men and women talk!”

HGTV’s Designing for the Sexes is a decorating show where a professional designer is brought in to resolve decorating differences between couples.  The differences between couples when it comes to decorating style can be dramatic.  Take, for example, the titles of some of the episodes:

• “Moroccan versus Retro Backyard”
• “Sports Bar versus Elegant Family Room”
• “Warm and Cozy versus High-Tech Kitchen”

Who could possibly resolve these differences?  It takes a special designer to be sure, one who has a command of both masculine and feminine design preferences.  The first host of the show was Michael Payne, a man who is always impeccably dressed.  A short radio interview with Mr. Payne is below.  My favorite part of the interview is at the end when he describes his own home remodeling project with his wife as the “House of Payne.”

For a real-life (and somewhat unusual) example of how a husband and wife decorate as a team, we turn to our favorite social columnist, Ruly Ruth:

“Visual Spatial Orientation”–the art of arranging objects within a defined space. This applies to the physical organization of items in a 3-D environment…..aka interior design as well as the organization of physical clutter–i.e., papers, notebooks, books, toys, etc.

Some people are phenomenal at this art. I am not. This is one of my least perfectionist areas. To say the least….color selection, patterns, lines are not so important to me….no wonder I never took art classes.

Meet my husband and me. My husband is a USMC helicopter pilot–he is my polar opposite. He is EXCEPTIONAL at visual spatial orientation—he can easily picture and work in a 3-D environment. Visual concepts come very easily to him. In our family, he is the physical organizer of all things—furniture, toys, books. He HATES this part of his job and often gets very frustrated and wonders why I can’t do it like he can. He can look at something, and figure in less than 5 minutes the best way to place objects. I can try my best and mess around and won’t come close. Some military families are able to have the wife move the family and pre-arrange the house. I’m so bad at this that when my husband was gone and my kitchen was driving me crazy, I had to call a girlfriend to come redesign things for me. It was exactly what I wanted and I LOVED it! (Thanks, Amber!) She was paid in dinner and wine, by the way…the cheapest, best advice ever!

However, we seem to be more the exception than the rule. Traditionally, home design was marketed to women. We, the females, seemed to mainly choose the furniture, patterns, design of the home. The true home-makers. Although with HGTV and other such channels, we are seeing the influx of men in the design field and their expertise and insight added to the “female” point of view. We’ve even seen more masculine design stores pop up.

It took a few years and couple of moves to finally relinquish what I thought should always be the female’s job: interior design and organization. Once I accepted my downfall in this area, it made life much better in the sense that I could ask my husband in advance to do whatever the given task was. (The more advance planning given, the better the outcome I’ve decided.) Also with his wood-working and furniture-building skills, this has become a really good combination.

But then there are still the women that can decorate and choose interiors like no one else on earth. My friends Caryn and Cherie–mentioned only in alphabetical order since both are so phenomenal at this. They describe colors in words I use for food. They talk about couches and sizes and colors and lines of furniture as if they were couture clothing. And even “Look at this cute little guy! Love him!” (To describe a custom-designed chair.) And obviously in their relationships they are both (wisely) the dominating decorators. Hats off to them!

I suppose my Ruly Ruth challenge for the month of April is to get everyone to evaluate their personal decorating skills. And see if there’s truly a passion for this in their lives, or if you’re like me and have more of a fleeting interest. And for those like me whose interest needs a spark, I challenge us to keep reading Ruly and refresh ourselves with different decorating styles and ideas. Maybe even implement one!

Have you experienced design conflicts with your spouse?  How do you resolve them?  Please share in the comments.  Have a great weekend!