Do you ever look at a professionally decorated room and wonder what exactly makes it look so good? There are many aspects of decorating that come together to create the perfect room... but there is one element that brings it all together into a harmonious whole. That all-important element is balance.

Balance is an extremely important part of your color scheme. Not in which colors to use, but in how much and where. When it comes to color balance, it's important to remember that darker colors take up more visual space. For example, if you have one hunter green pillow and one soft rose pillow on a light-colored floral sofa, the majority of people coming in the room will notice the green pillow before they notice the rose pillow or the sofa. The problem with this, is that you didn't decorate your room for people to look at your green pillow - you decorated it for them to notice the beauty of the whole room and feel comfortable in it.

So how do we apply color balance to our decorating? It's not really difficult. Once you have decided on your colors and patterns, evaluate them. Figure out which of your colors will take up more visual space and weight, which will take up less, and how much more or less. Evaluate each pattern as a separate color. Think of everything in terms of how many parts of each should be in the entire mix. In the above example, since the green is very dark, and the rose and floral are very light, then you'd probably want to use a mix of approximately 1 part hunter green, 4-5 parts soft rose and floral. If your floral was darker - perhaps using more of the hunter green than the rose - then your mix should be more like 1 part hunter green, 1-2 parts floral, and 3 parts soft rose. But if your floral was still light and your green was a medium sage - then your mix should be something like 1 part sage, 3 parts soft rose and floral. You must use more of your lighter colors to balance the weight of the darker colors and make them appear equal. Perhaps place two rose pillows in front of two green pillows, or trim two rose pillows in hunter cording. If these are the colors in your bedroom, you might want to keep the hunter for your bed skirt and a throw pillow or two, and use the lighter colors and prints on the more prominent parts of the bed, such as the comforter and larger pillows.

What if you don't want your colors and prints to appear equal? Maybe you want to use lots of the print and a sage, and only want the rose and hunter to be accents. If this is the case, then you'll evaluate your main color(s) separately from the accent color(s). Figure out how many parts of your main colors and prints balance each other, and figure out how many parts of your accent colors and prints balance each other. If the sage and floral are equal, then use them equally all over the room. But use approximately 1 part hunter to every 3 parts rose in your accents. Otherwise the rose will disappear and hunter will be the only noticeable accent color.

These principles in color balance apply first to the entire room, then to each section or part of your room. And they aren't hard fast rules, just guidelines that will help bring everything together and make your rooms beautiful.