Van Day Truex quotes:

In design, Mother Nature is our best teacher.

Go to the source for ideas, go to the Metropolitan Museum, find your inspiration in nature, go to the Museum of Natural History, but never rely on something that someone else has done.

Interiors speak! Rooms emphasize whether one exists or lives, and there is a great difference between the two!

I wonder if any element of interior design is more personal than color? Nothing can more quicly reveal aspect of personality and character than the choice - or absence - of color.

Too many bright colors make for congestion. Too many bright colors need, above all, contrast in value, to eliminate vibration.

Control, edit and distill.

Good design is forever.

I suppose the most marked example of color as structure is in the Byzantine use of mosaic decoration that becomes architecture. The decoration of the interiors so related to the form that they fuse. In less elaborate interior design this is always the ideal approach to color - used not only as just color alone.

How obvious it is that color has its various connotations-hue, value, and intensity - and without the basic understanding of these three determining factors, we are somewhat limited in the proper use of color in rooms.

The modern scene in decoration is not a unified or controlled one. The unified control of the arts during the reign of Louis XIV no longer exists; today the designer is free to achieve a wider variety and more personal approach to the interior.

Rich colors are typical of a rich nature.

Training the eye is the most important way to gain an appreciation and understanding of good design in busienss management.

It is general knowledge for anyone interested in color that subdued value, intensity and hue make for quieter, less adventuresome interiors. Stronger approaches need stronger knowledge, more experience and flair.

Remember, color is not just color, but mood, temperature and structure.

It is obvious that any rather non-color, monochromatic design is safe, easier, more generally restful and with life being the hurdy-gurdy that it is, more and more of us prefer and interior giving the maximum response.

Better rooms better furniture, better objects d'art can only be created for a society interested in living - not existing.

Color is a major element in scale. A small room can have a larger look by the use of closely related values, hues, and intensity. A large room can be made to look smaller by marked contrasts of color and value, hue, and intensity. Value is one of the most important elements. Whether light or dark, little value contrast makes for unity, and sharper contrast makes for stronger punctuation.

The combination of an individual[i.e., a client] with a positive idea of living and a good designer is the great force in contemporary decoration. I don't care how good the designer is, I am sure that he [or she] would rahter have a person with definite ideas rahter than have to work with a negative figure as a client.

The easiest approach to any strong color is to use a lot of it, thus unifying a room. However, beware of too many strong colors unless you happen to like living on a battlefield.

The overscaled compositions being produced by so many abstract painters, which are full of movement and use of color, are ideal example, ideal transformations of an entire wall and entire room.... There is no denying that one of the major attractions of these successful large compositions is their structural decorative use in the contemporary scene... That these large canvases can be superbly decorative may not be considered complimentary by some of the artists involved...

There is nothing more trite than a period room imposed on a contemporary setting.