Calgary Fall Home Show: Lohnes answers at Ask Us Live

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For the past 30 years, Toronto-based designer Karl Lohnes has solved countless interior decorating challenges through the pages of Canada’s own Style at Home magazine. Now, the veteran stylist will make his Ask Us column a live, in-person experience at the upcoming Calgary Fall Home Show.

“The Alberta home shows are among my favourite, and I encourage people to bring me their decorating questions. I’ll be there for three or four hours following my Main Stage presentation for Ask Us Live,” says Lohnes who was one of the founders of Style at Home launched in Toronto in the mid-90s.

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An author, designer and artist in his own right, the highly personable Lohnes makes regular appearances on Toronto and Montreal media outlets sharing his decorating knowledge and makeover secrets. Although his post-secondary education was in marketing, his passion for interior design led him to a Saturday job at a friend’s home decor store in downtown Toronto. That retail experience connected him with the city’s elite stylists and home fashion editors who would drop into the store, sometimes to just borrow the odd glamourous thing. This weekend gig was where he unleashed his inner design diva, catching the attention of an editor who was looking to start a new Canadian home design magazine.

“They said I seemed to be on the ball,” he says. “I believe that if you love to do anything, whether it’s cooking, knitting or even fitness, you can find a job in it. There’s always a place for you if you’re passionate.”

Lohnes’s Main Stage presentation at the Calgary Fall Home Show is where he’ll share the five biggest design mistakes people make with their homes and how to avoid them. Those boo boos include buying area carpets that are too small, hanging art too high and choosing paint colour too soon.

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“People dream of a beautiful yellow room and then they go buy furniture and it doesn’t coordinate. It never turns out. Do what the designer does and choose the paint colour last,” he says.

When Style at Home first published, Lohnes would receive letters from readers lamenting the fact that their local hardware store was their only source of paint and home decor items. Before the days of online stores and Instagram-induced inspiration, people felt stuck with limited design choices. But anyone can pull a room together with simple rules, he insists.

“The rules I like to give people are like footprints, no matter where they do their shopping or what their style is,” he says.

Lohnes is one of the celebrities scheduled to appear on the Main Stage at the Calgary Fall Home Show, Sept. 27 to 29. The lineup includes everyone’s favourite home handyman Bryan Baeumler who returns with a brand-new project up his sleeve. Tickets are available in advance and presentation times are listed on the website at calgaryfallhomeshow.com.

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