Colin King’s 5 Tips for Arranging the Most Stunning Vignettes in Your Home

Colin King is a household name at AD, having styled countless high-profile shoots for our pages, but his pathway to the profession kind of fell into his lap. Colin first studied as a classical dancer, eventually becoming a personal trainer for celebrity clients like Gwyneth Paltrow and Victoria Beckham. Jobs in social media management for interiors firms and brands like One Kings Lane helped him dabble in styling photos and hone his brilliant eye for detail, but Colin’s first big break came when Reid Rolls, a photographer friend of his, invited him to help concept the interiors at a shoot for Warby Parker founder Neil Blumenthal’s Hamptons home. At the time, Colin wasn’t entirely sure of his career path. “It was just very casual happenstance, the right place, the right time, and saying yes,” he recalls. 

From there, many more doors opened, kicking off an illustrious styling career that has extended into collaborations with brands like Anthropologie, Crate & Barrel, and Zara Home. Other life milestones include having his Tribeca loft published in the November 2022 issue of AD, becoming the artistic director-at-large at Beni Rugs (where he’s involved in everything from product design to the dyeing process and marketing), and writing his very first book. 

Out now via Rizzoli, Arranging Things explores the magic of arranging and rearranging objects within your home, forming artistic vignettes that transcend the mundane. Its pages encompass dozens of images from prior shoots to accompany his musings on his creative process. He notes that he was fortunate to collaborate with his “dream team” of AD global features director Samuel Cochran (coauthor of the book), Roman and Williams’s Robin Standefer (who penned the foreword), and consultancy firm Javas Lehn on the design. 

Above all, Colin adds that he didn’t want the book to offer a series of prescriptive tips but rather serve as inspiration for the reader to experiment with creating moments of beauty that feel personal and special to them: “I wanted to share my own experience in working through some of these kinds of concepts and what to pay attention to and what’s worked for me in the past,” he explains. “It really is this trial-and-error moment that, when you arrive at it, it just feels right.” Here, Colin talks us through some of the styling wisdom that appears in the pages of his book. 

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. 

Instead of giving really prescriptive advice of buying a certain thing or channeling a certain aesthetic, this book is really more about working with what you have. What was your thinking behind that?

That was the scariest part for me because I wanted to make a disclosure to everyone that it’s not formulaic. My hang-up as I was trying to create these tangible ideas for people was that I felt like I was taking away the power from the viewer and the arranger. What I’m really trying to say is, “Look at the things around you and forge relationships between them in a new and exciting way that feels good to you.” It’s really about confidence. Rather than imitating, get the things that you love and find a cool arrangement that works for you.

What are some of the most meaningful objects that you own and love to display?

I always gravitate toward anything that has sentimental value or evokes a memory. I have a drawing from my mother and I think of her every time I see it. Or there’s a little image of my brother and my dad at a photo booth when we were younger. Those are the little things. It’s not necessarily physical. But, before I could afford collecting different things when I was traveling, I would pick up a rock, and that would be my connection to the place. They can be kind of sculptural, and you can put a pedestal underneath one or place it on a napkin, and it feels like something of more importance than it is.

How can a person train their eye to notice the untapped beauty of the objects within their own home?

My first tip is to abandon the reason you bought the thing. Looking at objects beyond their intended use, a rock becomes a sculpture. A vase becomes this monolithic moment on a table, or you pull everything off a coffee table and you realize that it’s kind of a sculpture in itself. It’s a new way of looking and reimagining things. That’s what I really think styling is about. In fashion, you can wear a black T-shirt a million different ways. Same with styling a house.

What are some things you consider when starting the process of creating these vignettes?

I like to play with light, whether that’s setting up a beautiful table to arrange objects in the window, or there’s a shadowy corner that needs some sort of life. And also, furniture. With a bookshelf, for instance, you’re met with limitations in depth and heights. So, finding objects or books that fit within the shelves is a nice way to start that process of elimination. I always like to peel everything away and start fresh. It’s like a puzzle.

Can you talk a little bit about the importance of contrast, creating tension, and that dialogue between objects?

Ultimately, you just want to have a sense of movement, but also stillness. Finding objects of various heights is always a great place to start. And also, various bodies. There might be a tall, thin vase next to a more stout, round vase. Sometimes I like to play with a similar color scheme, but all different materials and textures. So, playing with heights, different forms, and then using different planes to arrange them. 

Arranging Things

$50 at Amazon

Do you have any guiding principles on when to display something versus what needs to be tucked away?

I don’t have any guiding principles other than I think experimenting should be a daily practice. Sometimes I’ll rearrange my coffee table and I’ll hate it and redo it the next day. I think getting all of your favorite objects in constant rotation is really great. I think that that’s kind of a beautiful metaphor for life as well. We’re constantly moving things, and folding laundry, or cleaning up the kitchen. It just feels like you’re always arranging in a way. 

You’ve had a very unusual path to becoming a stylist. Do you have any advice for somebody else who thinks they have a knack for it?

In this world of social media, it’s really important to find your point of view. Using a platform like Instagram as a glimpse into how you see the world is really vital for any creative. Also, listen to your community because I don’t think I would’ve had the bravery to do it without people being like, “I think you have an eye.”