Signature Classes
Watch for Donna's 2015 Signature Workshops!
We all know how design trends affect our businesses and our marketability. At the top of the 2015 Trends are those of Bling, Bling and more Bling as well as Bold and Metallic Color Combinations and Pattern. Recognizing these new trends, some say that wallpaper is growing in popularity and that faux finishes are on the way out. But your business does not have to reflect that opinion if you focus your attention on developing and marketing fashionable, patterned finishes for your designers and clients that have come to expect unique and custom style.
In a world where walls of "old world beige" dull the senses, Donna Phelps transforms her new world vision of faux finishing into artistic backdrops for modern day living. Using her trademark motifs of unique patterns, textures, and exciting new metallics that add sparkle, reflectivity, and depth, she designs finishes that enable you to create a unique sense of style perfect for the client that desires and appreciates one of a kind, handpainted wall decor.
A returning trend is the "feature" wall and it's a look that's here to stay. Feature walls offer "recession-proof" style, allowing clients the cost effective opportunity to have more dazzling, original and dramatic finishes than might not be appropriate or affordable when considering all walls of an area. Continuing this dramatic trend onto the fifth wall - the ceiling - is becoming more popular as well.
Donna's goal is to provide knowledge and inspiration that can be interpreted, adapted, and applied to suit your individual marketing and design requirements. Staying in tune with the most current and popular of those trends aids in keeping portfolios fresh and helps to create recession-proof style. Through her workshops, she share's a decor style that reflects the demand for ways off the beaten track offering a wide palette of possibilities for feature walls or ceilings. Color, Pattern, glamorous Metallics, and Sparkling Glitz along with new to our industry, Mica, are where it's at, and that is exactly where the focus will be in this years collections workshops. Students will learn finishes that are well conceived combinations of top finishing products, the latest in motif and pattern design, and exciting new and easy to use embellishment tools and materials such as Mica Flakes, Mica Chunks, Pattern Rollers, Mirror Glitz, Metallic Transfer Foils, Gold and Silver Leaf, and more.
Each year Donna creates a new design collection of faux and architectural finishes that perfectly fit the market trends! These collections have become the cornerstone of her Signature Class Series and include her favorite "design and style" finishes. Some of her past collections include The Cosmo Collection, The Ornamental Collection, and The World Tour Collection, Glam Nouveau, Modern Safari, Contempo Tropics, Bling It Home, and Mica Trends! Over the past few years, she has uped the ante by collaborating with her partner-in-education, Gary Lord, with a new series of classes including several focused on introducing the use of Faux Effects newest Cabinetry/Furniture Product, Old World Finishing Paint. Other style specific workshops designed and taught in collaboration with Gary include Innovative Trends and Innovations In Design workshops in Cincinnati, Dallas, and Sarasota.
In all her finishes from these many collections, Donna has always combined elegance and sophistication with progressive design concepts. She premiered her very first signature collection at the 2007 Meeting of the Masters to many excited compliments from the attending faux finishers from around the world. Since then, she has continued to teach her cutting edge finishes here in Sarasota in her home studio as well as many other venues including Idal Conventions in Memphis, Indianapolis, Ft Worth, etc, the Faux Retreat, Prismatic Painting Studio in Cincinnati, Faux Effects Internation Studio at FE Dallas, and more! She will be teaching this fall at the Concrete Decor Show in Indianapolis as well as returning to teach at FE Dallas.
Thanks so much for visiting our site and be sure to watch for new Innovations workshops to be added to our schedule throughout the year!
