Color is the strongest feature in many displays. Bold color contrast attracts attention. Creating a single color story is another strategy and a very effective way to feature unrelated products. Color patterns draw you in for a closer look. This display is an example of color patterning at its best.
Cole Hardware in San Francisco mixes colorful merchandise with the simplest of white props, proving that colorful display techniques are not just reserved for apparel, gifts and toys.
Display ideas to share:
Simple spools of twine on a spindle become a display for elegant brooches. This image is from Pinterest, shared by numerous users.
Summer display idea:
Foam pool noodles are sliced and turned into garland for an inexpensive, colorful store display idea. View additional, clever DIY ideas at the blog Craftzine.
A few fun store displays:
Chair leg rungs become apparel racks when the chairs are hung on the wall at Decades Vintage Store in Portland, Oregon.
Each fitting room is different at the Brass Razoo in Nampa, Idaho. Adding character to the store, each room even has its own chandelier. Photo credit: Amber Fischer, amberfischer.com
Reader submission:
During a visit to an Ikea near Dallas, my future brother-in-law, Justin thought of Retail Details when he saw this vertical display of lamps and emailed it to me this week. It will be nice to have someone in the family who loves displays as much as I do! He spent an entire day prop shopping with me for some showroom clients in Dallas last winter.
A new Retail Details feature: I’ll be posting visual merchandising project ideas for input from readers. Please click on “comment”, below the blog post, to share your thoughts and expand on my idea. With the store owners permission, I’ll share pictures of the end results later in the year. Please note, it takes a few hours for your comments to show up on the blog. The comments area is monitored since we get so much spam.
As always, thanks for reading the blog and stay display inspired!
~Becky Tyre
The Retail Details blog is accepting a few new sponsors and advertisers in the sidebar of the blog for 2012. Please contact us for rates, email swirlmarketing (at)comcast.net
You can submit photos of store displays for blog consideration at that email address, as well.
Becky Tyre is a visual merchandising consultant and the owner of the Retail Details blog, also on facebook. You can read more from Becky in the Display Inspiration articles and Trends sections of GIFT SHOP Magazine.
Oars are used as hang rails in this summer display at 
Porter Square Books
Rice
This display at 
This scarf display is in the 
Some displays use props and some are products on traditional fixtures. At the 
They used sachet packets for the scent Velvet Woods, adding feathers to construct these colorful peacocks in their showroom windows. They turned out great and caused quite a buzz around the marts.
If you want a lesson in effective use of color in visual merchandising, visit a showroom that carries 
This photo, above, is from their showroom in the 
Sometimes single colors are the best way to make a statement. This is particularly effective when displaying a collection such as this pink grouping by 
Bentley’s Reserve
Once again, their use of color and merchandise arrangement shows a nice blend of mixing metals and a little pop of color. The result allows the white products to really stand out! Product areas are 
Life preservers have always made good props for resort and spring displays, but the colors, stripes and dots on these took this visual merchandising staple to a new level. These two displays at ACCESSORIZE immediately caught my eye on my way to tour a retail store elsewhere in Stockholm. The background graphics were quite nice, as well. I wish I had taken a picture from further back to get the full effect of this display story. To read/view parts 1 and 2 of the Stockholm Sweden displays, 
Don’t you just love how the cake stands are used in the displays on these shelves at 
At Retail Details, we LOVE interesting vases used for jewelry displays! This one is from 
Cute display idea for headbands and hair ties using a boot and a bottle at 
Retail Details & Swirl Marketing send our warmest congratulations to our friends at 
The floor of the store window at 
Father’s Day is not in June in Sweden, but we stumbled upon this menswear display window. The frames were filled with scrunched white fabric for a very interesting effect.
At the entrance to each store, a pedestal was placed with signage promoting the dandy theme. Atop each pedestal was a glass dome and each store created a vignette display featuring items from their store.
