When decorating a new home or redecorating and updating your current home, one thing that’s incredibly important to keep in mind is style. Now, you can always go with a classic, homey decor style, and go with whatever’s common and trendy at the moment. However, you might be happier with your room’s new look if you browse around and look at some of the different, specific styles you could try. Here, I’ve put together a list of five of the most popular decor styles, so you can see which one you might like to incorporate into your own decor!
If you want to see more examples, take a look at my Pinterest board!
Looking for a place to find some new and exciting pieces to fit one of these styles? Check out Vintage Home in Paoli! (They’re especially great if you’re a fan of the rustic look.)
Note: If you’re redecorating because you want to sell your home, you may want to consider having it professionally staged.
Industrial Style
Industrial style decor has been a really popular one for the past ten to fifteen years. It’s modeled after the basic, bare-bones looks of urban factories and warehouses, with bare brick or cement walls, exposed light fixtures, visible beams and pipes and high ceilings. The furniture features a lot of wrought iron and other metals, as well as unfinished wood, and tends to be more functional than stylish. This style tends to be a little darker, and more basic in tone.
Rustic Style
Rustic style decor is like the industrial style decor of the country. It follows the same bare-bones, back-to-basics principle as industrial style, but instead of having a distinctly urban feel like industrial decor, it feels very much like it belongs in the countryside, in a little cottage or a cabin in the woods. Sometimes called “shabby chic,” this style embraces natural imperfections, especially in wood, which is often left unfinished or with chipped or worn paint. Everything looks handcrafted. This style embraces pale, clean colors in order to bring out the natural beauty of the home itself.
French Country Style
If you like the idea of rustic style decor but want your home to look a little more “finished,” you might want to consider french country style. Sometimes called farmhouse style, french country style decor embraces the same idea of natural beauty and simplicity, but also adds a few more opulent elements, like small chandeliers, plush pillows, and padded chairs. It also tends to be a touch more colorful, adding florals, pastels, plaids, and metallic colors like gold into the mix.
Bohemian Style
The only real rule of bohemian style decor is that there are no rules. The choice of free spirits, this style is eclectic by nature. It can include elements of any of the previous styles we mentioned, plus more. It tends to be brighter and more whimsical than any other style, and often includes flea market purchases, unconventional furniture choices, plants, and a lot of very personal, individualistic details. (Think Monica’s apartment in Friends: It doesn’t look like it was planned, it looks like it just sort of…happened. Yet it’s still very visually pleasing!)
Minimalist Style
Like bohemian style, minimalist style decor can be a combination of many different styles, but with one main, overarching rule: Everything should serve a purpose, and as many purposes as possible. The whole point of minimalist style decor is to minimize the number of things you have in your home. Things should look clean, uncluttered, and spacious, and are probably mostly white and other light, neutral colors. Minimalist style is all about conscious choices and careful placement.
