How to Find and Define Your Design Style

First, let me say that home is a place everyone should love! So knowing what you love and what you don’t love is the first step in creating a home you will love to spend time in. Your home design style will most likely evolve and change over time so the best way to get a feel for what suits you is to find inspiration! Then you can start to pull features from different styles to make your house into your very own home.

Before jumping in, I would highly encourage you first to explore decluttering to make space for this important leap in defining the design style of your home. Also, I would look at doing a dream home edit to help provide some clarity for part two!

Part 1: Formal Design Styles

Without further adieu, in Joanna Gaine’s “HomeBody”, she defines six interior design styles:

1. Farmhouse – warm, cozy, relaxing, and full of charm and character; homemade, authentic, inherently aged; a story behind every piece
2. Modern – essentials – clean lines, texture, and textiles, form and function, everyday items that are practical
3. Rustic – organic and raw elements – textured, distressed, aged, stucco, terra cotta
4. Industrial – open concept, minimal, functional, repurposed, and unrefined, exposed details
5. Traditional – classic, ornate, stately, historic, refined, and polished
6. Boho – vintage, eclectic, whimsical, colorful, vintage, unique, textured, layered, and quirky details with woven textiles

After defining some of these, our design style is definitely modern farmhouse over here at The Rennaker Ranch. I have always loved clean lines and practicality with charm & character and every piece in our home tells a story. When I talk about finding your design style, I don’t mean you should limit yourself to one particular look, label or trend.

Part 2: How to Define and Mix Design Styles

1. Notice the long-term preferences that draw you in and make you happy.

It starts in your closet. Seriously! Pick out the clothes that you wear and love the most and you’ll notice a pattern. They’ll be the articles of clothing that you feel your best in and make you happy to wear!

That’s your whole house color palette!

2. Consider the mood you want to create at home.

Are you looking to go for comfy and cozy? Homey and traditional? Eclectic and colorful? Moody and vintage? Creative and balancing? You get my point. Once you define how you want to feel your house to feel and the function of each room, it gets easier to define the colors and pieces.

3. Pick out your favorite pieces that you currently own and cherish.

Is there a theme among the pieces? What story does each piece tell? Is each piece serving its function? If the pieces are just not cutting it – tidy, declutter, re-home, and then move onto step #4!

4. Browse Magazines, Catalogues Or Pinterest for Design Inspiration

Everything from Pottery Barn! No, JK but seriously though – this is important! Again, what are you drawn to? Pinterest is great to get ideas, especially with their shoppable pins. Put together a board for each room of all the inspiration! Clip out images of the magazine that makes your heart go pitter-patter!

5. Consider your dream destination

Are we going to the Caribbean? Perhaps Martha’s Vineyard? Or is it Waco, Texas cough *MAGNOLIA MARKET AT THE SILOS* cough? Europe? Asia? If you could pick your house up and move it, where would you want to go? Because all of those elements should be in your house to transform it into a dream home destination!

6. Pay equal attention to what you don’t like.

I don’t like the rustic or boho design style because I consider these two styles very ostentatious to the eye. It makes me have to think about all the pieces that are being incorporated into the home. Point being, your dislikes are just as important as your likes!

UNDERSTANDING OF DESIGN STYLES + DEFINITION OF STYLES=

Home is a story that should be filled with the treasures that spark joy and tell the adventures of the people that live there and how they have made it their own. I am a true believer in the life that unfolds in those four walls and have made it my mission to turn my house into a home and hopefully inspire others to turn their houses into homes because home is the most important place on earth.

There’s a story to be told of a house that was turned into a home. Tell it by finding and defining your style!

Love,