Welcome to the weekend, friends! I hope your weekend is off to an awesome start! Is it warm where you are? Spring is officially here! It was back to our routines this week, as we were on Spring Break last week. It completely recharged my batteries! So happy you are here, and so excited to talk style! Your home style, of course!
What is Home Style?
Friends, if I am completely honest, I am not sure I can use one style type to describe my personal home style. Modern farmhouse is probably as close as I can get, although I like to incorporate some rustic pieces and some classic black and white mixing.
For the sake of this conversation, how do you feel about moving away from the formal named styles to just talking about how we find what we like? Your home should reflect your personal style. The way you style your home should make you happy! Let your home reflect who you are as a person. What do you value? What do you enjoy?
I painted my kitchen cabinets white! Click here to see how!
Gosh, I so believe in creating spaces that speak to me! Not literally, of course, but I love when the spaces in my home reflect my personal style. This has taken me a long, long time to realize this truth!
The Journey to Finding my Home Style
We purchased our first home in September 1994. Holy buckets, that was 25 years ago! We house shopped for one year before finding our dream home. In many ways, I admit, it was more my dream home than the hubs. Why? Because the home was beautifully decorated, exact to the current trends, and required nothing on my part to make it gorgeous. And this was 1994, friends, so we are talking lots and lots of country florals in mauve and teal. I have zero pictures, but trust me when I say it was absolute love at first sight when I saw this home!
Most new homeowners are excited to take on projects, to put their decorative stamp on their home. In 1994, not this girl! I loved the decor of my home and more than anything, I loved that I did not have to do it. Truth be told, I did not have confidence that I could do it. The style suited me and that was great, because I had no idea how to do anything! Other people painted. Other people laid new flooring. This girl was perfectly content to do nothing!
Style Through the Years
We lived in the home 12 years. In that time, we pulled up the carpet in a hallway and attempted to refinish the wood floor underneath. We replaced the carpet in the living room. I pulled the wallpaper off in the dining room and painted it. Three times. My husband laid tile in one of the bathrooms. I am pretty sure that is the full list of things we did- in 12 years!
Funny how when we bought the home, it was my dream home. By the time we sold it, it was a great house that in no way reflected my personality. It was dated. I had changed and the style of my home had not- not one bit!
I made this faux brick accent wall using joint compound, masking tape, and paint! Happy to share- just click here!
Changing Styles- Is this a Thing?
As the years passed, and I grew older and more mature, perhaps :-), I became more comfortable with my style and what I liked. In 2011, I found Pinterest! Need I say more? Browsing pictures of various home decor styles, I found so many things I liked, so many things I loved, and things I was not a personal fan of.
From roughly 2010-2014, my style was probably best characterized as Tuscan. Deep tans, rich orange and yellows- yeah, that was my jam! Tuscan style felt elegant, and I enjoyed mixing it with black pieces. During this time I started to follow bloggers with Tuscan styled homes, inspired by both their ability to style beautiful homes and their courage to share their style with the world!
I started to notice my love for all things brown and yellow began to shift to gray and black. What started as just pinning images with these colors led to purchasing decor with these colors. I love, love, love the clean lines with black decor!
Mixing Styles
Whether it was Tuscan style decor or black and gray mixes, one thing was true: my style was reflecting what I loved at that time! I was learning to style my home with things that make me happy. I remember my first styled foyer that I absolutely loved! Excited for change, I bought a black Ashley entry table from Kirkland’s, and hung a sleek rectangular shaped mirror above it. I purchased a black rug from Walmart to lay in front of the table. To top off the look, I got a wrought iron wall piece to hang above the mirror. Oh la la- when I tell you I loved this look, I mean I LOVED this look! It went beautifully with my yellow painted walls!
I think what I loved most, even more than the look itself, was that I had created this space. The entire look was my creation! Up until this point, I picked out furniture and maybe some rugs but never put an entire room’s look together from scratch.
Let Your Home’s Style Reflect YOU!
Does your home reflect who you are? Can you see your personality in the “stuff” that is around your home? Do the things around your home make you happy?
In the last three years, the style of my home has shifted to lots of whites and neutrals. The farmhouse look is one that visually appeals to me, and as I have implemented white and farmhouse pieces in my decor, I just fell in love with it more. Honestly, I do not embrace styles just because they are trendy, I embrace the styles I do because I find they bring me happiness. And while an all white look is gorgeous, I find myself incorporating pops of black in my decor!
I love browsing Instagram, Pinterest, and other blogs for home décor ideas! Do you?
