5 Tips for Cohesive Home Design

People are often complex, with endless layers of likes, dislikes, and opinions. When it comes to designing your home, how do you combine all the components you love in a way that is both charming and cohesive?

The good news is you don’t have to limit yourself to only one theme or one color; you can implement your most inspiring ideas for your dream home. Every room in your home should come to life in its own way without detaching itself from the rest. With the right amount of planning, the right elements, and textures, your home design will feel as curated as a museum. Read on to master these five design tips for your most cohesive home:

Establish Your Style

To ensure that your home comes together harmoniously, it’s crucial to understand the approach you’ll be taking. Ask yourself: What is your personal design style? What inspires you? What do you want to see throughout your home? This could be anything from modern to antique, from eclectic to curated. Whether you know exactly what you want your home to look like, or you have no idea where to start, it’s beneficial to set up a visual mood board that will act as a guide to always refer to. Having inspiration photos lets you know what the key elements are needed to carry out your design but also ensures that at no point will you stray too far from your end goal. 

As you’re exploring different images, styles, furniture, and decor choices, it’s important to take a mental inventory of what stands out to you both positively and negatively. Define the pieces that are your must-haves and the pieces that you could do without. Across all your inspiration, what are the underlying themes that each idea has in common? Those similarities will allow you to articulate your unique style and guide what you incorporate throughout your space. 

Choose a Color Palette

Deciding on a color palette is crucial to designing any one room; the same is true when you’re looking at the design of your home as a whole. One of the first things you should do is choose interior paint colors that will work throughout the entire home. This includes your primary colors, which will be a large focal point of the room, most likely used for painting the walls—followed by complementary colors for details like trim pieces and decor. You can then finish this off with special accent colors for added dimension and depth. 

This process shouldn’t feel limiting in any way. In fact, your home can be cohesive even with a different color in every room. Choosing a color palette is a great way to ensure that any combination of colors will mesh together well as you compare tones and undertones to get that perfect look. If you have a certain statement piece in the home, such as a rug or valuable art, this can be a great starting point to build your palette. Take note of the colors throughout, both the bold and more neutral tones. The primary color in one room can serve as an accent color in another, carrying that constant connection throughout the whole house.

Define Each Space

A cohesive home can still enjoy the separation of space. To make these separations work in your favor, be intentional about the flow and transition that carries from room to room. As you’re designing your home, consider each room’s unique purpose and how it fits within the rest of the house. Defining each space, whether it’s planning out one room or breaking up an open floor plan, allows you to think through the best layout. This way, you can easily create a most inviting and free-flowing environment. Prioritizing the way the home flows will help you consider a design that enhances this idea.

Diversify Your Textures

Using different textures is a great way to mix up the look and feel of each room in your home without straying far from the coordinated theme. You can take many approaches to texture for creating a cohesive home design. This can be done by incorporating a variety of textures of the same color or keeping the same type of texture in different colors throughout the home. 

Texture can be incorporated in many different ways, and this can be an opportunity to let your creativity and individuality shine through, whether it’s through larger furniture pieces like decorative chairs or accent decor such as curtains, pillows, and blankets. Experiment with different fabrics, from velvet to leather to boucle. Try contrasting this with furniture that’s a different material but still complimentary. This creates depth that can be carried through multiple rooms. If you’re not afraid of a more handy project, try bringing texture to the walls through a custom project such as building out a shiplap wall. Wood accents like shiplap are versatile for any design; they’re an easy and affordable way to breathe new life into your space. If you prefer to keep the furnishings simple, adding intrigue to the walls can elevate the space and can be replicated while still remaining original across different rooms.

Keep Base Elements the Same

Whether your decor is going to make a bold statement or take a more subtle and neutral approach, the foundation it sits on can largely impact the final product. Keeping floors the same throughout one story of the home, if not the whole home, truly ties everything together. Although, this doesn’t include rooms similar to bathrooms and mudrooms, where you have the opportunity to change things up. Other important base elements include ceiling and trim colors. In traditional design, it’s common to choose a neutral white; however, some homeowners and designers are opting for unique and unexpected colors. While your walls can always change color, keeping the ceiling colors and trim the same throughout lays a strong foundation to anchor the home.

Your home is an expression of you and your unique personality. You don’t have to sacrifice all that you want within to have a cohesive design. You can have the best of both worlds once you know your style, define your color palette, recognize your best floor plan, embrace texture, and build out a strong and supple foundation. There truly are no limits to what creativity you can bring to every square inch of your home.