We’ve talked all about design styles before, and how to determine what your favorite style is! But what if you don’t perfectly fit into one box? Luckily, design styles were made to be mix-and-matched – as long as you do it the right way! We’re walking you through how to seamlessly blend two or more design styles for a home that reflects your personal, unique style.

When you’re looking to combine more than one design style in your home, there are a couple different approaches you can take. The first is to blend design styles in every room, and keep it consistent. For example, if your style is a blend of modern boho farmhouse, you’ll keep that theme throughout your home. The other option is to choose a couple main styles (modern, farmhouse, and boho in this example) and vary which style(s) you’re showcasing in each space. There are a few things to keep in mind, regardless of the route you take:

Keep a neutral base and a limited color palette

If you’re mixing design styles, it can be all too easy to end up with a chaotic space, or a home that ends up looking vastly different from room to room. Avoid this by keeping a relatively neutral base, accented with colors from a limited, consistent color palette. At the Lake Loft, we have tons of black, white, earth tones and wood, but we also included a lot of blue and green tones throughout the house, keeping it cohesive from room to room.

Pick a primary style

Even if you plan to blend two or even three design styles together, having one overarching design style as your baseline is helpful when selecting furniture, colors and decor pieces. If you want a mostly modern home, you can easily incorporate some farmhouse or bohemian elements. If you love coastal style, minimalistic modern decor can fit well, too. The key is to have a good idea of your baseline style, and work off of that.

Choose complementary design styles

Along those lines, some design styles, like ultra-modern and cottage, just don’t mesh together. They don’t have any design elements in common, so they’re super hard to mix-and-match. Choosing design styles that more naturally complement each other is a safer bet for an end-result that looks naturally cohesive. Think modern/Scandinavian, modern farmhouse, or coastal/Colonial for styles that easily blend together. Shabby chic and ultra-modern? Not so much. The Lake Loft is a blend of coastal, modern and farmhouse design. We wanted to keep it neutral, welcoming and natural, and we wanted it to feel unique but still cohesive!

Allow accent pieces to stand out

If you have accent furniture or decor in your home, make it a true accent piece! A bright piece of furniture in an other-wise neutral, minimalist home; a vintage piece in a modern space; these standalone accents are a great way to add a nod to another style while keeping your primary style consistent. You can also incorporate accent design elements, like a fun wallpaper, colored tile, brick wall, or varied hardware or lighting (hint: we did all of these things at the Lake Loft!) to keep each room looking unique and fresh, while still blended with the rest of the house.

Vary your smaller decor

While you should probably keep most of your large furniture and design relatively consistent throughout your home, smaller decor elements, like throw pillows or artwork, are a great option for blending decor styles in each room. A gallery wall or shelf is a cohesive way to mix-and-match different pieces of decor, and pillows are a great option for adding fun textures, patterns and colors to tie decor styles together.

We loved getting to play around with a few design styles at the Lake Loft, and couldn’t be happier with the end result. We got feedback from a lot of people at the Artisan Home Tour that the home felt unique and interesting, and that it was refreshing to see such different rooms all blended together into a cohesive home. We want to know how you like to blend design styles in your home – what are your go-to styles? Comment below (and on Instagram @AlmaHomes) and let us know!

And don’t forget, there are still two weekends of the Artisan Home Tour for you to come see the Lake Loft for yourself! Grab your tickets and we’ll see you there, or join us for a virtual tour here!