The best part about looking to the past not just for inspiration but also for furniture and décor is that you have decades upon decades to choose from. You can pick out your favorite designs and styles from the last hundred years and beyond. Not only does this open up your options, it’s also a great way to start investing in high-quality pieces – and often for less.
It does take an eye and a bit of know-how to mix and match vintage pieces in your home masterfully. While trial and error are always great when you have to buy these investment pieces to bring into your home, there’s less wiggle room. The good news is that with a few key tips, you can mix and match your stunning mid-century furniture with your Victorian pieces or with your modernist art Haus pieces in no time.
First, Understand How to Spot Quality
When you first enter the world of vintage, you may be overwhelmed with the options. There are some extremely expensive vintage pieces, cheap-as-chips options, and a massive mid-range. If you’re ever in doubt and want the best pieces, always go to a reputable stockist. You can get some of the best mid century furniture, for example, from The Furniture Rooms and know you’re getting top quality.
If not, you’ll know what to look for. Veneer, for example, isn’t essentially a marker of a poor-quality item. Veneers have been used to lay down decorative wood designs for well over a century. The difference between high-quality veneered items and low-quality ones is the construction of the overall piece and what the veneer itself is made out of.
Joinery is another thing to look at. Is the piece held together with nails or with dove-tail (or similar) joints?
It’s easier to determine the quality of the piece when you can see and feel it up close, but learn what to look for, what brands to watch out for, and what’s worth your money and what isn’t, and you can start investing in some amazing pieces.
How to Mix and Match Vintage Furniture
Mix and matching can look absolutely stunning. This applies to furniture styles, wood tones, shapes, textures, and even colors. The key to mixing and matching all of these elements, of course, is balance. The eye and spirit need to feel settled when in the space. If there’s too much of one thing, the eye will be drawn to what’s different and feel a bit disjointed in the process.
You want to feel wrapped around the comfort of your home while enjoying the unique styles you feel drawn to. To help, use these tips:
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Have a Counterbalance
An easy, effective way to balance new styles in your home is to have a counterbalance in the same room. For example, if you have contemporary furniture and add a mid-century coffee table, for example, adding a mid-century lamp or a side table to the mix balances the design out. Have a chrome lamp? Add a chrome magazine rack. At least one other piece that follows the same theme can help balance out the room.
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Work with a Color Scheme
That being said, you will need to edit. If you are really dedicated, you can have everything you love about interior design in one room, but this can end up getting messy. It can feel balanced, yes, but if you can’t enjoy the design decisions you’ve made because there’s too much noise in one room, you aren’t going to enjoy your space as much as you should. That’s why you need to edit. Work with a color scheme and separate your design loves by room. This way, you can have it all in a way that emphasizes what you’ve done rather than clutters it.
