How I Create A Coherent Interior Design In Our Home

When I decorated all the “public” areas of our home, one of my main goals was to create a cohesive interior design in all areas. I didn’t need them all to be the same, or have the same color palette throughout, but I didn’t want the rooms to feel disjointed and disjointed. I want the house to feel like there is a general flow from one room to another.

That’s the plan, and while my implementation of that plan hasn’t been perfect (some of it requires a lot of trial and error, while other areas aren’t quite right and need to be changed in the future), I think I pulled it’s mostly, and it starts with neutrals that I use throughout the house and in almost every room.

I have seen many homes where the design plan is cohesive by painting the walls of a room the same solid neutral color. There’s nothing wrong with the idea as long as that’s what the homeowner really wants and wants. But that’s not me, so I tried to use the same concept with a little creativity.

I use the same two neutral paint colors in almost every room in our house – Behr Polar Bear and Benjamin Moore Classic Grey. In the living room, the walls are Classic Gray and the crown molding, baseboards, window casings, and door casings are all Polar Bear.

In the music room, which is just next door and open to the living room, I used the same colors with a twist. All trim in the room, including the slatted ceiling and wainscoting, is Polar Bear. On top of the wainscoting, I stenciled the walls to create a wallpaper look, and I used Polar Bear and Classic Gray for the “wallpaper”.

In the hallway, which is right in the music room, I used Polar Bear on all the trim and the built-in cabinetry (not shown below). For the walls, I did a horizontal stripe of Polar Bear and Classic Grey.

And then in the hallway bathroom, I used Polar Bear on all the trim and wainscoting, and Classic Gray on the upper walls.

And finally, at this end of the house is the guest room. I consider this a “public” area of ​​the house because once we build our addition and have a proper master bedroom, the door to this room will remain open at all times (unless we have a guests using the room) and the room is visible to anyone entering the hallway. So in this room, again, all the trim is Polar Bear, and I used Classic Gray on the cabinets. Then I brought the two colors to the painted floor.

At the other end of the house (past the kitchen, which doesn’t have much paint other than the painted cabinets) is the living room, where I used Polar Bear for all the trim as well as the picture ledges and TV frame. . Then I painted the walls Classic Gray.

I’m still working on the details of my studio, and while it may be more colorful and busy than the rest of the house, I also consider it a “public” space, so I brought Polar. Bear and Classic Gray on the painted floor here too. Also, all of the trim in this room will be Polar Bear, and it’s possible that Classic Gray will appear elsewhere here once all is said and done.

Once I created a canvas using neutrals as a base, I then added more color to each room. I try to keep them all fairly similar, and in the same color families, so the colors in one room don’t look jarring in the next. That doesn’t mean they have to match, as long as they coordinate for the most part.

And that doesn’t mean I got everything right either. As I mentioned above, there are areas that I plan to go back and change a bit. One area I have mentioned in previous posts is the hallway bathroom vanity.

I love the color itself, but this bathroom is visible from the music room (where I have a raspberry velvet settee) and the living room (where I have pink curtains). And this vanity is a little orange that looks similar to the colors. But that can easily be solved with a liter of paint! And once I get that vanity color more in line with the two colors, it will look right in the rest of the house because it’s against the backdrop of Polar Bear and Classic Grey.

That’s the process I used in my attempt to create a cohesive look throughout the house. But creating that cohesive look doesn’t have to end with all your rooms having walls painted the same solid color. If you like the look, there’s nothing wrong with that. But if you’re like me, and you crave a little excitement and pattern, you can mix it up by using the same neutrals in different ways – solid wall, stenciled wall, striped wall, striped floor , checkerboard floors, walls with standard trim, walls with wainscoting, and more.