Balanced Living Room Decor
EMILY J FOLLOWILL
A traditionalist might see these patterned drapes and pair them with an equally bold sofa. Modern traditionalists let the curtains star and tone them down with a neutral, clean-lined sofa. Blue and green accessories punch up the color scheme in a way that’s still easy on the eyes.
Elevated Living Room Design
PETER MOLICK
When you combine stunning classical architecture with high-quality modern design, you get an elevated and interesting look. All the traditional details provide a soft counterpoint to the contemporary furniture. Wood and leather accents warm up the room and add dimension.
Small Space Living Room
JOYELLE WEST
Neutral, classic furniture creates a calm and spacious feeling in this small living room. The floor-to-ceiling bookshelves are the main source of decoration. The simple furniture allows the built-ins to take focus, rather than competing.
Minimalist Approach to Decorating
WERNER STRAUBE
A modern traditional living room can take an almost minimalist approach to decorating, which allows you to really see and appreciate the items you have. Focus on quality over quantity, selecting a few really interesting pieces of furniture and art, so that you can truly appreciate them. A minimal decor scheme also allows architectural details, such as original windows or a coved ceiling, to shine.
Highlight Special Features
ANNIE SCHLECHTER
Modern traditional living rooms allow you to turn up the volume when you find a piece you really love, such as this stand-out chandelier, and keep things simple elsewhere. The simple sofa and rugs balance out the bolder pieces, like the desk chair, the ottoman, and the accent chairs.
Selecting Art for a Living Room
EDMUND BARR
Art can support the style you’re trying to achieve in your living room. While this chaise and rug say traditional, the art, including a large contemporary piece, modernizes this corner. Arrange art in an organic grouping like this one, rather than a strict grid, to create a more youthful sense of movement.
Arranging Living Room Furniture
JOHN GRANEN
While the furniture in this living room is contemporary, the symmetrical furniture arrangement, designed for optimal conversation, adds formality. Unlike the more organic arrangements of modern design, traditional living rooms are set up for optimal conversation and entertaining. This means several types of seating arranged in a close, circular formation.
Mixing Design Styles
LAUREY GLENN
This small corner is a masterclass in mixing eras. Every point has a counterpoint, such as the turned wood table and the bold modern chair. A geometric lamp sits next to organic, handmade vessels. A quiet color palette is the throughline, helping everything look cohesive.
Rustic Traditional Living Room
NATHAN SCHRODER
In a rustic setting like this sitting room, modern elements, such as the sectional and coffee table, freshen up the space. The traditional rug and accent chair speak more to the style of the room, and a neutral color palette ensures it all goes together.
Painted Fireplace
JARED KUZIA
Painting your fireplace can be controversial, but it’s worth it if it allows you to express yourself more fully. Here, a black-painted fireplace allows the whole room to become more contemporary. The fireplace speaks to the black windows and the gray accessories, while the deep brown leather sofa and wood coffee table warm things up.
Styling Vintage Accessories
ADAM ALBRIGHT
Traditional accessories will often have a hand-made or hand-painted element. Pieces inspired by nature or made of organic shapes are also indicative of the style. Juxtapose your vintage finds against a modern wallpaper for a fresh update.
Minimalist Traditional Living Room
JOHN GRANEN
Notice how special details, like the antique coffee table and leaded glass windows can really sing when the rest of the room is designed very simply. A modern sofa in a neutral linen upholstery perfectly blends old and new. Houseplants and flower arrangements will add a sense of life and movement.
Incorporate Antiques
ADAM ALBRIGHT
Antiques arranged in a very orderly, symmetrical way bring depth and soul to this room without being overwhelming. Especially if your home is newer or modern in style, you’ll want to bring in vintage and antique pieces to get the balance of traditional and contemporary just right.
Open Plan Living Room
DANE TASHIMA
Vaulted wood ceilings and a large brick fireplace form a stunning backdrop for handsome modern furniture in this modern traditional living room. Painting the architectural features white minimizes them somewhat and allows for an easy neutral color palette. Still, the room feels warm and welcoming thanks to cognac leather accents and a cozy furniture arrangement.
Mixing Neutrals
MARTY BALDWIN
When designing within a neutral color palette, the most important aspect to pay attention to is a piece’s undertone. Undertones can be warm or cool, or you can be more specific and look for pieces with specific color undertones, such as yellow or green. This room features pieces with warm undertones. Even though the chest is gray, the fact that it’s a warm gray allows it to fit in well with the other furnishings.
Show Off Statement Pieces
JAY WILDE
The simplicity of modern traditional style allows really special pieces to get the attention they deserve. Items like this midcentury petal table and the ceramic sculpture on top of it stand out in this simply designed room. In a traditional space where color and accessories are king, special items can get lost.
Choose a Living Room Focal Point
Features like a stone fireplace and a vaulted ceiling add a ton of drama to this living room. The low, modern furniture enhances the view of these traditional, hand-built features and puts a fresh spin on the room.
Pink Living Room Paint
CARSON DOWNING
A soft plaster pink plays up the picture molding in this living room, giving it a slight Parisian vibe. The romance extends to the delicate sconces, pastel textiles, and French country-inspired coffee table. The modern tuxedo-style couch and contemporary accessories ensure this room doesn’t look stuck in the past.
Updating Wood Ceilings
JAMES NATHAN SCHRODER
Extensive historic woodwork like this can look kitschy or lodge-like in a hurry. Bring a rustic interior into the modern age with streamlined furnishing in understated fabrics. Painting the woodwork white also freshens up the space and distances it from the cabin look.
Living Room Wall Treatment Idea
JEFF HERR
Adding detail to your walls or ceiling is a way to get the traditional look, even if you live in a new build. This living room features shiplap and board and batten wall treatments to achieve an old-school farmhouse look. A grouping of clean-lined, modern furniture provides a counterpoint to the more decorative and traditional architecture.
Updated French Country Living Room
JULIE SOEFER
Soft pastels, round curves, and a mix of organic materials indicate a French country flair in this living room design. The furniture designs are kept quite simple, however, and the colors very neutral, which gives this room a contemporary spin on the rustic aesthetic.
Glam Living Room Decor
MEREDITH CORPORATION
Furniture and lighting take a very traditional space and turn it glam. From swanky brass sconces to a curvaceous chesterfield sofa, everywhere you look has another sumptuous detail. Even though the pieces are bold, the neutral color scheme is soothing and allows you to easily add and subtract items without worrying about whether they’ll match.
Make a Modern Space Inviting
ADAM ALBRIGHT
If your style is mostly modern, look for ways to warm up your living room, so that it feels welcoming. Warm wood tones, repeated in the throw pillows and brass brackets, add coziness to this space. Wood-paneled walls, even when painted white, offer a sense of depth and history.
Scandinavian-Inspired Living Room
MATTHEW WILLIAMS
Filled with blonde wood, clean lines and pastels, there’s a definite Scandinavian influence in this living room. Incorporate these elements to achieve a Scandi room of your own. To get the perfect modern-traditional mix, observe the style of the room: This room has a lot of traditional architectural details, but if your space is more modern, include some vintage pieces in your decor.
Classic Furniture Details
JOHN BESSLER
Turned legs, carved arms, overstuffed cushions: All can be found in furniture critical to classic living room design. The pieces in this room exemplify how traditional decor can still have a light touch due to their neutral colors and simple prints.
Color and Pattern
EMILY FOLLOWILL
This stunning dining space makes use of a variety of traditional style essentials: an organic print, bold hues, symmetrical light fixtures, metallic accents, and analogous colors. It's especially noteworthy for the almost hidden use of the blue wallpaper inside the bookcases; those feature a collection of rigorously edited Asian sculptures, too.
Statement Light Fixtures
EMILY MINTON-REDFIELD
Light fixtures can transform classic living room design, whether they have intricately forged metal elements or a cascade of crystals. Remember the heritage influence in shape and size, and use the colors to tie together other accents in the room, too.
Statement Wallcovering
EMILY J. FOLLOWILL
This classic living room design has so many beautiful details that narrowing down the most outstanding element is difficult. With the wainscoting, the pediments, the curved lines of the ornate wood hutch, and the overstuffed furniture, this room has virtually every aspect of a traditional living room. It also has a statement, swoon-worthy wallpaper—in a nature print that's also very much a signature of traditional decor.
Richly Stained Wood
ERIC ROTH
The deep, dark colors of the wood furniture—chests, side tables, buffets, and more—of traditional living room decor are entirely in step with the overall style of such spaces. Gloss finish may also lend a welcome air of formality, as does restrained hardware.
Patterned Floors
ANN VANDERWIEL WILDE
Much the way that symmetry is essential to classic living room designs, so is geometry, particularly in floors. Here, intersecting squares set at an angle provide a neutral contrast to the warm beige and cocoa hues in the fabrics.
Bold Nature Prints
MICHAEL PARTENIO
Traditional decor often draws much of its imagery from the natural world. Birds, plants, and animal patterns can appear in fabrics, wallpaper, and accents. This room offers an excellent example of boldly embracing a multitude of representations. What ties the space together is the subtle color variations—all green, in varying hues, with just a pop of analogous blue.
Symmetrical Layout
WERNER SEGARRA
Regularity creates order and a visual sense of purpose, which makes it a good tool to utilize in classic living room design. Here, that symmetry comes about through the placement of matching traditional side chests and side chairs, as well as a proportional sofa, for a view that's sumptuous but restrained.
Historic Art
MICHAEL PARTENIO
Art that would have been at home centuries ago still works in traditional living room decorating schemes. The frames are often equally ornate, with rich finishes and carvings to set off portraits, nature scenes, and more.
Floor Coverings
HELEN NORMAN
In many classic living room designs, hardwood floors are an indispensable piece—but so, too, are rugs. They help soften underfoot surfaces, add pattern, and tie together disparate hues. Here, the subdued geometric design reflects the neutral focus of the creams and grays in this bright space.
Architectural Elements
GORDON BEALL
Much of what cements a living room as traditionally styled is its decorative features: molding, trim, and woodwork. Those elements bring solidity and elegance to the room in this space, particularly the coffered ceilings.
Aged Finishes
EMILY FOLLOWILL
No matter whether a structure is centuries, decades, or even months old, a classic living room design is easier to execute if the finishes give the appearance of age and solidity. That may come through a wash—here, the soft gray of the woodwork—or paint that appears just slightly distressed but still finished.
Rich, Bold Wall Colors
BRIE WILLIAMS
Colors in traditional rooms tend to lean toward the basics: blues, reds, greens, and yellows. Even still, they can appear in fearless ways, as in the purple-black hue of this traditional living room. The color here carries through on the built-in bookcases and the wood floor, mostly hidden beneath a room-brightening cream rug.
Sumptuous Window Dressings
TRIA GIOVAN
Multilayered shades and curtains—often with tiebacks, swags, or other extras—add depth and visual texture to classic living room design. They're also a clever way to include an accent-worthy color or pattern: Here, a gray-brown, floral-inspired print ties together cording on the side chairs and the sofa's hue.
Pattern Mix
EMILY FOLLOWILL
Many traditional living rooms, particularly those that draw their influence from more Old World-leaning spaces, feature a cascading collection of patterns loosely united by either a color or similar shape. Here, the dominant color scheme—an orange-leaning red and a light yellow—offers harmony to no less than five patterns.
Classic Materials
TRIA GIOVAN
Wood, brick, glass, stone: You're more likely to find this collection of components in any classic living room design than you are more unusual additions. Here, the pieces are assembled in rigorous patterns and finishes.
Combined Textures
NATHAN SCHRODER PHOTOGRAPHY
With all its consistency, classic living room design still has room for variance in surfaces and finishes. Here, there's a washed, aged finish to the pair of symmetrical hutches and the grain inherent to the coffee table. Fabrics also offer a nubby feel with a pattern grounded in the traditional favorite: a flower/foliage motif.