3 Ways To Elevate Your Home Decor Through Minimalism

The latest trends in home decor reveal a desire for a feeling of tranquility and calmness, perhaps as a response to today’s overly busy and distracted lifestyles. From Marie Kondo’s decluttering craze to a return to natural materials in home design, everyone is looking for a way to create a peaceful, less hectic inner space. When it comes to home decor, less is definitely more.

How can you tap into this yen for a little more Zen?

Simplify your design strategy

When revamping your room to create a more minimalist effect, choose a limited color palette, meaning one to three colors at most. Select mostly more muted or neutral colors, though you can use one vivid color in a piece of furniture or art to grab the spotlight.

Let the textures of the materials that you use for the floors, walls, ceilings and furnishings — whether they are natural wood, stone, ceramics, glass, tile, fabrics or canvas — create the room's visual interest instead of yesterday’s too-busy colors and patterns. Choose a couple of contrasting textures, like glass and reclaimed lumber, or woven fabric and stone, to highlight in the room for the best effect.

Choose furnishings with clean lines

When you're selecting new furniture for your minimalist rooms, look for high-quality, standout pieces designed with clean lines, with no fussy design details or busy patterns. Don't acquire more furniture than the room really needs. Chances are you can do without all those end tables and extra chairs.

Make one exceptional, stylish piece of furniture be the focal point for each room, and don’t over-furnish or over-decorate the space around it. Then avoid the urge to smother the couch or sectional with tons of blankets and throw pillows. Let the furniture speak for itself.

Leave plenty of open space.

Resist the urge to fill every corner and surface of the room with ornaments and knickknacks. It's the open space, unencumbered by any visual clutter, that creates the feeling of calm and tranquility you're craving.

And if you're lucky enough to have a great view out the window, install only simple, streamlined window treatments — or no window treatments at all — to highlight that view.

Minimalist decor is all about making careful choices and choosing the best quality furnishings and decor over quantity of items. You can turn any room into a beautiful showcase that you'd be happy to entertain and live in, with some thoughtful decision-making.