That’s a thing, right?
In trying to find the “style” of our home, I took a look around our neighborhood. It’s a pretty established neighborhood with hills, large(ish) lots, big trees, and a park. It fit all of our check boxes (with the exception of the one big grocery store in town that I hate) and it’s close to work, schools, and restaurants. The homes in our neighborhood were built between the 1960’s to the 1990’s, depending on the location. Ours is in the newer section and was built in 1993, and is considered a “large, expanded colonial.”
I thought maybe if I researched colonial homes, it may give me a bit more inspiration of what our style for this house was going to be. It doesn’t really make sense to have a house on the beach that’s decorated in mid-century modern style, or a cabin in the mountains that’s decorated with coastal decor, right?
So here is the image that comes to my mind when I think of a “colonial” home:
Source: North Burns Park
Not quite the same, but similar. The noticeable details are the 5 windows along the second floor and the front door being in the center, creating somewhat of a symmetric look. Also, a colonial style house will have the kitchen and living rooms on the first floor and bedrooms on the second floor. Check.
Obviously our exterior needs a lot of work: landscaping, front door work, new shutters?, and a new roof. I’m not really looking forward to having to replace our roof at some point soon, as it’s about 25 years old and reaching it’s life span. However, I am looking forward to replacing it with a dark grey color shingle. We’re going to take these projects as they come.
But when I picture an old colonial house, this is the interior that I imagine:
Source: Best Kitchen Design
Noooo thank you. That chandelier. The wallpaper. The Furniture. All not my taste. However, if you look a little closer, the things that really stand out to me are the bones of the house: the molding and floors. If you can get the the bones of the house right, I feel like the rest will just flow nicely. You can change out a couch or art, but changing the bones is so much more effort, work, and money, that you want to make sure you’ve got it right from the start.
I talked about how the molding in this house was going to be really important to us going forward in our posts about Connor’s nursery (here and here). I love the classic and simple crown and baseboard molding, but wanted to go chunkier. We also wanted to add some detail to the tops of the doorways and windows, while also updating the doors. I’ve been in love with these paneled doors for years, so I’m excited that we’re finally in a house to be able to use them and enjoy them for years to come.
I think wall treatments, as in molding/shiplap/board & batten, are beautiful and I plan to incorporate them into other areas of the house. However, I want to make sure we get it right. Shiplap is a big trend right now, so I worry about overdoing it and it looking dated in 10 years, but there are so many other types of wood features on walls that have been pretty timeless and I’m excited to incorporate them into our home. I think it’ll give it that lasting character that this 1990’s builder grade colonial house could use.
Source: Young House Love
And of course, we are obsessed with our new wood flooring. I’ll plan to do a whole post about it soon, but it was a big and costly decision process that I have zero regrets about. It’s really going to give our house a unique, but classic look that will survive years of wear and tear from kids and dogs.
I guess what I’m really trying to get at is the fact that I think we’re on point with the bones of our home. We’ve got the flooring, we’ve got a plan for molding, and after some tweaking of the floor plan, I think we’ve got a good foundation to the decor of our home prepared.
From here, its all easy to change out, buy, sell, and replace. I think the key is to try and not get attached to things like couches and dressers because they can always be replaced. No matter what style your home is, or what year it was built, there are so many things you can do to make it yours. Just try and make sure that you have a good foundation that you’ll be happy with for a long time, and that it doesn’t feel too out of place from the type of home you live in.
And because I really can’t stop staring at this picture… I’ll leave it here again 🙂 Man, we really need to tear this wall down.
Source: Studio McGee
What style home do you live in? Do you think that your decor style is compatible with it?