Eclectic Country House - A Mix of Styles and Ages
What to do to a person who likes simplicity of country style at the same time, grace and luxury of baroque and renaissance, functionality of minimalism and art deco, how to combine all these qualities into a harmonious whole and is it possible?
Yes. And this became possible in the 90s of the XIX century after leading designers of Europe asked a similar question. Their idea was precisely to try to mix elements of already existing classical styles, making something new in the world of design from this mix. As a result of these searches, a new style appeared - eclecticism, which is translated from Greek as "I choose, I choose."
In the early twentieth century, he was seriously replaced by such styles as Art Nouveau, Art Deco, eclipsing it with its novelty and extravagance. But real art cannot be overshadowed by anything. A similar thing happened with the eclectic style. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, retaining its fundamental concept (to incorporate all the best from other, already modern styles), eclecticism again broke out into a group of leaders. Experts explain this fact by the fact that among people there are very few adherents of any particular style.
To understand this phenomenon, we will get acquainted with the main stages of design and features characteristic of the eclectic style.
Choose a basic style - a string for eclectic "beads"
For the harmonious construction of the interior in the eclectic style, a certain style is chosen that will be the basis of everything that happens in the room. The main is the color of the underlying style. It is desirable that it be white, beige or gray.
Best for this role are minimalist styles, Scandinavian or modern classic.
Necessarily present other colors in the form of bright accents. It can be furniture, textiles, decor elements. At the same time, one should not adhere to any rules, with the exception of one thing - eclecticism does not imply excessive variegation of colors. Experts recommend using no more than three colors.
Correctly string "beads"
Now you have to choose the styles whose elements you would like to see in the interior of the room to be designed. At the same time, do not combine more than three styles so that your room does not look like an ordinary storage warehouse.
An interesting feature of the style is the presence in the interior of elements that will undoubtedly attract, with which, constantly, the attention of your guests. It can be anything: a scarecrow or an animal’s head, a mirror in an unexpected but nevertheless successful place, life-size bas-reliefs of famous people, a panel on a theme that would seem to be inconsistent with the status of the room, etc. In short, anything that might surprise you should find a place in your room.
Furniture relative to the door should be placed taking into account its size: massive furniture is in the background, smaller furniture is in the foreground. This arrangement gives a certain depth of room space.
The styles chosen for eclecticism should be interconnected. This connection can be color, shape, accessories. It is important that in one style there is an element of another style.
These can be chairs of different styles installed around the table, sofa cushions or bunks.
You can decorate a monochrome wall with paintings with a landscape, black-and-white photographs, or something from contemporary fine art. But for harmony, there should be enough of them on the wall to cover most of the wall.
The wall with art painting will look great. This is a very winning option for wall decoration, harmoniously written out in the interior in the style of eclecticism.
The use of rarity in the interior of the eclectic style for some will be a godsend. Not every person, without regret, parted with objects of an earlier period of his life, of him, or of those close to him. An eclectic style will help you keep them.
Finally
Eclectic is a complex style, with all its apparent simplicity. The main thing that you should not forget about when designing an eclectic-style room is that all interior elements should be in harmony with each other. The use of elements of several styles does not mean thoughtlessly mixing them, because the idea of the style itself - mixing, we combine.