Interior design has been gaining more and more popularity and recognition. Some of the world’s most famous sites are only popular because of their remarkable interior design. What was once reserved only for museums, government offices, and other important institutions is now a significant part of our everyday life and the homes we reside in.
Just like architecture, interior design too changed its trends and forms throughout history. Over the years, the trends relating to interior design changed as artists gained more knowledge about the effects of space, colors, shapes, and materials. As a result, contemporary trends of the 21st-century interior design can make any home unique, peaceful, and airy.
To find out more about interior design for the 21st century, make sure to check out this guide.
Interior design: science and art combined
When people are asked about interior design, most say it’s simply making a place look more appealing. However, interior design is much more than that.
The essential purpose of interior design is to create interiors that enhance the well-being of people using the space, outsource the functionality of the room, and bring everything together in a fashionable, attractive, and well-designed entity. Therefore, interior design not only looks stunning but improves the overall quality of life for people.
Even though that’s true, how can interior designers come up with simultaneously beautiful and functional designs in real life?
When it comes to science, interior design demands a comprehensive understanding of space, while interior designers need to have insight into the psychology of living in a designated area. On the other hand, art focuses on the creative implementation of colors, shapes, and textures to get a cohesive and visually appealing outcome by following the previously mentioned principles.
Therefore, successful interior design combines the powers of art and science to produce some of the best designs in the 21st century. Interior designers must be creative, pay close attention to detail, and possess advanced organizational and communication skills to present their ideas clearly.
Creating a balance
The 21st-century interior design strongly relies on balance. It’s one of the most superior elements in the contemporary design of indoor spaces to create proportionate and visually symmetrical rooms.
Balance in interior design depends on an equal distribution of the so-called visual weight. Namely, some objects have more visual weight than others, so choosing and placing these objects in a well-coordinated manner is a fundamental step towards creating a balanced appearance.
Visual weight is just what its name suggests. It refers to how heavy or light an object appears to the human eye. For instance, large, colorful, solid, dark, and vibrant objects seem heavier to the human eye than thin, small, light color or open ones. Regardless of the style, a certain level of balance between heavy and light elements needs to be present in all spaces.
To achieve a balanced design, you should divide a room into four equal parts. Each quadrant should contain an approximately equal volume or amount of heavy and light objects and furnishings. Equal distribution is the key, so avoid placing all heavy or light objects in one place.
Variety in interior design
Variety wasn’t always one of the essential steps of creating a pleasant and comfortable living environment. For instance, the biggest trends in the interior design industry of the previous century strongly advocated no variety at all. Wallpapers, curtains, bedsheets, and tapestry all had a matching pattern, which considerably closed up the space and limited its character.
In the 21st century, variety is seen as a key or at least a desirable interior design element. Even the simplest and most basic contemporary designs, such as minimalism and the Scandinavian style, implement variety as their fundamental step in creating attractive and one-of-a-kind living spaces.
You can achieve variety in many ways, but it’s essential to know just the right amount of variety. Depending on functionality, style, and personal preferences, interior designers can develop different designs for their clients.
Adding contrast
Although the interior design industry is filled with varieties regarding styles, colors, shapes, sizes, and textures, none of this would matter without the appropriate amount of contrast within the spaces. Variety and contrast are created to produce a similar effect of well-designed spaces – add personality and diversity, which will draw more attention.
As such, contrast is as important as variety in interior design. Creating contrast isn’t challenging at all since you can achieve it on multiple levels. All interior designers have to do is place objects of striking difference next to one another.
It can mean basing the elements of contrast on color, shape, size, or material to create unique combinations that’ll certainly draw attention to every corner. Choose one or two contrasting elements to avoid ending up with an unsynchronized space that lacks harmony.
Creating harmony within a space
While variety and contrast are essential elements that dictate how interesting and eye-catching a design is, it’s just as important not to go overboard with them. As already mentioned, taking contrast and variety too far can result in a disorganized and poorly managed space.
The creation of unity and harmony is another part of 21st-century interior design since all elements need to unite and blend. Creating a cohesive, well-thought-out, and coordinated design will evoke a sensation of unity and harmony, and a room will only feel like a part of a whole.
Achieve the ultimate unity by ensuring all elements have something in common that binds them together. It’s a good idea to create an overall theme all room objects need to follow. Then, decorating with accessories and items with common colors, shapes, styles, or patterns will make creating a harmonious room much more straightforward.
Use of 3D design software
Something that certainly marked the 21st century is the overall advancement and the sudden increase in the use of technology. Each year, better, faster, more sophisticated, and more accurate devices, tools, and software programs are hitting the markets. As a result, the strong effects of advanced technology started changing how other industries function.
Interior design wasn’t an exception, and technology plays a very significant role in this industry today. The use of 3D design software completely transformed the interior design we knew of before technology took effect.
What people once did with the help of rough sketches, inaccurate drawings, and material samples can now be done much more precisely. 3D design software allows interior designers to visually represent their ideas down to the smallest detail. With these tools, interior designers can implement colors, sizes, shapes, patterns, textures, and even lighting in their sketches.
Not only does the use of cutting-edge technology ease the communication between the interior designer and their clients, but it also helps the professionals come up with impeccable designs by equipping them with an accurate representation of a future project.
Lighting within the interior
Lighting is often briefly mentioned in interior design, although all professional interior designers understand its importance, especially in the 21st century. Modern interior design simply wouldn’t be the same without its focus on lighting, and that’s a fact.
Natural and artificial light sources can greatly influence the mood and atmosphere of a room, which is why interior designers learn how to manipulate different light sources to achieve specific effects.
In short, lighting is used to highlight specific parts of the room or items. Contemporary Scandinavian style is just one of many interior design varieties that strongly rely on natural light sources to achieve bright, pleasant, open, and inviting spaces.
Artificial light sources are here to provide similar effects, but that’s not their only purpose. Many lighting elements are artistic statements by themselves, used to draw attention to specific objects around the room. Some light fixtures are accessories on their own, with various shapes and materials used for their designs.
Different interior design styles
The world is full of all kinds of colors, textures, and materials, so it’s not surprising interior design contains various styles people can choose from.
Although some individuals believe the 21st-century interior design is starting to lack variety and that all designs look alike, that’s not true. Some trends and preferences exist, but they’re only a tiny part of everything contemporary interior design can offer to clients.
Individuals can choose from many designs to follow or simply use as inspiration for the creation of their unique living spaces, but here are some of the most famous varieties that marked the interior design of the 21st century:
Minimalism
The core of minimalism is to provide a clear lifestyle for the homeowners by implementing only the pieces with a necessary and distinct function. Based on simplicity, minimalist style supports the less is more philosophy and looks at the ways to logically connect the purpose of existing pieces.
Maximalism
Contrary to minimalism, maximalism looks at different ways of implementing various objects and involving them all as a part of the space in question. The curation of layers and adding up on the existing foundation is the key role of maximalism, while organization, attention to detail, and clear thought are crucial for producing a colorful and curious result.
Industrial
Industrial style takes its inspiration and basic concept from factories, warehouses, and manufacturing buildings of the 20th century. Industrial style is established on building around the existing architectural structure and not changing its core details. That includes plain brick walls, concrete flooring, exposed pipes, and steel windows and doors.
Scandinavian
Closely connected to minimalism, Scandinavian style is another variant to design a simple, functional, and clutter-free space. The Scandinavian style focuses on bringing as much light as possible into the rooms by using light, neutral, and airy color palettes that complement and invite more light into the space. Warmth is brought in by using natural materials such as wood, wool, and linen.
Modern rustic
A perfect example of creating harmony and contrast within space is by following the key principles of the modern rustic style. It involves clean and functional living with the addition of antique details. Mixing the modern and the vintage can work beautifully and often ends up in a functional yet appealing design.
Modern glamour
As another highly influential style variety in the 21st century, modern glamour takes its key elements from the 20s and 30s Art Deco in addition to the old glamorous Hollywood. Rich colors combined with soft fabrics and fluid lines are what made modern glamour popular even today.
Accessorization
You can use some key items and objects to fit in just about any interior design style or variety. What’s more, you can also switch styles without purchasing a bunch of new furniture pieces. The key to every style in the 21st century lies in the details and their accessorization.
Namely, harmony, unity, contrast, variety, and lighting create a balanced space with a good flow and pleasant atmosphere. However, details are what make a room stand out from the pool of similar designs. Although a lot of people understimate the power of details and accessories, they can have a big impact on the overall picture of a room.
Decorative items and objects such as paintings, sculptures, figurines, clocks, architectural accents, and various other accessories can add more character to the space. Furthermore, decorative details, including textile embellishments and trims, flourishes, hardware, and handle accent touches, are often overlooked even though their power to transform the place is incomparable.
Some other details that can ruin the aesthetics are visible wires from electronic devices or lamps, mismatched outlet faceplates, and the general quality of workmanship.
Conclusion
The interior design of the 21st century closely focuses on all aspects interior design covers and even more than that. It’s important to remember even the smallest details can have a powerful effect, so each step needs to be well-calculated. You need to choose every item carefully when trying to achieve a certain effect.
With these key elements of 21st-century interior design, now you can come up with some of the most breathtaking and impressive creations.