9 Design Trends We’re Loving From the 2023 Real Simple Home

Which ones will you bring into your home?

What happens when you ask a bunch of prestigious designers to decorate a house from top to bottom? You get a home packed with the latest and greatest design trends, of course! We worked with six top-notch tastemakers for this year’s Real Simple Home and they truly delivered their best work—each room is teeming with clever decorating tips and trends galore. We pulled together recurring themes we noticed within the spaces, but also one-off examples that confirm what we’ve been seeing out in the design world. Thankfully, so many of these trends are incredibly easy to work into a space. And because they’re so livable, they have longevity behind them, and you won't have to swap anything out in three months. Read on to find out what’s hot and happening in design.

Related: Take a 360 Virtual Tour of the 2023 Real Simple Home

Wicker and Caning

Natural materials like wicker and caning have been trending upward for the past year or two, but now we’re really seeing this decor trend in full-force. There were at least five examples we counted throughout the home, from the chairs in the dining area and kitchen to cabinets in the living room and study. Perhaps the biggest use of this we’re seeing across the board is wicker lighting, as evidenced in the study and guest room. It’s a great way to introduce some warmth and texture, according to many of our designers from the home.

When asked why Kim and Scott Vargo of Yellow Brick Home added cane chairs to their dining space, they explained, “Our entire goal was to bring the outdoors in! Brooklyn is obviously a very urban environment, but the height of the building allows for a unique view down onto the treetops. We chose the cane backed chairs to bring in another natural element and to play nicely with the earthy green and rust tones in the space.” And Michelle Gage, who designed the study, says, “Rattan adds a lightness to the room and we always want our spaces to feel youthful.” Guest room designer Megan Hopp has an affinity for thrifted wicker—so if you’re on a budget, you’re in luck, because garage sales are usually full of the stuff.

Monochromatic Lamps

Lamps drenched in a single, solid color are cropping up—in fact, there were two in the Real Simple Home! One monochromatic lamp appears in the guest room designed by Megan Hopp, shown above, and another is in the living room, shown a little further down. Megan’s use of the cobalt blue against the patterned wallpaper works and doesn’t look busy because it’s one solid color. It’s a clever strategy if you want to make a bold statement without going overboard (perfect for any risk-averse home designers out there).

'70s Style

Elements of the 1970s are scattered throughout the house, but where the decade really shines is in the primary bedroom David Quarles IV designed. Perhaps the most obvious homage to the decade is the disco ball, which is also one of his design signatures. He says, “I think every room deserves a disco ball! Disco balls are synonymous with dancing, good times, and endless laughter. My goal is to spread a sense of happiness in the spaces I create.” The colors (greens, orange-reds, browns, blues) are also a nod to the decade, and according to David, they enhance the warmth he wants the room to convey.

Another groovy accent? The part-shag rug—the patches of shag are incredibly clever. Instead of a full shag rug, which might feel a little extra, having the fibers distributed this way is a subtle-but-interesting twist. “In a space that is so full of color, pattern, texture, and feeling, I like to give visual ‘breaks' so one can fully appreciate the space in all of its opulence without being overwhelmed. So finding this rug at Dyphor was perfect, since it provides just the right amount of visual and tactile texture without overcrowding the rest of the room that is so full of detail.”

"I think every room deserves a disco ball! Disco balls are synonymous with dancing, good times, and endless laughter."

David Quarles IV

Canopy Beds

This '90s trend, which may have been part of your childhood bedroom, is creeping back into the mainstream. It’s something we started tracking on social media, but when Megan Hopp worked one into her guest room, it confirmed for us that canopy beds are absolutely having a comeback. Her reason for including one in the design plan is so smart and part of her “fewer bigger things” philosophy. She says, “I wanted to build the design around a larger scale bed as its focal point. A canopy structure bed does so much to add height, dimension, and even architecture to a space—all through a simple shop and set up process. I love this modern Room & Board bed because of its easy customizable nature, and bold color selections available.”

She added pretty custom drapery from Pepper Home, which adds a layer of serenity and calmness to the space. (It really helps the bed feel more cocoon-like!) About her curtain choice, she says, “I wanted to use a really whimsical, fun pattern with a more neutral base color to juxtapose all the surrounding color. I adore a classic block print, and thought the Penelope curtain was the perfect modern twist to suit the space and design.”

Related: How to Make Bold Paint Colors Work in Your Home

Painted Trim, Doors, and Ceilings in Bold Colors

Paint the entire town…a color, any color. Paint (colorful paint that is) is now not just for the walls, but also for the trim, doors, ceiling, and more. More and more we’re seeing anything but white on these details and we’re here for it. Four designers in the Real Simple Home coated their spaces in all the bold paint. Michelle Gage, who designed the office, chose to cover up the trim and doors in a deep eggplant color, Plummy Rouge by Valspar, to complement the floral wallpaper. “We are loving this rich purple tone lately. In the past, our inclination might have been to contrast the trim with the blue or pink from the flowers, but we wanted to do something a little less expected, so we pulled out the purple. This allowed us to bring pinks and blues into the room in other ways, like in the rug or accent chair.”

Megan Hopp, who also executed this technique in the guest room, went with a satin paint. “It’s my go-to selection for most projects in terms of durability and a chic finish.”

Rusty Colors

Quite a few rooms in the Real Simple Home have rust-colored touches—the dining room, living room, and bedroom—so it’s fair to say the reddish hue is growing in popularity! Bobby Berk worked it into the living room he designed saying, “I love that earthy rust color! It's such a rich tone and has so much depth. It was really the perfect shade to pair against the deep indigo rug, and balanced out the other warm tones in the sling chairs and the yellow screen.”

Related: How to Decorate With Large Indoor Plants

Natural Stone

Marble, soapstone, and even the once-ridiculed travertine are enjoying their time in the limelight outside of the kitchen and bathroom right now. They look beautiful in those spaces, but when they’re sprinkled throughout the home in the form of smaller pieces of furniture and decorative accents, they add a layer of luxury (and it’s a fraction of the price of a waterfall countertop, for example). Marbles and other stone materials impart a simple, clean sophistication, and they balance out rooms with plenty of soft surfaces and rich patterns.

Fluted Furniture

Another easy way to fold in more texture is with fluted furniture. Ridged pieces are becoming extremely popular for this reason, and three rooms in the Real Simple Home had variations of this trend, showcased in desks, nightstands, and a console. The ridges in these pieces can collect dust quickly, though, so regularly pass a duster over them to keep them looking pristine.

Gallery Walls With Large-Scale Art

Gallery walls are not new, but what we have been seeing more of is large sections of wall taken over by just a few oversized pieces of art, instead of a smattering of tiny pieces. We love how Bobby Berk executed this in the living room he designed. It’s so much easier to curate and hang—just a few pieces! Here, he opted for differing sizes, but another technique we’ve seen is filling up an entire wall with four or six equally-sized frames for extra impact. 

Related: Meet the Designers of the 2023 REAL SIMPLE Home

For more Real Simple news, make sure to sign up for our newsletter!

Read the original article on Real Simple.