Interior Design Trends to Avoid
Interior designers warn against eleven home trends that are likely to age poorly, including barn doors, shiplap, and all-gray color schemes. The message from professionals is to invest in timeless quality and avoid fads that may lead to regret. Meanwhile, designers are embracing bold personal choices in 2026, with advice to "ignore the trend forecasts" and fill your home with items you truly love.
- The sliding barn doors that became a staple of the modern farmhouse style were originally designed for pure utility on farms, where their space-saving mechanism was crucial for moving livestock and equipment. - Shiplap's history dates back to Viking shipbuilding, where overlapping wooden planks were used to create a watertight hull. In older homes, it was used as a structural backing for wallpaper and was never intended to be an exposed design feature until it was popularized by Joanna Gaines on the show "Fixer Upper" in 2013. - The dominance of all-gray interiors over the past decade was tied to a rise in minimalist and Scandinavian design, with the color's neutrality seen as a sophisticated and calming backdrop. Its popularity was significantly amplified by visual-heavy social media platforms like Pinterest and Instagram. - As a counterpoint to fleeting trends, designers often recommend focusing on timeless elements like neutral color palettes, natural materials such as wood and stone, and classic furniture silhouettes like a Chesterfield sofa. - The shift away from gray is leading toward warmer, saturated, and moodier color palettes, with designers in 2025 and 2026 embracing deep greens, chocolate browns, terracotta, and rich reds like oxblood. - An emerging trend for 2026 is "Grandma Chic," which reacts to years of minimalism by embracing feminine and nostalgic elements like floral patterns, skirted upholstery, and tasseled details. - The move toward personalization is also seeing a rise in "pattern drenching," where a single motif is used immersively across a room's architecture, and the use of rich, traditional weaves like damasks and jacquards in a modern way.
