Category: Western Design

Southwestern Rugs – Decorating Our Main Room

Posted on by toby

southwest rugSouthwestern Rug Style

Southwestern home decor matters to me because it’s what truly makes your living space a home. Blank walls, bare floors, and empty shelves are neither inviting nor comforting. Artwork from friends and photos from adventures hanging above a vintage leather sofa; a high-pile area rug perfect for sinking your toes into; shelves full of your favorite books and interesting curios that catch the light: That’s what home is.

I understand where minimalists are coming from. Having too many things, too much clutter, can lead to chaos. However, I can’t imagine not having the beautiful drawing that my girlfriend made me hanging in my bedroom. I can’t imagine not having an area rug in my living room to accent the carpet and the sofa, or the tapestry hanging in my hallway to break up the white wall space.

Our favorite part of decorating with Southwestern rugs was being able to choose between all of the different types. This is currently our favorite area rug shop for southwestern rugs.

My home is lived in. It’s not always clean and tidy like in an issue of Better Homes & Gardens. I have a cat who sheds, climbs, and scratches, and I work full-time. My vacuum cleaner is from the eighties at least, and it seems as though when I clean up one mess, another one appears two feet away. Sure, maybe it would be easier to deal with the abundance of cat hair if I didn’t have rugs covering nearly every inch of my floor. Maybe it would be easier to dust without so many knickknacks clogging up my tables, counters, and shelves. I recently realized that, of all the books that I own, I haven’t opened a single one in the last year.

Southwest Interior Design

So why do I keep this stuff around? The answer is simple: Every piece that I own serves a purpose, and that purpose is to bring me joy. I’m a big fan of the KonMari method of organizing and decluttering your home. While I’m no master at it, the idea that you must defend keeping each item that you own by whether or not it sparks joy for you is a brilliant way to make sure that your home is a place that doesn’t over- (or under-) whelm you. It can be a huge task, but it’s worth it to have a living space that is welcoming and warm and doesn’t make you want to tear your hair out.

Home decor is a way to personalize your space and make it yours. Especially if you rent, like I do, it can be difficult to make it feel like it’s yours. Further, the fact that you might only be in the space for a short time can make it easy to justify not decorating it to your tastes — why go to all the hard work when you’ll just have to move it all out and readjust for the next place? The typical lease term is a year. Imagine coming home to the same plain, uninspiring space every day, for 365 days. Pretty dismal, right? My last apartment was a twenty-by-fifteen-foot studio that came with a couch and a dresser. I had no space to decorate and my lease prohibited hanging anything on the walls. I was only there for a year, but I was miserable. I felt like I was living in someone else’s home; it certainly didn’t belong to me.

Now I have a two-bedroom apartment in a school building constructed in 1917. The windows are enormous, the living room is spacious, and I have a walk-in closet. I love it here, and it’s reflected in the space. I have art on every wall and rugs all over the floor, and trinkets placed on any flat surface available. My plants have light, and my cat has space to zoom around after he’s had his dinner. Most importantly, though, it feels like home, all because I’ve been able to make it mine.

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Incorporating Southwestern Design into Your Home

Posted on by Showdown

Modern Southwestern design is a blend of Spanish and Native American styles that draws inspiration from the local environment.  The styles fuses the colors of the southwest and natural textures to create a space that is warm and unique.  Southwestern style uses open floor plans, exposed wood and bright oranges, reds and yellows.  Let’s have a look at how you can bring this style into your own interior design at home.

The Colors

The colors used in southwestern design take their inspiration from the natural world around them and the deserts of the area.  You can use azure blues from the sky, reds and oranges from the local flora and the warm earth tones from the desert sand.  There is a lot of color in southwestern design, you can use natural colors on the wall and splashes of color are added with area rugs, and throw pillows.

The Furniture

One of the great things about southwestern design is how incorporates different textures, making your room feel warm and lived in.  You can use big oversized leather furniture next to a simple wooden rocking chair and it works beautifully.  Wood will be the predominant material for coffee tables or end tables but they can have decorative tile or ornate metal fixtures to make them stand out.  Here are some more design styles you can incorporate into your home.

Accents

The art work and accent pieces are where you can really make a statement and showcase that unique southwestern style.  You have so many options to choose from but traditional accent pieces will combine different colors and textures.  Wrought iron and metal feature heavily in this style, if you have high ceilings you can include a large wrought iron chandelier.  Flooring is usually stone tile or a rich hardwood but you can soften that up with thick fleece area rugs.  Leather furniture is fairly common and you can accent it with colorful pillows and a Navajo blanket.  Candles and Native American pottery work well and if you want to put some art pieces on the walls then landscape portraits or deer heads add to the overall design scheme.

Southwestern design can tread a very fine line between beautiful and kitschy, so don’t go over the top.  Add pieces slowly until you have the look you are trying to achieve.  Southwestern design is a fun style that is meant to be lived in and it can be great fun scouring antique shops and thrift stores and finding that perfect piece.

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Build Your Own Western Saloon Right at Home

Build Your Own Western Saloon Right at Home

Posted on by Showdown

When you think of the Old West you can’t help but conjure images of the saloon.  You can picture Wild Bill Hickok playing a game of poker at a beaten up wood table, or cowboys popping in for a shot of whiskey at the bar.  Every western you have ever watched has the saloon featuring prominently as the good guys and bad guys face off.  If you have always been a bit enamored with the old west and would like to incorporate that style into your own home, then let’s show you how you can build your own western saloon right at home.

Getting Started

There are two things that are an absolute must in your saloon the first will be the swinging doors that are an iconic part of the saloon.  The second part is a beaten up old wooden floor that looks it has been scuffed up by many pairs of spurs.  How you proceed with the rest of the décor will depend on your budget and how much space you have to work with.  One thing is for certain you can have a grand adventure hunting down the décor to create your saloon.

Décor

Aside from putting in the bar itself the rest of the décor can vary dramatically, some saloons were pretty modest with just a couple of wooden table.  The more elaborate saloons had everything from floral wallpaper, chandeliers and brass spittoons.  As for finding the right furniture or decorative items you can scan your local thrift stores and antique shops for vintage chandeliers, some antique glass bottles to go behind your bar.  Keep an eye out for old tables and mismatched wooden chairs.  The more distressed looking the chairs are the better.  Some of the more affluent saloons may have had an old piano for nightly entertainment.  Almost any piece of décor from the period can work.

Wall Art

Back then the walls of a saloon had the quintessential deer heads or the bleached skull from cattle.  The photos on the walls would have been black and white in wooden or silver frames, bear in mind that no one smiled in pictures much back then.  There may have been the occasional wanted poster, you can make those types of prints yourself using family members and an app.  To hang behind the bar you should get yourself a saloon sign, on wood with an old font, it will be the best piece of art on your walls.

The old west is such an iconic part of American history that we’re still obsessed with that era more than 150 years later.  You can create a piece of history right in your own home with an old west style saloon.

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