Table Of Content

Not only is this a great trick to make a small living room look bigger, but it is also a key tenant of the modern living room. Unless you want to splurge on an expensive vintage ethnic-inspired rug design. Pour your heart into your modern lounge, and learn how to decorate with blush pink to make your modern scheme blink with rose-tinted allure and calm. If you're feeling crafty, these DIY fireplace ideas will transform your fireplace into a fun and stylish centerpiece at very little cost. Think about how different fireplace ideas could resurrect a tired space – whether the fire is functional or not. The most stylish mirror ideas will enhance the size, brightness, and look in modern small living rooms.
Raised Furniture
Kitchens that are decorated in on trend styles such as modern farmhouse feel modern until they don’t. An all-white, minimalist, or black-and-white kitchen tends to look more modern than one that is decorated in the latest color of the year or outfitted with more traditional fixtures. Modern style is about more than just neutral color palettes and minimalist decor. Today's contemporary decor seeks a balance between clean lines and cozy accents.
Go for an all white living room color scheme
Contemporary art, like the eyeball-shaped sculpture by Olivia Erlanger, hanging across from the fireplace, does its part to keep things fresh too. In this environment, choice antiques can make sense as well, when balanced by contemporary elements. The sleek lines and no thrills approach of this living room are definitely channeling some minimalist vibes, but the pale wooden coffee table and the cozy soft furnishings prevent the room from being cold and impersonal. Layering up textures and adding accents of wood creates warmth in a sparse, modern living room.
The Interior Design Trends We're Watching for 2024—and Beyond - ELLE Decor
The Interior Design Trends We're Watching for 2024—and Beyond.
Posted: Fri, 19 Apr 2024 07:00:00 GMT [source]
Transform your living room into a multifunctional hub
From Mies van der Rohe’s Barcelona chairs to Charles and Ray Eames’s designs for Herman Miller, countless modernist furnishings have cropped up in the pages of AD through the years. Here, we take you inside a Beverly Hills mansion, a New York City duplex, a Paris apartment, and other homes that display the height of modernist design. And the penchant for color is visible in coating cabinets in bold, unexpected hues.

Clean, white walls and a selection of modernist white lamps, as well as glass sofa table, create a restful atmosphere. A contemporary living room designed by Brad Ramsey has a modern shell but brings in plenty of organic and vintage accents. Oversized trim on the floor-to-ceiling window creates a modern grid pattern that mirrors the artwork, dramatic marble fireplace surround, and built-in shelves.
Embrace natural wood
Anyone can make a sleek living room appear warm and welcoming—all it takes are some thoughtful accessories. In this Brooklyn townhouse, Ishka Designs packed on the charm with intriguing ceramics and eye-catching artwork. Sometimes one must choose between a dining area over a living room—or vice versa. When space is limited, make miniature modern living rooms out of unused corners, like Augusta Hoffman did here in her elegant New York City apartment. The term modern can mean so many things, and if you think about it, so can a living room.
Sculptural Ceiling

To stick with the white color palette, designer Christina Kim brings in a large, white sectional sofa. Ashley Montgomery enhanced this cozy yet modern, farmhouse living room with light-colored wood throughout. From the side table to the coffee table to the floors, the wood choices make the space look more open and brighter. Put your green thumb to work and bring fresh plants into your living room, displaying them in ways you may not normally do. In this breezy communal area of Ashley Gilbreath's beach house, a medium-sized palm plant on the coffee table continues the paint color of the walls into the seating area.
Create clean lines
Defined by clean lines, natural materials and minimalist decor, modern home design is one of the most well-known interior design styles. In the living room, the aesthetic translates to a space that feels airy and uncluttered, yet cozy and welcoming. Here, we've rounded up dreamy modern living room ideas that showcase steal-worthy design trends and functional layouts for casual family time.
Modern living rooms are comfortable and inviting spaces built for relaxed family time and casual entertaining. Today's living rooms include elements like ultra-comfortable seating, built-in TV walls, and a focus on natural light. It includes comfortable furnishings, simple wall decor, and modern lighting that ranges from updates of classic forms to innovative shapes made possible by LED technology. Although they are often (mistakenly) used interchangeably, there is a distinct difference between modern style and contemporary style.
Mirror, mirror on the wall, you make interiors shine, like in this Urbanology Designs space. Think creatively about how to maximize your home’s storage capabilities, even if that means making use of the area under your bed—a designer-approved hack! Miami-based designer Tatiana Seikaly of Studio Seikaly, for instance, elevated a bed in a child’s bedroom to create a closet underneath. “The stairs leading up to the bed doubled as drawers for additional storage,” she says of the one-of-a-kind setup.
When it comes to interior design styles, contemporary interior design may be the most future-thinking. Defined by clean lines, decorated minimalism, and current trends, contemporary interiors are distinctly of-the-moment—even when the moment changes. Found throughout homes, offices, and retail settings, below AD dives into just what makes this versatile style and how you can bring it into your space. This modern, open-plan living area incorporates a neutral sofa, loveseat, and rug alongside organically shaped coffee tables, contrasting black accents, and natural wood elements in the adjoining kitchen. In the 1940s and ’50s, midcentury-modern design, with its clean lines, warm woods, and bold upholstery hues (often in woolly, menswear-inspired textures), changed the way homes looked. Suddenly, less was more, and decorating a home was about finding a design where form served function—a philosophy that continues to inspire designers to this day.
If you're still stuck on how to choose living room furniture, we've got a pretty clear guide that puts things in perspective. If you double-up your lounge as a guest room for overnight visitors, consider investing in a space-saving, game-changer best sleeper sofa also. While “modern” and “contemporary” are often treated as synonyms and used interchangeably, there is a technical difference between the terms.
Opt for a spacious sectional topped with throw pillows, a large coffee table and simple, framed artwork on a crisp, white wall. Modern living rooms draw from past design styles and aesthetics, reinventing traditions to create spaces that are less of a particular style than a sensibility. Yes, you can enjoy a mix of both paint and wallpaper in a given space without having to default to an accent wall. “Try layering a printed wallpaper border atop a plain painted wall; a clever way to add character to an otherwise monotonous space,” says designer Angela Harris of Denver-based TRIO. Unlike the cheesy and too-country patterns of yesteryear, companies are releasing contemporary motifs, like the newly launched Lick X Kelly Hoppen CBE wallpaper borders that make minimalism timeless. “There is a return to warmer tones in design with a desire for more of a lived-in, comfortable feel,” Galloway says.
We love how this grey living room idea uses so many different shades of grey to create a layered effect. And if you really can’t let go of color, try adding a few splashes of contrasting shades in orange and yellow accessories to break it up. These cooler hues just speak to the modern living room design aesthetic and are so easy to live with and update. This exercise of mixing rustic with contemporary has long been 'in' for interior designers. This Cordelia 3 Seater in Texas Tan by Sofology gives us chic cowgirl vibes, and if you're feeling really out-there, we'd swap the rug for a cow print motif or faux hide. The benefits of houseplants can't go unmissed, freshening up the brown decor.