The first room that you see when you enter my house has the most comfortable Lee Industries sofa. The upside is that it has held up beautifully to little boys using it as a trampoline and turning it into forts over the years.
The downside is…well…let's just say that I was fully committed to the Shabby Chic trend when we bought it. Covered in about 3 different fabrics with a busy floral dominating the majority of it, this ode to Rachel Ashwell needs to go but it hasn't been in the budget yet so I can live with it.
The problem with having furniture like this comes in when you want to sell your house. Today's buyers are looking for a fresh, modern aesthetic but most people don't have the money to go out and buy all new furniture to update their houses. That's not practical or realistic so we have to work a little smoke and mirrors magic.
Tips to update dated furniture
A Little Brain Science
Leaning into brain science is the one of the coolest smoke and mirrors hacks for anyone staging a house so let me explain exactly what I mean. We are genetically wired through something called cognitive imprinting to feel most comfortable with things, people, places that feel familiar. Excellent. So how does that apply to updating well loved furniture of the past?
Simple. By introducing elements that feel fresh and new around said furniture, sellers have trends from today–that they are seeing at Target, HomeGoods, and online–that they can connect with in a space.
And let's take that a step further…
If we can bring things in at eye level, we've created an even bigger win because those are the items people will see first. So let's dive into the actual styling strategies you can use to freshen up furniture of any vintage!
Throw Pillows
I've talked a lot about the power of a good pillow and here's the exact scenario where a throw pillow can do its highest and best work in the world!
Now by throw pillows, I don't mean to hide the sofa with pillows. Haha! We can be a bit more sophisticated than that! But seriously, I am always amazed by the magic of throw pillows when we need to make furniture feel fresh and new again. It's kind of how I feel about my mascara but that's for another post.
As an aside, I really dislike the whole slipcover approach because they usually never fit right and the kind that you can get quickly typically look cheap in person.
Rugs and new window treatments are also a great solution, but if you want to have the biggest impact for the least amount of money, I will always steer you to throw pillows first. And the best place to start with pillows is to start by tossing out the matching pillows!
Source: Pinterest
I love flowers, but this sofa could look so much better if we changed those pillows out for a more modern options. Solid pillows are a great choice to break up all of those flowers. I love what they did in this room with the solid pillows.
This is a beautiful image too where they used solid pillows on the sofa, but I also love how the large scale stripe in the drapes draws you attention and also modernizes feel of the sofa.
And that's actually our next hack. We can really update dated furniture when modernizing what's at eye level.
Window Treatments
And that lovely image above brings me to window treatments aka curtains. This is a really simple and quick fix that has huge impact on a space. I've done a deeper dive on window treatments here and here. In this image below, we were actually trying to update the feel of vintage wallpaper so not only did we add fresh new curtains, but we also updated the bedding with modern textures that just makes the dated wall-to-wall carpet and wallpaper become a somewhat charming counterpoint.
Art
Here's another example of adding throw pillows and window treatments to draw the eye away from the furniture. And, we leaned in even further to the whole concept of bringing in more current pieces to the eye level with oversized art pieces and lamps.
Lighting + Accessories
In dining rooms with a lot of traditional furniture and maybe more ornate window treatments that aren't easily removed without invasive reconstructive surgery to fix all of the holes, we like to add updated lighting over the table (and here we also added fresh accessories which is another hack!)
In this example below, we brought in modern feeling lamps and accessories (including new dining chairs) to freshen up this client's dining furniture and art.
So there you have it! My top tips to update dated furniture. If you would like to learn more tricks of our trade, download your copy of the e-book “Sell Your House In 72 Hours” to get allll the goods!
xo, Lori
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