Transitional Designs-What are they and How to pull them off?

 

People are often confused about their true sense of style, when they’re trying to do their home interiors. For your home décor to accurately depict your inner stylist and reflect your personality it has to be a certain style. There are mainly three styles and people often resonate with one of them, Traditional, Contemporary and Transitional. Some people like French windows, heavily carved furniture, antiques and heirlooms pieces, wool rugs and accents of gold and royalty oozing from their décor, these people belong to Team Traditional. Some like their interiors to be more modern, with quirky decoration pieces, funky colors, cool window treatments and rugs made from materials like fringes and furs; well these are people from Team Contemporary. Now let’s talk about the people who searched this article and looked up for Transitional style.

What is a Transitional Style?

A transitional style is a perfect amalgamation of both the traditional and contemporary styles. It’s the best of both the worlds, a happy medium blend. Anyone who feels that traditional style is way too overpowering, formal, stuffy and intense and also feels that contemporary style interiors are far less formal, cold, eccentric and eclectic than, the name for your style mantra is transitional style. It brings the perfect level of harmony between the elements of both the styles in an amazing consolidation. Transitional style is basically a beautiful marriage between contemporary and traditional style, where it embraces the good qualities of both and turns out to be far more elegant, comfortable, classy and enduring.

Traditional style furniture, fabrics, finishes and decoration pieces all belong to either traditional or contemporary style but the way they are placed and coordinated together in a setting, makes the whole look strike a perfect balance and is eligible to be called transitional style. Both the traditional and modern styles have a few things that are contradictory to each other, like in traditional style walls are mainly painted with shades of white or neutrals whereas in modern décor the paint work is colorful and quirky.

In traditional style, furniture is made mainly from wood, is upholstered with plush and heavy fabrics, chandeliers are the main light source, wool rugs provide much needed warmth and the accessories are antiques and heirloom items which are either hand-me-downs or fetched from yard sales or thrift stores. On the other hand, modern style décor has metal or fully upholstered sofas and chairs, accompanied with stylish coffee tables, rugs for sale in patterns, beautiful abstract art work, walls donned with colorful paints or wallpaper and accessorized with eccentric pieces of decorations. But when we talk about transitional style, we aim for sleek profiles, well defined lines, comfortable furnishings, neutral color palette, and punchier more aesthetic décor. Transitional style is a fresh new take on both the other styles, emerging as the new favorite of designers and homeowners simultaneously.

Summing up, transitional style is the mixture of new and old, masculine and feminine, safe and risky, subtle and bold and quirky and classy. To pull off a transitional style décor, one needs to be well versed and must have a clear thought process, in order to strike the right chords and achieve a look that not only looks different, it’s also functional.

How to Pull Off Transitional Style with Panache

In order to pull off transitional style with panache and perfection one needs to retain the elegance that traditional elements bring in while adding specks of newness and freshness with colors and furnishing that is more contemporary and modern. People often get confused when they try to bring together two styles which are poles apart from each other and often merge all the wrong elements together; the result is wacky, loud and obnoxious. Contrary to what people think, transitional style is quite subtle and mellow.

Bold Furniture with Sleek Lines

The furniture has simple, sleek and classic lines and with little to no curves and carves. Sometimes there is a soft curve but mainly it has defined lines. The furniture is not too manly, stiff or uncomfortable nor is it too girly, frilly or comfortable. The ultimate materials that do complete justice to transitional style are brass, metallic and wooden furnishers. The focus is laid on moderate and well balanced pieces that showcase refined and exuberant style.

Unassuming Color Palette  

The color palette of transitional style is customarily in neutral colors like, taupe, greys, tans, warm whites and beiges. If you like darker, rich colors than blues, browns, and shades of green and purple also depict transitional style very well. The main reason behind keeping the color palette less complicated is to create a style that looks clean, chic, uncomplicated and aesthetic.

Fabric Adds the Fun Element

As the theme of transitional style is mellow and subdued, adding colors with cleverness is a bit tricky. We can’t get color-crazy in most of the elements but some leverage can be taken with fabrics and decorative cushions. Texture and transitional style go hand in hand, so fabrics like chenille, suede, corduroy, leather and cotton add cozy comfort to the space and enlivens it up.

Accessories and Accents are a Bare Minimum

As told earlier, transitional style takes the elegance of the traditional style and elusiveness of the contemporary style. The accessories are minimal, on point and very chic. A beautiful life size artwork or a sculpture, porcelain vases or any antique item will be enough to accessorize the space. One can also opt for an accent wall that not only adds a much needed pop of colors but also grabs attention without taking anything away from the décor.  Rugs for sale like wool rugs, oriental rugs or Persian rugs add a great punch of colors as well as a class to the otherwise expansive and mellow setting. Put accessories that create visual interest but without overshadowing the well-thought out décor. The accessories should stay within the transitional style boundaries and shouldn’t be visually distracting.

Bottom Line

You see transitional style bring together the best of both worlds under one roof. Many designers and homeowners are resonating with this style more and more nowadays. So if you find traditional style too gaudy and contemporary style too modish, now you have the next best alternative.