The Art Behind Selecting Home Furnishings

As an interior designer, I am often asked what the latest trends in homes furnishings are, which is actually a harder question to answer than you might think. Trends lie in home decor, not home furnishings. Changing the colour and fabric of cushion covers, painting a kitchen wall and buying new lampshades are all easy ways to update the look of your home. Trends in home furnishings are slow to change, purely because the cost of large items such as settees, fridge freezers, beds and free standing baths are high. It is not possible for anyone to justify an unnecessary spend on home furnishings, and if you buy the right furniture in the first place, you may not need to update your look anyway.

There are some classic designs in home furnishings out there, some examples are the Barcelona Chair by Mies van de Rohe, the Bombo Stool by Stefano Giovannoni and the ever iconic Egg Chair by Arne Jacobsen. What all of these pieces have in common is their ability to be timeless pieces, even though they have a style from a particular era. The aesthetics however are of such a quality that they could be akin to sculpture, moving beyond the pure function of an item of furniture.

Compare these three pieces to some generic modern furnishings and it is easy to see how some home furnishings do not extend beyond their intended function as furniture. Although that is precisely what furniture should be, functional, we seem to have lost the long lasting qualities that were once considered inherent within home furnishings. Can you imagine finding an Ikea sofa in an antiques boutique three hundred years from now? Not only are the current styles employed by such manufacturers a cheap imitation of design classics rather than beautiful in their own right, the materials and manufacture are not in line with achieving longevity.

Hand crafted home furnishings in today's antique shops have chairs that were made in the 1700s that are still desired by many people. Although antiques do not quite fit into the same category as iconic home furnishings, the emphasis is on the quality of manufacture, or handicraft. Many of the iconic pieces treasured by furnishings enthusiasts were hand made by the design houses, and it is this attention to detail that gives certain items a quality that mass produced pieces cannot achieve.

The generation of home furniture buyers today half expect to be updating their interior decor 'look' every five years or so, and therefore have come to the conclusion that home furnishings have a trend. If these people were to centre their efforts on investing in well made and beautifully designed furniture, they would understand that investing in style is a personal statement. Rather than be a slave to furniture fashions, or a sheep following a shopping shepherd, more people should make a bold move and buy an iconic and lasting centrepiece for their home.

Buying a piece of furniture that costs thousands of pounds is a bold move, and it is a massive statement about a person's personality. Whimsical people need not apply. It is not as some think a waste of money, in fact, it is quite likely that by investing in well made designer goods you will save money in the long term in not having to purchase replacements. Above all though, the test is in the love of the piece itself. Just as you would be willing to spend a lot of money on a sculpture that would last your life time and beyond, so you should be willing to view a piece of quality furniture the same.

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