Sustainable Interiors: How To Style Upcycled Furniture In Your Interior

In this article, Hayley Baddiley from Denby Pottery takes a look at the sustainable interiors trend and shares some tips for styling upcycled pieces in your home.

Every small sustainable action can help to make a positive impact. Whether it's choosing to use a reusable bag for your shopping over plastic alternatives, or freezing leftover food instead of throwing it away, there are plenty of ways to help make a difference to the environment.

The trend for more conscious living is certainly making its way into our homes. Pinterest recently named conscious consumption as one of its top trends for 2020, highlighting low-waste living, product swaps, and thrifted home décor as areas that have proven popular. It's evident that more people are looking for ways they can make their homes into sustainable spaces that they're proud to live in.

Finding ways to use upcycled furniture in your home is a great way to reduce furniture waste and capture the lived in, natural look that's so popular right now. Here are my top tips for styling upcycled pieces in your interior.

Try to identify a style before you begin

Before you start to change your interior, I would recommend taking a moment to decide on what style you're trying to achieve. If you're looking to work upcycled pieces into your current décor, it's worth taking stock of what you love and adding items that complement these features. For instance, if you already have a lot of earthy tones in your kitchen, you could add an upcycled table and chairs to build a farmhouse, rustic style that expands on what you already have.

On the other hand, if you plan to completely overhaul your décor, you will still want to identify a style in advance so that you can make co-ordinated choices with your decorating and upcycling. This will help you to create a cohesive look, as well as give you an idea of what areas you may need to put more work into finding thrifted furniture for. With an idea of what types of furniture you'd like to upcycle, it will be easier and quicker to find and secure suitable pieces.

Be resourceful and creative when you're upcycling

To really get the most out of this activity, you'll need to be both resourceful and creative when you are finding and creating your recycled pieces. For example, if you've decided you want to rescue a wooden bookcase, it's worth looking for one made from real wood, which is much easier to work with than the likes of chipboard. Thinking ahead like this can make life much easier when it comes to upcycling the piece.

Being practical and realistic can be helpful, but that doesn't mean you can't experiment with your projects. You definitely have room to be brave with your choices because, most of the time, failed experiments can be easily rectified and will add to the character of the piece. A dull chair you've painted in a shade that is too bright can simply be repainted, and a distressed piece can be restyled in layers that add more depth to the finish.

Strike the right balance with your pieces

When you're decorating with upcycled furniture, it's worth trying to strike the right balance with your pieces. While it's a fantastic idea to upcycle as many pieces as you can to help the environment, overpopulating your space with your creations can risk turning your décor from something that is eclectic to something that is mismatched and hectic, and pieces may also be left unused. However, if you position your upcycled items sparingly, there's no reason they can't look right at home and make beautiful and functional items.

An easy way to style a large upcycled item of furniture is to make it a statement piece that is balanced with the rest of your décor. A simple method for doing this is to use the rule of three, which relies on the thinking that things are more aesthetically pleasing when they appear as a trio. All you need to do is pick one colour or pattern from your upcycled piece and then bring it across two other items you own to bring a sense of balance to your space.

Another way to help an upcycled piece to feel at home in your décor is by teaming it with other textures, which will instantly create a greater sense of depth and a more lived in feeling. For example, by displaying or storing ceramics on a distressed piece in a dining room or kitchen, you're introducing textures that really complement each other as well as giving the furniture purpose.

Upcycling furniture can be enjoyable and very rewarding, as well as helping the environment. Use these tips to get started with an upcycling furniture project for your home.