Our Modern-Industrial-Farmhouse

James and I have lived in a series of one bedroom apartments since we moved in together five years ago. Needless to say, we don't have much furniture. Between all of our house projects I've been thinking a lot about how I'd like to furnish and decorate our new home, partly dreaming about how I'd do it if I had an unlimited budget and partly scheming up ideas of how to make it happen on our limited budget. I've discovered that filtering through all of my personal style and design preferences to determine how I want those influences to be represented in our furnishings and home style is a challenging process to say the least. Throw in James' design preference and it becomes even more complicated. After months of thought and many, many bookmarked inspiration pictures we are finally settling on a style "theme" if you will...or really, themes. Me- I trend toward mid century modern. James likes the industrial farm house appeal. Together I like to think of our design aesthetic as "old school goes modern comfort". Take a look at one of our Pinterest boards to get a better idea of our style inspirations.

Lovely mid-century Danish style credenza


Rustic industrial farmhouse vibe

The challenge will be to achieve this look throughout a much larger living space than we've ever had...on a budget. It's not too hard to find furniture these days, but quality and/or quirky furniture will cost you an arm and a leg and the cheap stuff is just...well cheap. Since our style trends toward "old school" we decided to start shopping at antique stores, something we have in abundance in New England. I spent last weekend with my mom, touring many shops looking for just the right pieces at just the right price. We had a fun day and saw a few interesting options, but the prices just weren't right. The last place we stopped was our local Habitat for Humanity ReStore. If you haven't heard about these, they are awesome for so many reasons. We found two perfect mid-century dutch modern pieces for our dining room, a low dresser which will serve as a credenza and a little hutch for displaying some of our serving dishes. We believe they are authentic 1950's era and they are made of quality solid wood, something you don't find too often anymore. The two together cost $150, a real steal if you compare it to new furniture or antique store prices. It feels nice to give these pieces a new home too. Reuse and recycle! I'm planning on refinishing them both which should be a fun learning experience.

In order to achieve the more rustic yet modern farmhouse look, we are on the hunt for furniture pieces made from rough, raw or reclaimed wood. Several months ago I saw a bedroom set in a magazine that caught my eye. At the center of it was a reclaimed wood platform bed. It was gorgeous and eco-friendly. Read about the bedroom set here on Re-Nest. But at $2400 for the bed alone, I just bookmarked it in my "dream list" and forgot about it. Last week I was sorting through random furniture listings on Craigslist and guess what I came across? THE bed, never used, listed at a greatly reduced price and just 45 minutes from home! It was so unreal that I had to go see it. It must have been fate because after just a few minutes of discussion and negotiation, I was able to purchase the bed for $400 (remember, this bed was originally $2400!) and I was on my way home with my dream bed! It was still expensive but I consider that a pretty good deal, especially because almost all of the similar style beds we have been looking at would cost us at least that much or more and were of a much poorer quality. We haven't put it together yet, so I don't have any pictures but the Re-Nest picture of the bed is below. Now we're on the hunt for the perfect night stands to go with it.

Stay tuned for more furnishing decisions to come. And next week we'll be talking kitchen design. Things are coming together. We're finally closing in on the FUN stuff!!

Update: Since this page has turned out to be a popular one among those Googling "Industrial Farmhouse" I figured I'd direct anyone who is interested to our ongoing House Tour posts. I originally wrote this post well before we moved into our new home, before much of the furniture was bought or the house was decorated. It's still a work in progress, but it is, well progress. And if you're interested in learning how we built our "green" home from scratch, check out our Building Green posts. Thanks for stopping by, even if it was by accident!