Get the Look: Styling Your Outdoor Space
Get the Look: Styling Your Outdoor Space
Posted by Fortunoff Backyard Store
Style indoors & out.
Everyone has style, but are you incorporating that style into your outdoor space? When decorating a home, most people start with the interior and work outwards. The backyard is the last thing on their list, but exterior design can be daunting if you’ve never done it before.
There are more things to consider such as outdoor durability, landscaping, and your home’s architecture. To help overcome some of these challenges, we curated a selection of outdoor decor items that correspond with five different styles. In this blog, we walk you through how to style your patio using our Get the Look patio decor edits, beginning with a quick introduction to exterior design.Text
Exterior Design Basics:
When designing an outdoor space, think of the project like a pizza. Your home’s exterior is the base, or in this case, the dough. You want to consider the style of your home. Is it modern or craftsman? What is the facade made out of–brick, siding, or stucco? Identifying your home’s style will help you find patio furniture that will complement it because your patio furniture is the pizza sauce. It adds flavor to your space and gives it purpose.
Think about how you would like to enjoy your backyard when searching for outdoor furniture or read our how to shop for outdoor furniture guide to help narrow down your options. Next, we further personalize your backyard design by adding accessories. Would you put a pineapple-printed throw pillow on your patio? The toppings are up to you, but here are a few styles we love:
Contemporary Patio Decor:
Our Contemporary Get the Look design highlights a minimalist aesthetic. Many of the decor pieces and the sets we chose to build upon feature a blend of sleek lines and organic shapes for balance. We styled our Contemporary Get the Look with modern homes in mind. These homes may have a boxy exterior with brick or neutral-colored siding or stucco, which coordinates well with the pops of color present in our contemporary accessories. In our featured image, you’ll find our Hampton Seating Set paired with a crochet-style rug in a neutral color.
The seating set alone creates a purposeful lounge area, and the rug further defines the space. We love how the wicker seating set and the patio rug play with texture without stealing too much attention away from the other decor items in this display. The pops of green in the outdoor throw pillows draw the eye as intended and make the setup feel fresh and cozy. We then brought in some carved planters for more texture and gold metal lanterns for mood lighting and to bring out the natural glow of our teak outdoor seating set.
For a more playful contemporary look, we suggest swapping out the crochet rug for our Mobile Ivory Rug. You lose a little texture with the swap but gain plenty of visual interest with the added color and non-repeating pattern.
Mediterranean Patio Decor:
For our Mediterranean Get the Look, we channeled a vacation mindset. The patio decor pieces in this style take inspiration from travel, tradition, and nature. The home we envisioned when pulling these patio accessories has a stone or stucco exterior with some cultural flair–whether that’s Southwest or Spanish, we feel this look would enhance a range of spaces.
Our Mediterranean styling starts with our pictured Metro Seating Set paired with our Aztec-inspired rug. The rug does a lot of the heavy lifting to make this space feel more like a far-away resort, but once we add our tropical leaf-printed throw pillows and hand-carved accents, the vision comes to life. We continue this trend with a few teak accessories. The real wood grain plays well with the wood-textured finish in our Metro set and creates an air of authenticity. Add some real or faux plants to make this space feel more like a tropical escape, and you’ve successfully recreated our Mediterranean style.
If you like what we’ve done here, but wish there was more color, you can opt for our blue carved accent table instead of the black one and swap out the rug for our Bubble Stripe Blue rug option. We’d also suggest incorporating our Leisure throw pillow in navy to make things feel more connected. Wanting to recreate this look for a patio dining set? Add our tribal-printed melamine plates and your choice of rug for a stunning tablescape.
Transitional Patio Decor:
Our Transitional Get the Look is a return to comfort. These decor pieces and sets prioritize bold shapes, colors, and patterns without being ostracized. There’s a familiarity to this style, and it’s best displayed in craftsman and traditional-style homes. Transitional accents complement houses with brick, stucco, or siding, but we’d shy away from corrugated metal exteriors.
We begin our Transitional styling with our Contempo Seating Set and tribal-printed rug. The size of the seating set and the plushness of its cushions create a welcoming environment, and the fading in the rug’s print makes the space feel lived-in.
The throw pillows and accent table build on this relaxing atmosphere, and we chose easily recognizable patterns to further promote a sense of casualness. While the throw pillows and rug inject the space with color, adding neutral accents like our iron lanterns can elevate the space without overpowering the other elements.
Want to dial down some of the colors? Opt for a patterned rug in a neutral color and coordinating throw pillows. As long as you keep the proportions large in your outdoor furniture set and patterns, you can freely play around with color and still create a beautiful Transitional look.
DID YOU KNOW:
Just like exterior design, the principles of feng shui focus on elemental forces. In fact, the literal translation of feng shui is "wind-water."
Classic Patio Decor:
Details define our Classic Get the Look. It’s opulent and traditional. Many of the decor pieces in this accessories edit feature floral visuals and antiqued finishes, and houses with stone and stucco exteriors or Old World influences would coordinate beautifully with this style, especially if those homes also feature cast or wrought iron fixtures.
Our Classic design opens with our pictured Cadiz Seating Set and blue boucle rug. Both pieces showcase complex patterns that feel feminine and luxurious with their twists and curls. However, this softness is balanced by the weight of the materials. We continue this theme by subbing out the Cadiz coffee table for the pictured stone table.
The leaf-like carving makes the stone table feel more like a sculpture, and it plays nicely with the pattern on the chair's back and rug. Because everything we’ve added has such a strong visual presence, we opted to stay within the same color family for the other accents. We selected throw pillows in a lagoon shade to match the set’s cushion colors and kept the prints moderately simple so as to not distract from the craftsmanship of the cast aluminum.
For more drama, add some pieces from our royals drinkware set. The crystal-inspired collection can elevate any beverage and make guests swoon over your attention to detail.
Modern Cottage Patio Decor:
Inspired by a slower way of living and relaxing, our Modern Cottage Get the Look focuses on rustic textures and simple accents. The accessories feature minimalist details with country charm. You’ll find antiqued finishes, gingham patterns, and farm-inspired textures. Homes with neutral exteriors or farmhouse influences would coordinate best.
Our Modern Cottage styling begins with our Tangiers Dining Set. The multi-color resin wicker weaving brings a lot of texture to this Get the Look, and when paired with our extendable patio table, it creates an artfully mismatched dining area that feels homey. We then set the table with dishware featuring a burlap-inspired print to continue the texture theme and finish the look with our check placemats to give the table that picnic casualness.
To create a cozier space, we recommend adding a rug underneath the patio set. A neutral color will play up the modern features in this style, and don’t be afraid of a textured pattern!
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