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The insider’s guide to retro furniture
December 28th 2015
Retro style is everywhere these days offering huge design potential and an easy-to-live-with look that can be as full-on or understated as your heart desires.
The Return of Retro
From retro furniture and accessories, to fashion, art, home appliances and entertainment — this is a look that is very much en vogue.
And why wouldn’t it be? Harking back to a much simpler time, with soft, pleasing design features and the perfect foil for both fresh, high-tech interiors as well as more homely, traditional schemes, anyone on the lookout for redesign ideas for their home should consider investing in a bit of retro furniture UK style.
Retro Furniture and Accessories
What we are talking about here are either original pieces from the 1950s through to the 1970s, or pieces inspired by them — and in particular retro furniture UK based, although much modern day retro-inspired furniture also looks to the Mid Century Modern pieces from the United States during the same period.
Within this era, each decade had its own distinctive design traits.
– 1950s: Post-war, this was a time when furniture design very much looked to the future. Shapes were almost space-age and designs were innovative. Colours were pastel, although browns were also popular and black, white and red was a particularly popular colour combination. Despite the slightly abstract shapes of furniture (think curved triangular tables, for example) there was still a classic theme that has made this an enduring style.
– 1960s:By the 1960s, a younger, pop-inspired look was in. Chairs were ‘pod’ like and new technologies meant furniture could be made from moulded plastic in all sorts of weird and wonderful forms. Colours were bright, but took their influences from nature — this was a time when furniture was fun.
– 1970s: Lucite, glass and vinyl as well as chrome and wood became increasingly popular during this period. Floral and geometric patterns started to emerge as a trend and bold colours such as purple and orange were big news.
Above all, the furniture from all of these eras was very organic and flowing in its form and featured curves, circles and asymmetric lines — something to incorporate into your own vintage design ideas.
Getting the Retro Look
Perhaps you feel that your redesign ideas are more suited to just one of the above eras and want to focus solely on recreating that look. More likely, you will want to include many of the features from this period within your vintage design ideas to conjure up a sense of a room that has evolved and is more eclectic in its design. Happily, aspects from all of these ‘retro’ eras can be mixed and matched quite happily.
Perhaps best of all, retro interiors can quite easily be incorporated into more modern schemes — the often quirky yet fresh shapes of retro furniture will sit beautifully within industrial, vintage and contemporary schemes alike.
Reproduction or Original?
The last few years have seen a real boost in the popularity of upcycling furniture. Rather than just buying a second-hand piece, this is all about taking an old item and adding to it in a way that makes it more beautiful and useful than it ever was.
Upcycling furniture, such as original 1950s furniture, is a brilliant way to get the retro look — perhaps with the addition of chrome legs, a more modern paint finish or a new glass top.
On the downside, buying old furniture can have its problems. Time may have taken its toll on some of the cheaper, mass-produced pieces from the time and often toxic varnishes were used to finish furniture off, so do take care.
Reproduction or retro-inspired furniture is a great option here and there is plenty of choice. This really offers the best of both worlds — authentic retro-style combined with contemporary twists and modern manufacturing methods.
Take a look at the range of retro coffee tables and side tables from Zespoke. Not only do their curved forms and unusual shapes carry a strong retro theme, but they can also be customised — so that purple and orange coffee table you were after to complete your vintage design ideas really can be yours.
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