Choose a style
Most pieces of furniture have an attraction of some kind or another, but buying furniture piecemeal usually results in a jumbled mixture that looks more at home in a junk shop than in the home. It is better to try and be consistent and buy furniture in the same or complementary styles. This may be the same style for the whole house or different styles for different rooms. For example, kitchen furniture might all be traditional pine, the dining room may be contemporary oak and the bedroom may be a combination of Georgian and Regency.
Antiques: always the best?
Antiques may be the most desirable pieces of furniture to acquire, but there are limitations. The most obvious is budget. Not everyone can afford the prices some antique furniture will fetch at auction and realistically it is not sensible to have one highly prized antique when the rest of the home is furnished with packing cases.
Availability is also a consideration. The right antique is not always immediately available whereas of course modern furniture is readily purchased in all the colours, sizes and styles. Whether to wait or buy modern will depend on the particular circumstances and the likelihood of finding what you want as an antique. One website that gives details of antiques auctions in different parts of the country is
auctionhammer.co.uk
Don’t be tempted to buy an antique in a radically different style to the style you have already chosen just because it is an antique. That may be OK if you plan on becoming a dealer, but it won’t do much to create your perfect interior.
Be practical
Make sure your room is large enough to accommodate the furniture you want. Modern homes are far more compact and antiques such as dressers and wardrobes might fit, but will they overwhelm everything else in the room? Comfort is a consideration as is planned usage. Would a modern kitchen chair, for example, be more sensible for everyday use than its antique counterpart?
Mix and match
Having decided on a style, there is nothing wrong in mixing and matching modern and antique furniture. This does not mean buying reproduction furniture, just buying furniture in sympathetic styles. For example, our
Heartland Oak collection is contemporary furniture but would not be out of place next to furniture from the 15th Century onwards. Similarly our
Rustic Oak furniture is built to traditional designs and so will fit comfortably alongside many antique pine items.
Second hand
Second hand furniture is great if budgets are limited and lots of rooms need to be furnished quickly. The secret to successfully buying second hand furniture is to buy good quality. Don’t bother with second hand flat pack or particle board furniture because this can be obtained new for the same money.
The bargains to be found in second hand furniture are the highly stylised furniture of the forties, fifties and sixties. The quality may not be very good (furniture of this period was often poor quality) but if the condition is passable the genuine items are already collectable and will be the antiques of the future.
New furniture
It would be wrong to think of new furniture only as a substitute for antiques. Not everyone wants to be surrounded by the styles of previous eras and much modern furniture is attractive in its own right. Within the limits of your budget, choose furniture that has been well made and that is made of good quality materials. See our section on choosing
furniture for today.
Modern furniture has been designed for modern lifestyles and although it may not appreciate as noticeably as antique furniture it will usually be much easier to live with and should certainly be worth keeping for the future.
Reproduction furniture
Reproduction furniture is furniture that deliberately copies the styles of previous generations. This is not the same as furniture that is contemporary in style but shows similar characteristics to the furniture of an earlier period or style.
Reproduction furniture is comparatively expensive when new, yet does not increase or even retain its value in the same way as the antique counterpart. Many designers and furniture specialists are dismissive of such furniture but it is a matter of personal choice and it could be argued to have its place, especially when the original article is either not available or prohibitively expensive.