Home Design Trends for 2016 Find the Latest Home and Garden Ideas for Decorating and Remodeling

Wondering about the most important home design trends for 2016? We’ve rounded up a bunch of must-know-about trends to track for 2016 and beyond. Because lifestyle trends influence home and garden trends, we’ll also take a look at some of the key lifestyle trends that are shaping what we’re seeing in the realm of home renovations and home furnishings.

Senior-Friendly Home Design Features

Grab bars make handy bath accents. They can help to prevent disasters in the shower.
Grab bars make handy bath accents. They can help to prevent disasters in the shower. These grab bars are available for sale online at Plumbingdepot.com. Photo courtesy of Moen.com.

Baby boomers are driving some of the top trends we’re seeing in home design, home remodeling and home furnishings for 2016. Some are moving into smaller homes, and in need of new furnishings that coordinate better with their new environments. Some are remodeling their existing homes to make them better-suited for their changing circumstances and lifestyles. Some are moving in with their kids or grandkids.


As baby boomers age, there’s increased demand for home design features that accommodate their all-too-often declining agility and mobility.


Accessible Entryways: For some aging homeowners, ramps are replacing stairs in the entryways, and elevators are becoming popular additions. Not everyone wants a ramp, so a popular alternative is on-grade entry — meaning that the occupants don’t have to climb anything or step up to the door of the home; it’s accessible from the ground level.

For those confined to wheelchairs, expansive doorways are easy to navigate. This is true of either main entries or interior doorways and halls.

User-Friendly Bathrooms: For seniors whose mobility is declining, grab bars can be helpful additions to the bathroom, the hallway and other rooms around the house.

For those confined to wheelchairs, wall-mounted sinks give added accessibility in the bathroom.


First-Floor Master Bedrooms: Stairs pose risks for aging homeowners. For those who are unable or unwilling to climb stairs, it’s convenient to have the master bedroom located on the first floor of the home.

Smart Homes and Home Automation

Home automation isn’t a new thing, but in the past few years it has been sort of a not-so-important non-trend. However, many of the powers that be in global corporations and governments have a vested interest in seeing this trend take root, so it’s likely to gain traction in the years ahead — and 2016 is shaping up to be a possibility for the trend to see increased consumer adoption.

The broader premise: if we connect all our systems together via the Internet — everything from public agencies and healthcare providers to consumers’ home interiors and exteriors — we can make everything more efficient, cut costs and create more sustainable ways of interacting, living and working.

With that in mind, we’re seeing an explosion of new WIFI-enabled smart gadgets as tech companies compete to ride this new wave of innovation. The result: an abundance of new smart gadgets and gizmos that you can connect to your smartphone or tablet (if you have one) to accomplish things like designing your lighting, automating a schedule for your sprinkler system, or remotely adjusting your thermostat. There’s more to it than that, so I invite you to take a look at our article entitled smart home automation ideas to learn more about this trend.

Outdoor Living Spaces: Patios, Outdoor Barbecues and Gazebos

Homeowners have been investing heavily in outdoor living spaces. This trend is expected to continue in 2016.


Building New Decks — Homeowners are finding that wooden or composite decks are currently adding value to their homes.


Outdoor Showers — For lakefront and beachfront homes, outdoor showers are currently in demand.

Mud Rooms and Drop Zones

Residential architects are reporting a noticeable increase in demand for mud rooms and drop zones.

A mud room is a transitional space between the outdoors and the inside of a home. It’s an area for removing and storing outerwear, shoes and boots. Mudrooms are particularly useful home additions in areas where it snows or rains often, as these spaces give occupants a convenient place to remove wet clothing while minimizing the resulting mess.

Wine Cellars and Wine Storage

Wine cellars have become fashionable with the trendsetting crowd, particularly with those who own luxury homes in high-end neighborhoods. If this is a trend that would be of interest to you, we invite you to check out our page about wine cellars and wine storage.

Increasing Demand for Larger Homes

At the upper end of the market, residential architects are reporting increased demand for larger homes. One noteworthy trend is that home buyers are trying to maximize value by seeking out a combination of the best possible locations with the largest possible homes on the smallest possible lot sizes.

Decluttering and Seeking Space-Saving Solutions

At the lower end of the market, there are plenty of people who are seeking solutions for too-small living spaces. Decluttering is a trend worth taking note of. Many homeowners are in search of affordable space saving solutions.


Interior Sliding Barn Doors and Wall-Mounted Sliding Doors


We’re seeing bunches of bloggers and other trendsetters who are implementing sliding barn doors in their homes.
Swinging doors have their place, but they aren’t always ideal for use in small living spaces; they can waste bunches of space that could be better utilized in other ways. Sliding barn doors give you several benefits at once:

  • The opportunity to choose a stylish, unique door that offers more visual interest than your typical white swinging interior door
  • Enhanced accessibility
  • Space-saving capabilities

Decorating Studio Apartments in 2016 — When you’re decorating and furnishing a small space, you need a different mindset than you do when decorating an expansive estate. We’ve prepared a guide especially to help studio apartment dwellers get the most out of their living spaces. Click here to check it out.

Sustainable Design Trends

Sustainable design is such an extensive topic that it warrants its own trend list. We’ve covered it separately.

Interior Color Trends for 2016

Global color trends influence every aspect of home decor, from paint colors to home textiles to wood stains and finishes. Here’s some of the most important info we’ve collected on the topic of color trends, popular paint colors and furniture colors for 2016:

Paint Colors

I give you the scoop on 2016’s hottest interior paint colors in my 2016 color trends report. I invite you to check it out.

Furniture Colors

Clear While clear isn’t exactly a color, it’s a trendy and timely inclusion on this list. Clear lucite pieces are popping up everywhere. Clear lucite chairs are particularly trendy, and we’re also seeing clear lucite details being used as accents.


Cool Color Stories — Furniture retailers are offering an interesting mix of color choices predominated by grays, blues, turquoise shades and greens — particularly spring greens and brighter, cleaner shades of green, in contrast to the celadon greens that were so popular in past decades.


Mixed Cool and Warm Color Stories — Some grays pair beautifully with clean, bright accents such as lemon yellow and vivid coral. We’re seeing gray being combined with a variety of different warm-colored accents.


Warm Color Stories –There are also color choices suitable for consumers who aren’t so keen on cool colors, and would prefer to use a warmer color palette. Warm-colored furniture pieces are being accented with metallic details in colors like gold, rose gold and copper. Warm woods are also an item in furniture trends for 2016.

So there you have it; those are our discoveries regarding the top home design trends for 2016.

References:

We compiled this list of 2016’s hot home design trends using a combination of personal experience plus data made available by various trend forecasters, architects, home builders, interior designers, remodeling companies, organizations and journalists:

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