When you’re remodeling your kitchen, there are so many things to think about. From cabinets to countertops, backsplashes, appliances, lighting, fixtures, and flooring, it’s details like these that tend to make the biggest influence on the overall look of the room. Sometimes, it’s easy to make a big impact just by adding a little bit of texture.
Adding texture to your kitchen design is a way to add visual interest and spatial dimension, and it also does a great job of enhancing neutral color schemes. With some well-placed textural elements, you can change the feel of the room completely without having to invest in a major remodel.
Here are a few simple ways you can add texture to your kitchen:
Wood Grain, Natural Fibers
If your cabinets are not stained or if your kitchen has a lot of clean, glossy surfaces, adding some wood grain is a great way to soften it up. Wood grain is a great accent, either as flooring, cabinetry, or other areas like the backsplash, the hood fan, light fixtures, countertops, or the kitchen island.
Flooring is another place you can add a wood-grained texture. You might look at cork, bamboo, or another type of wood with an interesting grain.
We had a client who went with pendant light fixtures that had natural fiber grass-cloth shades and natural cork for the flooring. Her cabinets were painted gray, and the countertops were solid white, so there wasn’t a great deal of texture in the room except for on the floors and the light fixtures. Adding these elements made for a striking combination. It helped to break up the sameness of the room and added a softness to the modern design.
Mixing It Up
Mixing up contrasting materials and elements is a great idea too. You can choose materials like natural stone, brick, metal, or glass. Using different finishes is another excellent way to add texture; for instance, a high-gloss countertop over a wood-grained laminate on the island.
Have Fun With Your Backsplash
Your backsplash offers the perfect opportunity to play around with contrasting textures. Tile and stone can be accented with a stainless panel, or you could play around with different grout colors.
However, if you do opt for a heavily textured backsplash, you should be aware of what’s going to be next to it; for instance, you might want to choose a countertop that is a bit plainer, so the two things don’t compete for attention. If you have a lot of contrasting stone textured wood grains, for instance, it will start to look a little busy.
Accent Walls
Having a single wall in the kitchen that is either painted a different color or uses a different type of material is another way to add texture.
Some choices you might consider for an accent wall include shiplap, soapstone, zellige tile, or cement tile. Cement tile, in particular, looks as great in a modern kitchen as it does in the scope of more traditional kitchen design. It’s got plenty of texture, it’s durable, and the newer designs are really striking.
What about the rest of the house?
In our experience, most people aren’t necessarily remodeling their whole house at once, but some may have concerns about adding texture in the kitchen but not in the rest of the home.
In truth, the places that you would naturally have texture in the kitchen, like a backsplash or a countertop, or wood cabinets – these aren’t things that you typically have in living rooms or bedrooms. As a result, it’s not necessarily going to look and feel odd, because you won’t be missing those things in other rooms. The opportunity just isn’t the same.
When Adding Texture, Balance Is The Goal
One thing that you might want to think about is if you choose a particularly rough texture for a kitchen floor, and if that floor flows into other rooms, you might end up with a bit of a design conundrum. If the other flooring types aren’t complimentary, the textural element might be overwhelming and defeat the purpose of the kitchen redesign altogether.
Bottom line – you don’t want the texture you add to be the most significant part of the look. Ultimately, you want the texture to be an accent and not hijack the kitchen design entirely. Where texture is concerned, balance is always the key.
Are you thinking about a kitchen redesign for your St. Louis home? Adding some texture could take it over the top! Schedule a conversation today and let’s talk about your ideas. We’d love to show you how we can help.
