Palo Alto Interior Design
If you recently moved to Palo Alto, or anywhere in Santa Clara County, you may be in the market for an interior designer. Maybe the older home you moved in to wasn't decorated in a way that fits with your more modern lifestyle. Or maybe this is your first home after living for so long with ready-to-assemble furniture and mismatched glasses. Or maybe you have been living in your current home for a while, and it just needs a facelift. Whatever the reason is, you are looking to get rid of your worn out current interior design and modernize your home.
But what does modern even mean? A lot of people use the words 'modern' and 'contemporary' interchangeably, which is fine for normal use because both of them generally mean 'right now' or 'current.'
But in design, 'modern' and 'contemporary' have very distinct meanings.
Modern design typically refers to a specific period and the furnishings that go with it. From the 1940s to the 60s, furniture and furnishing design broke with the long traditions of more ornate, more detailed, and more complex designs of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This new design was more reserved, with smooth curves, simple lines, and muted colors. Because this new movement was such a radical departure from the more ornate and gilded designs of the past, it was dubbed 'modern' because it was the new thing.
You would probably recognize modern furnishings if you saw them. Modern furniture is often long and low, with smooth curves and unembellished lines. There are no skirts or ruffles over the legs, which are open and minimal (they are often made of strong steel), which contributes to the airy feel of modern furniture. Patterns are usually very simple and geometric, and materials are either natural, like teak, linen, and leather, or molded acrylic and steel. Think Frank Lloyd Wright.
Contemporary design, on the other hand, is less of a coherent movement than Modernism, and more of a description of what's going on right now. When interior designers use the term 'contemporary', they are referring to what is going on in the here and now, whenever the here and now is. SO that could mean the neon colors of the late eighties and early nineties, or the clear acrylic of today. Contemporary furnishings are usually so called because they literally could not have existed ten years ago, either because the materials weren't being used for furniture, or because the design and manufacturing techniques hadn't been invented yet.
But Contemporary doesn't mean just anything that's going on today. For example, there is a big interest in vintage modern and Victorian styles currently, but nobody would call them contemporary. French Provençal and farmhouse design are also perennially popular, but they are not contemporary by any stretch of the imagination. However, contemporary design can mesh together multiple styles in fun and creative ways, like an Art Deco bed against a bare brick wall, or a hanging rattan chair and overturned vase for a side table. So contemporary is a little more difficult to define than Modern. It is usually just easier to look at what contemporary isn't than what it is.
Palo Alto Contemporary Kitchen Design
There is another sense of the word 'modern' that relates to interior design. When a room is decorated in a style that is far out of date, or if your kitchen appliances are older than you are, we say that it is time to 'modernize' them. When interior designers talk about modern appliances, we are referring to the most up to date, technologically advanced, and energy and water efficient models on the market. At the very least, we mean something newer and better than the mustard yellow washing machine you inherited with the house.
Appliances are the perfect place to start a kitchen design project, because a kitchen should be as functional as it is beautiful. Whether you need a bigger freezer, a more efficient microwave, or a refrigerator with a reversible door so that it gives you more room when it's open, new appliances make your kitchen feel more functional and more modern.
In addition to feeling more modern, new appliances can help your kitchen use energy and water more efficiently, and nothing is more contemporary and in style right now than recycling and efficiency. Most appliances are already made out of recycled steel, but we can help you find refrigerators, dishwashers, and other appliances that use less water, create less waste, and use less energy, to save the planet and save you money.
Whether you want a Modern kitchen design or a contemporary one, we can find the materials, designs, and fixtures that fit your home and your unique style. Our expert interior designers can create a beautiful kitchen with marble countertops, integrated sinks, and recessed lighting. Or we can create a kitchen with granite counters, steel backsplashes, and glass cabinets. The beauty of contemporary interior design is being able to do creative things with new materials, and mixing old and new styles to make something completely unique to you.
Whether you are looking for a stark, efficient black and white modern kitchen design, or a warm, inviting kitchen in rich woods and muted earth tones, we have the expertise and material resources to build the kitchen design of your dreams.
No matter if you are just looking to upgrade your appliances to the newest, most efficient models, or if you want to contemporize your kitchen in the clean, efficient lines and materials of the day, Kitchens of Los Altos specializes in helping you upgrade your kitchen to the ideal center of your home and family life that you dream it can be. Our kitchen design experts can help you find the perfect combination of materials, finishes, and colors to make your kitchen design as functional and beautiful as it can be. Call us today to start discussing the exciting possibilities for your brand new kitchen design.
Santa Clara County Bathroom Remodels
When people start thinking about upgrading their homes with modern or contemporary interior design, the bathroom is often the first place they start. There's no real mystery as to why that is. The bathroom is the one room in your home that you use every day, and it is the place that you go to get clean. That's why the bathroom can be the room that most quickly gets old and worn out in your home. After long enough scrubbing the grimy yellow tiles of the previous owners bathroom design gets old. You want surfaces with clean lines and clean materials that are easy to clean up and look beautiful for years. Fortunately, the expert interior designers at Kitchens of Los Altos have the beautiful and unique bathroom design ideas to create the clean, welcoming space of your dreams.
One of the best things about bathrooms is how clean they can make us feel. We go into bathrooms to brush our last meal off of our teeth, to wash the dirt of the day off of our bodies, and clean the buildup off of our faces to refresh ourselves and face our next challenge. The problem is that all of that dirt has to go somewhere, and while most of it goes down the drain, the moisture and soap scum can make cleaning a bathroom difficult. If that buildup is left for too long, particularly if you move into a home where the previous occupants weren't as concerned about cleanliness, it can be impossible to get rid of. This is made all the worse by traditionally styled bathroom counters and fixtures. The more detailing, surface area, and absorption your current bathroom has, the more places that moisture and soap scum have to stick, creating a breeding ground for mildew and bacteria. Part of the benefit of contemporary bathroom remodels is that new materials are sealed and treated to resist moisture, and with the smooth lines and hard angles of contemporary bathroom design ideas, you can easily turn your bathroom into a place that is not only beautiful, but easier to keep that way.
The beauty of contemporary design is that it is versatile enough to adapt to any space and any taste. If you want full-scale bathroom remodels for every bathroom in your home, we can make each one a unique experience with the same contemporary interior design techniques and philosophy. With warm colors and natural patterns, we can turn your master bathroom into an inviting place to relax in an efficient stall shower or luxuriate in a sunken whirlpool bathtub. With indirect lighting and subtle design additions, we can turn your cluttered and claustrophobic bathroom into a relaxing minimalist masterpiece. With bright colors and playful graphic patterns, we can turn your guest bathroom into a fun modern statement. All of these are possible with contemporary design materials and an interior designer who knows how to use them.