Thinking about painting your cherry kitchen? Maybe hold off. My trend cycle crystal ball predicts you might suddenly love them again shortly.
Here’s a great to update a wood kitchen without painting the cabinets.
Trends are a pendulum. They swing from one extreme to the other. We’ve been painting wood and choosing the palest, most bleached and ashy wood tones for more than a decade now.
Which means deep, warm wood tones are enjoying a revival.
The trick is to find the sweet spot in the pendulum swing. The timeless calm at the centre of the storm. And that’s what I’m here to help you with.
So, yes, we all fall for the next new look. That’s totally fine. But when it comes to glued-down-permanent and expensive stuff, we want longevity. So let’s figure out how to incorporate this new rich wood tones trend in a measured and timeless way.
And BTW, this does NOT mean you need to suddenly paint or toss all your white oak floors from the black and white trend. They are still a fresh and timeless wood tone that layers together with deeper wood tones beautifully.
3 Ways to Embrace the Warm Wood Trend
- Work with what you’ve got
If you’re in an older home with a wood stained kitchen, consider refreshing it with white or cream countertops and backsplash and keep the wood for now. As we settle into this overall warmer, earthier trend, you might appreciate the wood awhile longer. Besides, painting cabinets is expensive and it’s probably a better update to finally replace the blotchy dated floor tile with a timeless wood floor.
Get my help with updating your kitchen the smart and timeless way here.
2. Combine different wood tones
A sure way to get stuck in a trend is to take it too far. If you’ve chosen every wood element in your room in the same ashy weathered or pale wood, it’s going to look flat and possibly dated. Layering wood tones can seem tricky, but most wood tones play together pretty well. As long as they are in the realm of natural wood tones and not exaggeratedly HOT (think burgundy stain or Brazillian Cherry – now it’s red, not neutral).
When it comes to furnishings, you can decorate with a range of wood tones, like in this beautiful room above with extra dark panelling. There are a million different ways to create visual coherence in a room without matching every single thing. Yes, it takes practice!
Join my vibrant and colourful True Colour Insider Community to connect with other decorators and homeowners and collaborate on the colour and decorating learning curve. It’s so much fun inside!
Where you DO want to be extra careful is in matching up a new wood floor to older wood cabinets. Or coordinating your kitchen island stain with the floor for example. They can have contrast, but they should look related.
3. Break up the wood tones with colour
Breaking up wood tones with pale neutrals, white, cream and colour is a great strategy. As you can see with the pale violet grey cabinets above. Learn more about the best warm neutrals for kitchen cabinets here.
Wood loves colour. See how fabulous this blue room looks with the wood tones?
I love pairing blue and white or cream with rich warm wood tones, it’s a magical combination! But you can also look at trending greens and a wide range of colours to relate to your favourite colourful decor.
What do you think? Are you here for deeper, more formal wood tones again? Or are you all about light and not looking back?
Sign up here to learn how to trend proof your home, I have one more webinar left before the end of the season 💛
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Amen! I love stained cabinets. Just not my chocolate glazed maple cabinets that came with my current home. The floor is provincial stain. What stain would go with the cabinets?
Having a mini heart attack as my 25-year-old shaker cherry cabinets are being painted as we speak maritime white to coordinate with my travertine stone floor.
Thanks for continuing to fight the good fight. I’m not even 50 yet, I don’t work in design professionally (just for friends and family), and even I am exhausted by the cyclical nature of trends and how people will tear out or paint perfectly good fixtures that coordinate with the whole home and replace them with the “neutral” that is currently “timeless.”
Yay! Light wood was never for me. I’m back on trend for the moment.