What Makes a Home a Truly Quintessential Farmhouse? | Design Defined | Magnolia Network

Farmhouse style is easy.

Easy living.

When you walk into a farmhouse, it feels like home. It feels cozy. It feels like

like home. It feels cozy. It feels like a pie has been baking in the oven all day and you just can't wait to gather around with your family.

Farm houses absorb life so beautifully.

They really can just take whatever wear and tear families can bring and they just gobble it up. They just love it.

And I think that's part of the reason why they're so popular today.

Farmhouse style maybe more than any other is just so distinctly American.

It's about comfort. It's about

durability. And it's about functionality. It's about simplicity,

functionality. It's about simplicity, but also craftsmanship.

I think those two things balancing each other out is really what makes farmhouse style so iconic.

We see a lot of whites or like, you know, uh, iron handles. So that like hit of black that happens or these industrial elements. A shiplap of course

industrial elements. A shiplap of course or tongue and groove is something we see for siding. that's quite prevalent.

for siding. that's quite prevalent.

Typically painted white, barnwood and reclaimed wood and timber.

>> You're going to see dark metal used typically on the hardware. You'll

typically see a bathtub that's freestanding. Nobody does it better than

freestanding. Nobody does it better than farmhouse. When it comes to kitchen,

farmhouse. When it comes to kitchen, there's just a vernacular there that can have these rustic elements that are really just pulling in natural materials that of course go really nicely with this more neutral background that tends

to be these, you know, softer whites.

>> This is not a very stuffy style. This is

for a family who is going to actually use their home.

There's still something kind of in us, especially I think for those of us that grew up in America that look to this style as a way of simpler living from the past and really want that for

ourselves in the present.

American farmhouse style has been here since America has been here.

>> The first settlers came over. They

needed to farm. They needed to live. So

they built really simple houses that were minimal in design so that they could spend their time tending to their farms. >> Like thousands of similar communities,

Madison draws its life from the fields and farms that surround it.

>> I mean, this is one of those vernacular styles that really came up out of necessity. Local woods, local stones are

necessity. Local woods, local stones are the name of the game.

>> It was a economic source of wood from fallen trees.

>> Houses are square, materials are no frills, everything gets a fresh coat of paint and voila, you've got farmhouse style.

>> The original farmhouse design has been re-evaluated and recreated into current farmhouse design.

So, this begins, of course, with a farmhouse sink or an apron sink, which has the cool history of real function, of course, which is that without a

countertop in front of you and a drop in sink the way it is, that people could saddle up to the sink without straining their backs and leaning over. So, the

farmhouse sink brought that.

And guess what? It still delivers. It's

still an incredibly ergonomic way to design a kitchen. So much of farmhouse style is really honoring the authenticity of of farm life. The people

who would have lived in farm houses working every day. You're probably going to see a lot of rustic items with patina. They'd be made of great

patina. They'd be made of great materials. They'd be hardworking,

materials. They'd be hardworking, longlasting, but would probably show evidence of wear.

That style stuck for a reason. It

touched us somewhere really deep and it hasn't let up since then. Farmhouse

style today has what I would say is a quite limited pallet and this stems from the idea that it it started austere because there wasn't a lot of time for decoration because you were farming. The

humility, the humble materials and the simplicity is really the hallmark. And

today busy families often turn to this style as a way to simplify their life.

This property in Woodstock, New York, really embodies that craftsmanship spirit. I think they've simplified the

spirit. I think they've simplified the palette beautifully.

Everything is just warm whites, neutrals, light woods.

This kitchen is really stripped down.

There's no upper cabinetry. You've got

your cooking utensils right there on the counter. You've got your copper pots

counter. You've got your copper pots hung on the wall. The range looks so beautifully utilitarian with the metallic backsplash. Looks like it's

metallic backsplash. Looks like it's been wiped down a thousand times after a thousand beautiful meals.

So, in the bedroom, once again, you're wrapped in wood, but you've got kind of like alternating lines. You can sort of see how this house came together really.

The shiplap on the walls has been painted and then they've gone back to natural wood on the ceiling and it looks like natural wood on the floor. Throughout

this home, the floors are lovely.

They've been sort of just left to their own devices to just sort of age and patina. You can see the thousands of

patina. You can see the thousands of footsteps that have crossed the threshold of that house.

Also in upstate New York is this great property called Library Lane. And a

little bit more of a romantic take, I think, on a farmhouse property. A

fieldstone fireplace is the farmhouse equivalent of decadence. I think that that is pretty showy as far as farm houses go. And then the furnishings.

houses go. And then the furnishings.

Nothing gets me like a blanket thrown over a sofa. I think that that's really such a welcoming moment.

The quaint seating area off to the kitchen is a perfect spot to like curl up and drink your morning coffee. And

the pop of yellow also balances the white really beautifully.

The dining room is just one of the cutest things I've ever seen. The mix

match chairs has a really eclectic and put together vibe.

>> It's as if all of these chairs were scattered throughout the farm. It was

time to eat and everybody brought those chairs in, but they somehow worked at the end of the day.

These bedrooms are so simple. I can just feel the character of that bed. The wood

seems so rich. The textiles seem so tactile. and and it's really all credit

tactile. and and it's really all credit to, you know, the the lack of decoration in the rest of the space.

This is a quintessential American farmhouse. It's twostory, super

farmhouse. It's twostory, super symmetrical, and has a great porch.

I mean, this kitchen is so quintessentially farmhouse. Everything

quintessentially farmhouse. Everything is riddled with character. Everything

clearly has been chosen sentimentally.

Uh, but nothing's precious. Nothing's

delicate. You know, you could probably chop vegetables on any surface in that kitchen and be just fine.

There's a wood burning stove which is just so nostalgic. and even to this day really efficient for heating the home.

So, you're heading up the stairs which are fantastic. They've sort of got this

are fantastic. They've sort of got this paint stripe down the middle as if you just like removed a carpet runner and left whatever was there to fend for itself. Uh at the top of the stairs,

itself. Uh at the top of the stairs, you've got this bedroom.

You couldn't get simpler. There's no

crown. There's not a lot of trim.

There's no wallpaper. It's just a lovely bright light room with a beautiful bed in the middle and you can really appreciate all the details of the bed.

>> What I also like about this home is the bathroom design. When you walk in, you

bathroom design. When you walk in, you see the holy grail of bathtubs. You see

the cloth. They're super clean. They're

chic. And they originated in farmhouse design.

This other bedroom with the two dueling kids beds, I'm guessing, and the gingham check blanket.

Pairing it with a schoolhouse style desk just adds a lot of vintage charm. I

mean, that crackled paint finish on the desk is really magical.

Those are the things I think in a farmhouse space because of its simplicity, you really get the opportunity to appreciate the time that's passed in order to bring this

piece into the place that it is today.

Farmhouse style for me comes down to modesty, simplicity, and craftsmanship.

These are not spaces that are going for drama. You know, this is these are uh

drama. You know, this is these are uh humble spaces.

It it's really about humility and um a sense of modesty.

>> The one thing that I find to be the most pleasant thing about farmhouse design is the fact that everything is based off of neutrals,

but layered neutrals. You can have a beige pillow and you can have a white pillow stacked on top of it, but it's the NY texture that tells the story.

A great tip for farmhouse style is going to be pairing old with new. So, look for things that are not perfect. The paint

might be chipping, the stain might be weathered, but pairing that into a brand new home is going to add a lot of character.

I think you can go thrifting a little bit more with farmhouse style. It sort

of enjoys things that have lived hard lives that have character uh that maybe need a little spin and polish to them.

Uh that's made for farmhouse style.

I think if anything the last 10 years have told us is that people are very emotionally attracted to this style.

>> It's clean. It pays homage to the past and people love that.

It's easy living. It's approachable.

You can put your own take on it.

You can make it fun and you can make it yours.