How to style your home to suit your lifestyle and life stage

As a young mother I spent countless hours gushing over homewares and furniture online that I couldn’t afford. It was during this time my love of interior design began.

I had an insatiable appetite for interiors and not enough material, as design blogs only posted a couple of times per week back then. I was also frustrated by not being in a position to afford any of the beautiful things I saw.

But budget constraints didn’t stop me making progress on styling our home. I would frame the kids’ artworks in off-the-shelf frames; I would buy furniture from Gumtree and restore it; I would buy throw cushions at 40 per cent off. I eventually had enough money to buy a new sofa and ended up with an ugly dark charcoal modular so that it wouldn’t show marks made by the kids.

I’m older now and still can’t do all the things I would like to do with my home, but time has shown me there’s peace in accepting that the different stages of your life will offer different opportunities and approaches to your home.

It’s a journey and you have to play the long game. So here are my tips for getting the most from your homewares at any age.

Home design tips for your life stage

Two minute noodles and Ikea in your twenties

If you’re not shopping at Ikea, op shops, and Facebook Marketplace in your twenties are you even in your twenties?!  To be fair, I’m 41 and I still love a roadside or op shop find (never give up the thrift).

Few of us at this time of our lives are buying investment pieces for our home. The idea of “buy well and buy once” might be good in theory but when you’re flat-out paying rent and desperately saving to buy your first home, a $30,000 Italian sofa is hardly on the cards.

That said, don’t be defeated. There are ways to make your home feel loved and lived in that don’t include silk rugs and walls lined in natural stone. This is the time to get creative.

Hot tip: Seagrass rugs are having a moment and are so affordable.

‘Adulting’ in your thirties

Your thirties can be a whirlwind; a flurry of young kids (including nephews and nieces) and trying to keep momentum in your career while maintaining relationships with family and friends.

All going to plan, you might be a home owner and feeling even more inclined to improve your property.

This is a time when it’s fair that you’d want to own lovely linen bedding and a full set of matching dinner plates (although that’s overrated). You might even ask for an original artwork for a special birthday from a group of friends.

It’s not the time to be buying expensive rugs and velvet sofas, because your kids are going to smoosh food and dirt into those things like it’s nobody’s business and nobody has time to be worrying about that.

Stick to lovely washable slipcover sofas and inexpensive rugs until the kids learn food and toilet etiquette. And, in the meantime, enjoy the special pieces that the kids can’t destroy.

Investing in your forties

In your forties you’re potentially more established in your career and you may have a little bit more cash to splash, but that doesn’t mean you feel any clearer about your home style.

This is when I find home owners are more open to the idea of engaging professionals such as architects and interior designers and decorators to improve their home.

The kids are probably a bit older at this point and you likely have more hope that the new, expensive, timber dining table may not end up looking like the kids’ colouring books after a week in use.

Less is more in your fifties

In your fifties you might begin to want less. I find people in their fifties to be more discerning in what they have in their homes.

You might be using the phrase, ‘I don’t need another thing to have to dust.’

At this point you might be feeling it’s more important than ever that the home functions well, and be moving to a more utilitarian approach to your furniture – if it doesn’t serve a function, it’s got to go.

Empty-nesting in your sixties

As the kids fly the coop you may begin to shift your focus back to your own needs. Suddenly you’ll have extra space and spare rooms.

It might be the opportunity to indulge in the pleasures you’ve been kicking down the road since the kids were teenagers by transforming one of those empty bedrooms to accommodate a hobby.

You could build a meditation room, a sewing room, or an exercise/wellness room in one of the spaces no longer being used.

The glory years and beyond

In your golden years, you probably care about nothing as much as you care about comfort. You’re probably looking at smaller homes with fewer stairs to climb, and subscribe to the notion that nothing says luxury like lumbar support.

You’re also likely resolute that adhering to trends is absurd and nothing says “home” like framed photos of your family and sipping tea from your favourite teacup.

And you’d be right.

Led by a passion for interior design, Carlene runs Cedar and Suede, a full-service interior design studio based on the Gold Coast.