Gong Hei Fat Choy 2022! Celebrating Chinese-Inspired Design

February 1st is just around the corner, and this year means it’s time to celebrate Chinese New Year. Whether you’re planning to usher in the Year of the Tiger with an epic roar or not, there’s so much about the beauty of Chinese art and style worth celebrating.

Art isn’t just about what you can see. It’s also about how it makes you feel. This is undoubtedly true of Chinese interior design, making anyone who enters the room feel cozy and relaxed when they step inside. How can you do that, too? 

Today, we’ll turn to traditional Chinese style—aka Asian style—for inspiration for taking your home, office, or any other space you love to new heights. We’ll give you ideas for incorporating Chinese interior design through different types of furniture, flooring, and decor to bring more timeless, ancient elegance into your life.

Elevating Your Home or Office Style With Asian-Inspired Furniture

One of the easiest ways to bring Chinese interior design into your home is by incorporating Asian-style furniture. 

Somehow, simultaneously simple and ornate, Asian-style furniture uses a lot of exposed wood with deep, rich tones and is often ornately carved, heavily lacquered artistic flourishes. And cushions are usually crisp, taut, simple, solid-colored, or exquisitely patterned. 

There’s a strong similarity between modern decor’s clean, bold, unimposing aesthetic and Asian-styled furniture design. Both give the eye—and the room’s energy—free range to roam. Stroll through these rooms to get a sense of what we mean.

Now let’s zoom in a bit closer. Consider adding an Asian-inspired coffee table. Something with carved wood and rounded edges that ground and center — visually appealing but unpretentious. Also, one heck of a conversation starter. Pair it with chairs letting their traditional style influence shine like hardwood, rattan, or bamboo. Or lean modern with sleek upholstered armchairs with wood accents.  

Many new and antique Asian-style chairs are available in different shapes and styles. Let yourself explore and find the right feel for your space.

Ready for a new sofa? Upgrade in style and Chinese interior design inspiration without sacrificing comfort or trendy edge. Lean, crisp, and modern. Perhaps even tighten it up with tufting. And for your new upholstery — or reupholstery — try a simple, calming, off-white cotton-blend tweed. Or go bold and elegant with cotton in a gray Chinoiserie pattern.

Whether you stick with a Western-style sofa and tweak it with some traditional Chinese fabric or add a Chinese-style couch to the design mix, your sofa can be a great accent piece to bring some of that Asian design into your home.

Find That Chinese Interior Design Flow and Feel Through  Flooring

Simplicity. We’re hitting the thesaurus hard today to find new ways to say “simple.” It’s such a central pillar of what makes Asian design feel calming, grounding, and energetically free to flow.

That’s why adding some Asian-style flooring is another way to bring Chinese interior design into your favorite space. Flooring introduces simplicity through smooth, organic surfaces like wood or marble. Visually, it doesn’t clutter or weigh a space down with textures or visual noise. Practically, it’s easy to clean and maintain.

Choose wood in a color that’s more on the warm side. Think golden tones or deep browns to make your room feel warmer and cozier. Of course, bamboo is the ideal traditional go-to type of wood, but any polished or laminated option will fit the bill. Or stick with your existing wood floor and DIY it with a coat of paint or a sand, stain, and lacquer project. 

For another quintessential Chinese flooring option for your home use smooth and polished marble or stone floor tiling — again, simple. And amp up the impact of whatever flooring your choose by contrasting the color of the wood or stone flooring with the color of the walls and you’ll further open up the energy of the space. Cool, right?

One last flooring idea is tatami matting. Tatami mats are made with woven straw and typically come in a natural brown color. Though traditionally more closely associated with Japanese design, they fit right in with the uncluttered expansiveness of most Chinese design styles. They’re also easy to clean and maintain since you can sweep or vacuum them.

How To Incorporate Chinese Art and Design Style in Your Home Decor

Furniture and flooring are essential to set the vibe, but let’s look at the huge difference small decor can make. With the flow, simplicity, and boldness of Asian design, less is decidedly more. Avoid overcrowding spaces with too many different colors, patterns, and pieces all mixed. 

One easy way (and delightfully kitschy) is using paper lanterns for decorative lighting. For example, you can place one in your dining room window or on a small table close to the front door. Try hanging a string of lanterns bordering an accent wall, or go all-in and cover the ceiling.

Bring Asian art into your home with a painted folding screen, porcelain vase, or wooden sculptures. Add natural elements like a tabletop rock garden or bamboo plants. Hang some Chinese-inspired wall art — often made from silk and celebrating the country’s rich history, landscape, and culture. Think in terms of showcasing pieces rather than filling a room. Again, less is more.

And then there’s our old friend, the throw pillow. Given the traditionally simple wooden frame of Asian-style chairs and sofas, throw pillows provide an excellent opportunity for a pop of design style and a bit of a comfort upgrade.

Try adding throw pillows in a light and lovely textured linen fabric with a crewel embroidered Floral Asian pattern. Or bring in more of the smooth elegance of the feel of silk in a latticed patterned deep burgundy — sure to pop with elegance against any solid-colored sofa or wooden chair.

Finally, and just because it works design-wise and it’s fun, try using items with a meaning behind them, such as the zodiac animal symbol of the year. Or hang art featuring Chinese calligraphy that holds meaning you want to infuse your space with. Maybe go with pieces calligraphed with words like peace, joy, or home.

For Love of the Simple Sophistication of Asian Design Style

Wow, there are far more ideas, inspiration, and possibilities in Chinese-inspired interior design than could be explored in brief. But if Asian style design is calling you, we hope we got the ideas flowing and whet your appetite for more. 

Remember: simplicity is the key. By keeping the space simple, you’ll give this ancient, elegant, and sophisticated interior design style room to shine and lift the look and feel of your space while you’re at it.

As ever, when you’re trying to find just the right upholstery for your new Asian-inspired sofas, chairs, headboards, pillows, drapes, and more. We love helping you. Give us a call today. Xin nian kuai le! (Happy Chinese New Year!)