7 Old-School Interior Design Trends That ‘Grandmillennials’ Are Revitalizing
September 29, 2021
THOUGH 35, Whitney McGregor considers herself an old soul, an identity she shares with many young people drawn to unmodern things. The Greenville, S.C., designer—one of many self-identifying grandmillennials giving new life to traditional décor—embraces florals on florals and doesn’t quail in the face of scallop-trim.
Décor motifs like scallop-trim are subject to the trend-pendulum’s swing. “It all comes in cycles,” said 68-year-old Dallas designer Cathy Kincaid. When she graduated in 1974, she considered her midcentury-modern sorority house horribly dated. She spent the next 20 years finding fresh appeal in ornate dressmaker details like trims and tassels but, another two decades later, was peeling hand-painted scenic floral paper from her clients’ walls as midcentury came roaring back.
Today, in turn, many millennials covet patterns and ornaments their parents found frumpy. Ms. McGregor and her ilk find inspiration in historical American designers like Elsie de Wolfe, who brightened heavy Victorian interiors with trellises and chintz in the early 20th century, and Mark Hampton, who later in the century would cover walls, furniture and windows in the same floral print.
“We are looking back on what has stood the test of time,” said New York designer Lilse McKenna, 32, who swears by delicate Sister Parish patterns and Les Indiennes block prints. Style archaeologists like Ms. McKenna don’t just re-enact history, however, said Ms. Kinkaid: “They temper the traditional with the contemporary.”