You can't think about coastal style without conjuring up the beautiful colours of the ocean. This isn't to say that you must have blues and greens in a coastal style palette. A gorgeous tactile neutral palette also works well for coastal style decorating, however for my colour feature page for Country Home Ideas magazine this month, I have focused on the classic blue, white and green palette.
With beautiful fabrics from No Chintz and natural paints from Porters, both based in Sydney, this is a classic Sydney Coastal scheme. Double click on the image and click again to make it clearer!
Are you good at making cushions? If so, No Chintz has a great range of fabrics to really inspire you in your coastal style decorating. If not, then they will make them for you.
Don't be afraid to mix and match stripes, ikats and plains together. The trick is to ensure you find a colour link between them and use plain fabrics to break up the collection so that the eye has somewhere to rest. This way you can select the patterns that you love and know that they will work together.
You don't have to stick to just one colour but choose something as the dominant colour and then you can also introduce another colour for variation. Remember the 80/20 rule so that one colour is dominant and when you are starting out, it is a good idea to stick to simple related colour palettes, that is colours that sit next to each other in the spectrum. Coastal style is simple as you can work with the natural related colour palette of the ocean – beautiful blue and green.
I have lots of inspiration for classic and neutral style coastal schemes on my Pinterest boards which I would love you to follow – get in touch and let me know if you have any colour or decorating questions in the comments section below.
Related: Australian Coastal Style – 7 steps to achieve this look
Related: My top 7 tips for a classic coastal look
Related: A Coastal Style Vignette
Related: 7 tips for a neutral beachside scheme
