Nordic New England Farmhouse Design Inspiration

We arrived in Woodstock late last week and getting back to this house immediately reminded me of all the projects we have to do up here. Some fun ones and others not so much (deciding what we do about the vinyl siding :/). But there’s nothing we love more than a good project, and a challenge.

One thing I’m asked about a lot is our process. How do we get started and what do we decide to do first? I did talk about that a bit in this post, and in this house, Craig gutted or partially gutted a considerable amount: all the bathrooms, the kitchen, the basement, all the trim, and other random built-ins around the house. Since we bought the house (a little less than a year ago now) Craig has refinished the floors, renovated the kitchen and main bathroom, Marin’s room, renovated the basement, guest bedroom and basement bathroom, replaced the popcorn ceilings and partially renovated the living room. We still have a lot of projects to do including building a mudroom in part of our basement, finishing our bedroom, furnishing the living room, finalizing the dining situation in our kitchen, replacing the siding, and refinishing the deck.

Whenever we start a project we always begin by looking for inspiration. I like to describe the style of this house as Nordic New England Farmhouse. We certainly are not minimalists, but we definitely find inspiration from Nordic design, and of course we love New England Farmhouse style too. We also live in a ranch, so we have limitations. A lot of the ideas we find are not quite realistic for our tiny ranch homes, but we find ways to use them as a jumping off point for something that will work in our space. We both love Pinterest for design and decor ideas, you can follow me HERE. These are some of the images and ideas that are getting us excited for more projects this fall and winter. Follow along on our IG @thecozyranch too!

I’m always looking for great design and decor blogs or IG accounts too. Let me know any favorites in the comments.

Nordic New England Farmhouse Inspiration

I’m a huge fan of Jacey’s decor and design style, but it’s usually not in our budget lol. I really like this cozy nook with the windsor dining bench and round table. It’s perfect for the space we have in our Vermont kitchen, though we need to recreate this on a smaller scale. We are hoping to go antiquing and find a similar style dining bench to go with our table.

I LOVE every corner of Elise’s home. Every little detail is just so thoughtful and she is also hilarious so highly recommend giving her a follow on IG if you’re not already. This cabinet/locker situation in her mudroom is giving me major inspo for our basement. We have no mudroom in our upstairs (just a TINY closet when you walk in the house). Craig created this space for coats and hats which is great, but living in New England in the winter you need somewhere for all of your gear. We want to create a space to store boots, snowboard/cross country ski gear, bikes, etc. Since you can access our basement from the outside of the house it’s the perfect spot to create a mudroom.

This mudroom design by Becki Owens is another one I really like. I think this could be a great ikea hack and Craig could build a bench with store bought lumber and then use the IKEA PAX for the upper cabinets. We’re trying to figure out what we can actually get from IKEA as a lot of things are not available for delivery. We probably will paint the floors in the basement. As much as I’d love to do tile it’s not worth the expense for the space.

Honestly I am having a really hard time finding anything that resembles what I want in our living room. It’s a funky (and small) space, with a fireplace, a large window on one side and the front door on that same wall. I am 99% positive I want to get the Sixpenny Gabriel chairs to face our sofa which is the Sixpenny Elias. I ordered some fabric swatches to figure out what color I want to do. The chairs are roomy without being too big for the space (I think). I’m hoping to find an antique coffee table, and some antique side tables. We found a great rug from New England Loom that I love. I want to fill the room with lots of different frames and prints like this eclectic gallery wall by Rejuvenation.