How to Easily Integrate the Cottagecore Home Aesthetic
Do you love the romanticized look of cottage gardens and simple living? The idealized view of rural living has become a huge home decor trend and I’m here for it! However, I’m not going to completely change my personal style to the cottagecore aesthetic. Instead, I’m going to incorporate bits and pieces into my modern organic home. Today, I want to give you some tips to do the same. Learn how to easily integrate the cottagecore home aesthetic into your home so you don’t have to completely revamp your style.
This post may contain affiliate links where I earn a small commission on your purchases at no additional cost to you.
What is Cottagecore?
Over the last decade you may have noticed a trend towards simple rural living. However, you may not have realized that it has a name! Cottagecore is a lifestyle trend that has integrated into fashion, interior design and vocation. It is the idealized elevation of rural living. It takes all of the beauty of cottage style gardens and combines it with rural country design and ways of life.
Granted, it elevates country living to focus in on the most romantic elements. Some of these include:
- Abundantly beautiful gardens (without the pests and weeds)
- Happy-go-lucky farm life (think cuddly lambs and chicks without the poo)
- Simple living (enjoying homemade butter without showing the hours it takes to make it)
- Cottage-style interiors (lots of rustic elements, mismatched furnishings, basic tools)
Cottagecore truly romanticizes rural living. English countrysides come to mind when I think about it. I love the way it brings out the most enjoyable parts of cottage living and shines a light on the beauty that can be found in this simple lifestyle.
A lot of our “vintage artwork” that we see in modern homes has the cottagecore aesthetic at its foundation.
Why I love the Cottagecore Trend
There are quite a few reasons I love the cottagecore trend. This design trend:
- Reminds me of beautiful places I’ve visited in Europe
- Slows life down to a peaceful pace
- Brings in old-world charm in a manageable way
- Elevates the beauty of everyday things
If I wanted to fully embrace the cottagecore lifestyle, I would also fully embrace it as my interior design style. However, I don’t want to go full-bore on simple living, making my own {insert popular homemade items here}, or managing huge elaborate gardens.
I simply want to incorporate my favorite elements from this trend into my current design aesthetic. So here are some simple tips if you want to do the same!
How to Easily Integrate the Cottagecore Home Aesthetic Into Your Home
There are a few ways to add cottagecore home style to your home without a full revamp of your design style. Thankfully, it is a fairly versatile design style that makes it easy to pick and choose smaller facets of the design trend that you love.
1. Incorporate Cottagecore Home Artwork
Like the beautiful painting above, adding cottagecore home artwork is one of the simplest ways to bring in the overarching feeling this design embodies.
As you can see in my kitchen, I’ve added a small vintage painting on the left that idealizes a countryside landscape. It is one of my favorite paintings I found while thrifting with my mom. It uses lots of movement, a blended stroke technique and subtle colors.
Adding artwork with a cottagecore aesthetic is a very simple way to bring in this vibe without it feeling out of place or overbearing.
2. Use Organic Materials: Basic Linens and Quilts
Another simple way to add cottagecore home to any design style is to use organic materials. Linen, stone washed cotton, and quilts are fabrics that all give a nod to the cottagecore home style. If it is natural, it fits!
Avoid shiny fabrics, like polyester, or overly high-end fabrics, like velvet. If it wasn’t common for the everyday rural household in the “olden days” then it won’t quite fit into this aesthetic.
I like to bring these organic textiles into my home with simple cotton blankets and duvet covers, and knit blankets in the bedroom and living room. I also use linen dish towels in the kitchen, which adds just a touch of simple living to the mix.
3. Bring in the Outdoors
Bringing in the outdoors is the easiest way to add cottagecore to your home. You can do this in a variety of ways:
- Indoor plants
- Fresh flower bouquets
- Opening doors and windows
- Botanical accents
Most of the ways you can incorporate the outdoors is free or very affordable! Pick a bouquet straight from your yard or let the breeze come in and enjoy some fresh air.
None of these are particularly “cottagecore home” specific, but rather they help evoke that feeling of cottagecore, no matter your current design style. At it’s core, this design trend is all about enjoying the simple things of life and I love how bringing the outdoors in can accomplish that immediately.
4. Mix in cottagecore home elements
The next step takes this to a much more design-style-specific tip. So far we’ve talked about ways to add in touches of this trend here and there, but now let’s talk about keying in on true cottagecore home decor elements.
When I think of cottagecore, I think of the lifestyle of someone who lived in the 1800s. Using stone mortar and pestles to grind herbs because that is what they had to use, rather than because they are naturally beautiful.
Using carved wooden spoons to stir the soup because they could make them on their own, rather than because they won’t scratch the pot.
And, using dough bowls and wood cutting boards daily so they could feed their family, rather than because they are pretty to display!
Take it back to the basics when incorporating cottagecore into your home.
How to Mix Modern & Cottagecore Decor
The point of this article is to share how to use cottagecore in your home, no matter your design style. So let’s take a minute and explore that a little further.
The image below has some cottagecore elements and some that are in stark contrast. Can you spot the difference?
Cottagecore Kitchen Elements
- Wooden tray
- Wooden spoon
- Ironstone serving dishes
- Stone mortar and pestles
- Cutting boards
- Earthenware dishes
Non-Cottagecore Kitchen Elements
- Plastic mixing bowl
- Plastic Measuring Cups
- Bright and colorful pots
I love that this is a great example of how you can mix in certain design elements of cottagecore without them feeling like they don’t “fit”. I love the modern convenience of today’s kitchenware and don’t want to sacrifice that to “fit into a style”.
So when you are searching for cottagecore home-specific decor, keep in mind that it doesn’t have to be all-or-none. You can add touches of this style here and there to ground your other design aesthetics.
5. Mix in Statement Makers
One of the easiest ways I like to bring a design style into my home, without completely converting to it, is to add statement makers.
While my kitchen island isn’t 100% within this design style, the turned legs make a statement that screams of simpler times. Times when craftsmanship was slow and methodical and not automated.
Similarly, in my dining room I’ve added large corbels, lots of greenery and cottagecore organic elements like pottery, wood and ironstone. These work well because they fit within the cottagecore trend but also work beautifully with more widespread trends like modern farmhouse, organic vintage, and casual modern.
It’s a wonderful way not to silo yourself into one design style, but rather, fit within many.
6. Get Out Your Gardening Gloves
The final way to fully embrace this lifestyle trend is to garden! While this might not be a realistic option for some, it is a large part of why this trend is so popular. Gardens are, quite obviously, a stunning part of any home.
Climbing vines, flowering trees, and lush gardens all create such a magical retreat to enjoy. My garden is just starting out, but this summer I hope to see it flourish!
Last summer we did a lot of work to establish a flower garden area next to our vegetable patch.
I can’t wait to see what it does this summer. It will only be the second year of growth so I’m hoping it will take off quickly! You can see how we created this garden area in the posts below!
Decor Sources & Stay Connected
I hope that these simply 6 tips for how to easily integrate the cottagecore home aesthetic into your home have been helpful! You can find my shoppable home decor sources linked for you in the images below.
Thanks so much for stopping by the blog today! I hope that you’ll stay connected by subscribing to the blog and following along with me on social media! I do daily projects full of tips and tricks over on Instagram and share tons of inspiration on Pinterest!
Interesting. I didn’t know it had a name and, having grown up on a working farm in northwest Missouri, had to laugh at the fact that you’ve figured out how much work the real thing is! I’ve left country far behind, but do find I enjoy the nostalgia of incorporating some of the Cottage Core ideas you note in my kitchen.
I’m glad you enjoyed it!
Like it. But liking it doesn’t mean you’ll own it. That’s what I find quite unfortunate.
I love your explanation of cottagecore. I had never even heard this term until one of my clients mentioned it to me. I love the simplicity of it all.
It’s a beautiful style!
I think you’ve made me fall in love with the cottagecore style! I love how you’ve incorporated cottagecore into all the rooms in your home even though your home is quite modern. I love mixing old and new too so it’s not surprising that I love your style!
Thank you so much!
Loved that info. I had never heard of cottagecore but Iโve been doing it! Now I can do more with more understanding of it! Thanks
I’m so glad!