Farm-Style Looks You’ll Love (and What You Need to Know to Get Them!)

Farm-Style Looks You’ll Love (and What You Need to Know to Get Them!)

At Wood Country Building Services, we believe you don’t need to live out in the country to love the classic and comfortable design of farm-style décor. This popular design trend combines rustic inspiration with bright and clean style for a look that is anything but shabby. If you’re looking to put a little farm into your house, we’ve got three ideas to get the look on a budget.

Sliding Barn-Style Door

Sliding barn-style doors have become hugely popular, loved for their statement-making design, practical use and interesting hardware. You can buy a premade barn-style door ready to go, or you can use this cheap and easy alternative to make your own on a budget.

What You’ll Need:
A hollow core door
Flat prefab trim in the height of your choosing
Paint
Finishing nails or staples
Wood glue
Saw

A hollow core door can be purchased at a fraction of the cost of barn-style doors, and are much lighter and easier to work with. You can give it a barn-style look by adding flat prefab trim to emulate that detail. Frame the outside edges of the door with the trim and secure it with wood glue and finishing nails or staples. Then add decorative pieces in whatever design you choose, be it additional lines across the width of the door or a large X in the style of traditional barn doors. Fill the holes from nails/staples with wood filler or mud, let it dry and sand it down. Then do the painting. Get the barn door hanging hardware and install according to manufacturer's instructions.

Faux Shiplap

Shiplap walls are the modern way to add a wood feature wall to your house. This country chic look can come at a high price tag. You can create the same look using inexpensive pine underlayment and a little time.

What You’ll Need:
Long sheets of pine underlayment, enough for the square footage of the wall
Stud finder and nails
Sandpaper
Drywall mud
Level
Table saw

Ideally you will buy underlayment the same length as the width of your walls. If not, you can attach the faux shiplap in two pieces and fill the seams later. Cut your pine boards in strips, 4-6” wide, depending on your preference and what will best fit your wall. Sand down the edges of the strips so there are no rough sides. Using a level and a stud finder, secure the strips horizontally to the wall at the studs, leaving about a ¼” gap between each. Once all of your boards are in place, fill the nail holes with drywall putty and let it dry. Once it’s dried, sand the mud and prime and paint.

Faux Wainscoting

Wainscoting adds a beautiful touch of elegance to any room and is the perfect addition to any farmhouse-inspired décor. You can create this elegant feature for very little cost, but it will take some planning (and some math!).

What You’ll Need:
Paint
Painters tape
Chair rail moulding(and lots of it)
Level
Mitre saw
Caulking

What this idea saves in money, it takes up in planning, so get out a pen and paper, and a maybe a calculator, and get your design ready before you go shopping. You will design your faux wainscoting using chair rails – installing one line along your wall at the desired height of your wainscoting, and by using the chair rail to create small boxes to install along your wall, creating the wainscoting look.

You will need to measure the wall to determine what size to make the boxes and how many there will be. Ideally the boxes will all be the same width, but height can be changed to accommodate for windows or other obstructions.

Once you’ve figured out the size and number of boxes, you can buy enough chair rail trim to put it all together. Start by painting the bottom half of your wall white, you can make your wainscoting any height you choose. Tape off this section using painting tape to ensure a smooth line. Once this paint is dry, install your top line of chair rail using a level and nails.

Next, create the boxes, cutting the trim with a mitre saw at 45-degree angles to create a complete square. Install these squares, in pieces, onto the wall. Once all the squares are installed, you will use caulking to fill gaps at the corners of the squares to make them appear as one solid piece. Once the caulking is dry, paint your new faux wainscoting to match the wall.

Not only will you save money with these handy DIYs, but you can give your home a touch of that farmhouse-style design over the weekend.

If you need more information or have questions, visit Wood Country Building Services. Our team is always ready to help you with what you need. We're here to assist you in any way we can.