Interior Design Trends for 2011 - Consumers Seek Personalised Products

The big design trends of 2011

will stem from consumers reassessing what they need to live comfortably, seeking innovation, finding a local balance in a global world, and searching for personalised products.
The book Interior Trends 2011 compiled by the expert committee of the international trend board at IMM Cologne predicts that more than before people will question their real needs in life and will address issues of balance while seeking products with personality and innovation.
The book predicts:

1. Emotional austerity

As a result of the financial crisis, people are questioning what it is they need to live well. This will lead to the emergence of simplistic, formal or severe designs that combine the basic and old with the modern and the high-tech.

2. Surprising empathy

Consumers are no longer content with re-imagined concepts and are instead forcing designers to push boundaries and create truly innovative new products. Aesthetically this trend is characterised by angular or folded structures, and ash greys or blacks brightened with dashes of yellows or orange.

3. Re-balancing

Consumers have grown tired of being bombarded by constant marketing and instead are searching for products that are personal and create a sense of home in an increasingly globalised world. Within this trend there is a preference for simple angular structures and soft natural materials such as wool.

4. Transforming perspectives

Designers are beginning to question the boundaries between art and design, the virtual world and the real world—leading them to propose radical new designs that experiment with archaic forms and nature. These designs are characterised by glass and metal complemented with hard and soft plastics that combine to form a changeable surface. – AFPrelaxnews

Source: thesundaily.com