What comes to mind when we hear the phrase “luxurious interior”? Ornate plaster ceilings, carved furniture legs, gilding? Or perhaps dark wooden panels, Persian rugs, and massive furniture? In reality, today’s millionaires and regular Forbes listers prefer interiors styled as luxurious minimalism. Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos live in sleek, restrained spaces. Even Kim Kardashian, whose name has almost become synonymous with excess, shocked everyone with the austerity of her interior, designed by renowned designer Axel Vervoordt, a fan of the Japanese wabi-sabi aesthetic. The eccentric rapper Kanye West bought a house in Malibu designed by Japanese minimalist Tadao Ando. The ostentatious wealth of interiors imitating Versailles is becoming a thing of the past, driven by changes in both the pace of life and societal values. The very concept of luxury is transforming along with us. Today, luxury means time and silence—both auditory and visual. People are tired of the aggressive outside world; they want to turn their homes into quiet havens where they can spend time with family and loved ones.
WHAT DEFINES LUXURIOUS MINIMALISM IN INTERIOR DESIGN?
First and foremost, it’s a neutral color palette. A home with too many flashy and bright colors looks loud and disorganized. The secret to the best luxurious minimalist designs lies in the skillful use of a limited number of tones. However, the interior doesn’t have to be entirely white, as in Kim Kardashian’s home. Beige, gray, and brown shades are recommended. They create the perfect foundation for the decor. Soft greenery highlights cream and soft gray tones, creating a natural and calm atmosphere. Sandy white shades combined with subtle coral and blue hues evoke the feeling of a summer beach house all year round.
The second characteristic of this style is the abundance of open space and the absence of too many objects in one room. “Less is more,” said minimalist architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, meaning that the items accompanying you in daily life must be carefully selected. Functional minimalism in interiors implies that every object has a purpose, and the space between them should not be filled unnecessarily. In minimalist aesthetics, emptiness is self-sufficient. It serves as a kind of “blank canvas” for the eye and mind to rest on.
Luxurious minimalism values natural materials and craftsmanship. It encourages rejecting fleeting trends and overconsumption, instead investing in things that will last a long time. Furniture made from rare woods, skillfully crafted leather, carefully chosen parquet, and wallpaper made from hand-crafted washi paper—all of these are expensive but will bring joy for many years. Such furniture and finishing materials do not lose their charm over time. On the contrary, they only get better with age, acquiring a kind of “patina”—the very essence of the Japanese wabi-sabi philosophy, which is built on the beauty of time and aging.
DESIGN PROJECTS IN LUXURIOUS MINIMALISM STYLE
There’s a joke: a client comes to an architect asking for a minimalist home, and the architect replies, “Unfortunately, you don’t have enough funds for such a house.” Indeed, minimalism requires precise solutions and high-quality workmanship. In other styles, flaws in the finish can be hidden with plaster moldings or velvet drapes, but minimalism harshly highlights them, unforgiving of mistakes. Creating a project in the style of luxurious minimalism requires an experienced and skilled architect. Japanese architects are recognized masters of the minimalist style, and the “Ideologist” company collaborates with many bureaus and studios from the Land of the Rising Sun. With us, you can order a design project for your house or apartment that combines traditional techniques of Japanese minimalism with the best elements of the modern world.
