How to Change Your Home to Primitive Country

Assess your furnishings, accessories, light fixtures and window treatments to determine what can stay and be used in primitive country style rooms. Sell, donate or put the rest in storage.

Choose wall colors drawn from traditional country design. Muted colonial blue, terra cotta red, sage green and mustard yellow are common colors used in primitive country décor. Opt for neutrals like dove white or cream to act as backgrounds for folk art, stenciling and antique or reproduction furniture.

Pull up wall-to-wall carpet and install wood floors. Opt for wide pine planks. Paint or stencil them. Leave them unfinished to weather naturally like the floors in a vintage log cabin. Add braided area rugs or look for for canvas floor cloths like those found in a colonial era home.

Suspend rustic beams from the ceilings. Hang bunches of dried herbs and flowers as well as baskets from them. Install simple light fixtures made from wrought iron and designed to hold candles rather than light bulbs.

Install bead board on the walls. Put it halfway up and paint or paper the rest of the wall. Choose mini print wallpaper in star, heart or floral designs. Top the bead board with a shelf to be used for displaying collections and vignettes. Stencil above it in a colonial pineapple design or a country motif of salt box houses or checkerboards.

Furnish your rooms with wing chairs and camel back sofas. Upholster them in traditional motifs like plaids, checks and florals or opt for materials like burlap and heavy linen for a nubby, less polished look.Choose a steamer trunk or battered wooden bench for a coffee table. Use vintage wooden boxes as end tables.

Draw weathered Windsor chairs around a rustic farm table. Put well-worn cupboards to work as sideboards, media cabinets and storage. Employ a distressed chest of drawers complete with peeling paint as a bedside table or opt for a rustic plank bottom chair just large enough to hold a lamp fashioned from a small crock.

Layer quilts, homespun blankets and coverlets over chairs, couches and beds. Dress windows with muslin curtains hung on clothesline or twine nailed to the window frame.

Display a collection of crocks on an antique water bench in your kitchen. Hang a well-worn wooden plate rack on your dining room wall. Fill it with a collection of wooden bowls or old platters. Open the doors of a step-back cupboard and hang a folded quilt over one and a bunch of dried herbs on the other. Border a window with dried grapevines highlighted with dried berries and hydrangea blossoms.