Decorate like a designer: 6 affordable luxury style tips to elevate your home

Followtheflow // Shutterstock “Affordable luxury” might sound like an oxymoron, but as inflation grows in the United States and sustainability awareness increases, more people are looking for goods that meet their need for both quality and inexpensiveness. According to Bank of America, consumers in 2024 felt the effects of high inflation, with some “trading down to value or discount goods.” Along with needing to spend less, research shows that consumption patterns, especially among younger generations, are shifting to favor brands and businesses that prioritize the sustainability of their products. With less money in the pocket and sustainability in mind, consumers are looking for items that offer the hallmarks of craftsmanship–quality, durability, and artistry–at reasonable price points. Affordable luxury isn’t fast fashion–it’s the opposite. Not only is the production of low-quality clothing and goods associated with many environmental problems and exploitative labor practices, but it also feeds a system all about consuming more and more cheap goods. The affordable luxury trend, on the other hand, is actually about making high-end items accessible to more people. For luxury brands, this means selling more small goods like keyrings and wallets over purses and suitcases. For consumers, it’s purchasing quality over quantity and being intentional about where their dollars go–are brands actually engaged in sustainable manufacturing practices, or are they “greenwashing” the public? These patterns of adjusted spending are big motivators for brands and retailers to embrace the idea of luxe for less, but there are other influences igniting consumers’ desires, especially when it comes to affordable luxury in home decor. Social media platforms and televised design programs have amplified the desire for luxurious experiences and products in the home–and they’ve empowered audiences with knowledge about what to look for in those products. Lazzoni Modern Furniture curated six design trends bubbling up in 2025 that can help you achieve luxury at home without the hefty price tag. First, spend where it matters most fizkes // Shutterstock One of the most important qualities of furniture is craftsmanship. Unlike trends in fashion, where product disposability creates all kinds of trouble, your major pieces of furniture (think sofa, dining table, bed) are meant to last, so keeping them au courant is more of a matter of accessorizing than replacing them. Though it may seem like a good idea to freshen up your living space with the latest on-trend sofa, if your couch is a well-made classic, maybe you don’t need to spend on a new one. Instead, freshen it up with new pillows and a throw. But if guests are shifting uncomfortably on cushions so thin they can feel the sofa springs, maybe it’s time for a major purchase. Spend upfront on a piece that can carry you through any trend. Get grounded with a rug New Africa // Shutterstock The right rug can bring all the elements of a room together. Fluffy flokati or flat wool, Moroccan or made of recycled water bottles, a rug anchors your furniture, defining the space of the room. Layering rugs is a great way to achieve a more dynamic design or to add a new element–color, pattern, or texture. Plus, small rugs are much more affordable than large ones, so you can think of them like decorative pillows, something you can play around with and move to different parts of the room as your mood dictates–or even pull up when the season shifts. Change your light, change your life Olga Prava // Shutterstock The easiest way to elevate your decor is to change the lighting. If you want to go big, tackle the fixtures: It’s the quickest, most efficient way to switch up a style. Want to lean into glamour and go art deco? Change the fixtures! Do you feel like the vibe needs to be cleaner and more industrial? Ditto. If you don’t have the budget to transform fixtures, improve the lighting by experimenting with new bulbs or lamp placement. Try adding a table lamp in an unexpected place, like a kitchen counter. Smart light bulbs that adjust the light throughout the day to match the body’s circadian rhythms are not only a great way to add ambiance, they may also improve your sense of well-being. Add small pops of color Joseph Hendrickson // Shutterstock Take inspiration from a beautiful jewel box and think about how you can delight your decor by adding small elements of luxurious color. Maybe it’s adding pretty jewel-tone glassware to the dining room or a few velvet throw pillows on the couch? Perhaps a bright, vintage Murano glass paperweight for the bills on the office desk? Design-wise, tiny gestures can go a long way. Think about how it feels to be gifted something small and beautiful and then bring that spirit and color to your decor. What’s one affordable and deeply hued item that reminds you of life’s great pleasures? A beautiful candle, an antique vase, a felt coaster for the coffee table? Greenery steals the show Pixel-Shot // Shutterstock Plants are wonderful ways to enhance any decor–they add color and texture, and they clean the air too! The popularity of houseplants boomed during the COVID-19 pandemic, perhaps because plants were an affordable way to bring nature indoors when we couldn’t often go out. Indoor gardening remained an evergreen (sorry, couldn’t resist) trend as figures from the National Gardening Association attest, with Americans spending over $2 billion on indoor plants in 2021. Start by considering the conditions your particular plant requires so it can thrive, and consider the plant’s pot or container to be every bit as important an element of decor as the color of the plant’s leaves. Houseplants can act like punctuation in a room, accentuating its unique features, like adding height to emphasize a high ceiling or popping up where we need a bit of direction–see this great example of styling a bar cart with plants. Splurge on a centerpiece Followtheflow // Shutterstock Flowers are an easy, age-old way to add a bit of affordable elegance to your decor. Whether it’s a big formal arrangement or some simple blooms in a bowl of water, fresh flowers have a way of waking up a room–literally adding life and beauty to whatever surrounds them. They become a focal point, even if they’re not in the center of the table. And the floral trend certainly extends beyond the cut flower variety–floral motifs are popping up everywhere from fabrics to light fixtures–so don’t hesitate to buy or craft your own centerpiece. It’s not old-fashioned. It’s what a designer would do! Story editing by Natasja Sheriff Wells. Copy editing by Paris Close. Photo selection by Clarese Moller. This story originally appeared on Lazzoni Modern Furniture and was produced and distributed in partnership with Stacker Studio.