Um. I am not completely sure. I've taken the tests in BHG's New Decorating Book. (Not the new/new one, but the old/new one...) They come out different based on the day of the week I take the test. And the lines are so blurred these days too. Some rooms that seem very Transitional to me, are very specifically tagged "Traditional Decorating" in the magazine article.
OK. So help me here. I know that I am not comfortable in Contemporary. Not if that means lots of hard lines, steel tubing and bare surfaces anyway. So let's rule that one out.
Now, Traditional. Well, I think that MIGHT fit me better. I do like Chippendale and Sheraton, chenilles and cotton matelasse. I love antiqued looking frames and lamps. A nice rustic, rough-hewn table appeals greatly, along with Blue Willow platters and persian rugs.
But if traditional means matching side tables and a topiary on either side of the mantel, a four-poster bed and windsor chairs, then, no, maybe not.
So, what really is Transitional anyway? Would it mean an antique rug with a tiered glass ball lamp? Could it mean a rattan bed with very modern looking bedding? I think Transitional is confusing. And I used to call myself Eclectic, but only in my head, never out loud. Then, everyone said they were eclectic and I realized that maybe I wasn't after all.

How about a brand new category?

Estatical: This is where you shop mostly at estate sales, garage sales, and Ebay--supplementing furniture pieces you have already been making payments on and are tired of, but can't afford to replace yet. You have pictures on the wall purchased at Home Interiors parties in the 80's and 90's, but you also have some great vintage stuff you picked up for a song.

Maxximizer: Everything in your house, with the possible exception of your sofa and beds, came from one of the TJMaxx line of stores--HomeGoods, TJMaxx, Marshalls. Your mattresses are Sam's Club or Costco, and you have an antique dresser left to you by your Grandma. Target supplies the
details.

Early Hovel: This is the easiest style to spot. Every single item in your home was sold more than a decade ago and should have been replaced before the last Presidential election. You hate all of it. Nothing goes with anything else, there are no springs in the sofa, the side tables belong on the side of the road, and if you had anything else to take their place, all those plastic flowers in ugly vases would be Gone. And.......this part is especially important in identifying the proud owner of Early Hovel....your DH thinks everything is fine. He loves the laminate paneling and the rotting recliner. Farrah posters will be back in style in the next few years, and by George, he's hanging on to his!

Waiting-For-Chic: You have style, you have taste, you have ideas and panache. What you don't have is time/and/or/money to get anything done. You bought your home, got all excited and moved in. You had a big garage sale and sold most of your old (probably Early Hovel) stuff, and now you have lots of cool rooms, some with high ceilings and art niches, or maybe great hardwood floors and exposed beams, but no real furniture or art or rugs. You're eating on Home Depot barstools at the kitchen counter, or at a card table with folding chairs you borrowed from your folks. You don't know what kind of dining set you want yet, you can't paint because you don't have furniture, and you don't want to order furniture until the room is painted. You eat a lot of take out. And you drool over those beautifully done Pottery Barn or Crate & Barrel rooms. You want to entertain and your friends are clamoring for an Open House, but you're stuck in decorating limbo.

I think pretty much all of my made-up styles are Transitional. What do you think?

Red

Red, you have to write a book about home decor, it would be a best seller !!!!!!

Oh my goodness red, that is snort-the-tea-out-my-nose funny, especially the last one, which has a strange ring of reality to it!

LOLHOOOOHOOO Red, that was funny!

lol Red! I believe I've evolved from early hovel into traditional estatical with the passage of time.

To answer the question without any doubt I am traditional. I think any doubt I ever had was dismissed with the recent acquisition of my four poster with tester bed gigantor and his matching night stands and lingerie chest.

Traditional, generally. "It goes with everything!". But also eclectic... I have a lot of very cool, inherited furniture from a variety of sources and time periods.

Generally, I like a home that seems "established" and to ME, that is "traditional" (I'm closing in on 50 and am the youngest in my family).

But that didn't stop me from snapping up a very cool patio set last month... the purchased pieces are the same as the 2 chairs I shoved in the back of the station wagon a little over 3 yrs. ago. Someone had put them on the kerb, lol!

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Red, how amazing you are. You are one who knows her own heart and what she likes, you have a sense of humor and are finely attuned to accomplishing what you want with accuracy. I bet your family tries to keep up with you :)

Chelone, let me know when I can go shopping with you. I never found much kerbside, but I have enjoyed the English brass bread box, the teteure I have roses and clematis growing on and the Eeyore toy box the month my #1 grandson was born, which his parents had been looking for high and low.

Oh Red, you are too funny. I forgot about Home Interior parties. I remember going to those wishing I had enough money to do my whole apartment with their stuff. lol.

I was watching Karen McAloon on HGTV yesterday and she described a couple's style as bohemian chic - uncluttered, some old stuff, some Pottery Barn stuff (though she didn't use the PB words), and lots of textures. I could call my decorating style bohemian chic, though not in clothing. There I am firmly entrenched in Lands End preppy.

Very good Red! I felt you were telling the story of MY life! I have no idea what my style is but I pretty much fall into all of your made up categories! Nicely done!

Too funny! My style is what I cal transitional. definitly not contemporary and not traditional, though I have elements of both in many rooms. So, I am going with transitional. Here's some transitional rooms, according to HGTV.com, so I am going by that as my definition.

Here is a link that might be useful: Transitional Style

Red, that's just too darn funny...and very true!

Rather eclectic-ish traditional here - there's actually a fairly narrow range that appeals to me, so stuff tends to fall together relatively easily. There are a few more current pieces that push the "traditional" toward "eclectic", just because they fit our needs and budget at the time and worked all right with the places we lived in at the time (more contemporary than our current digs), but most of it's bland or generic enough that it sort of disappears. I'm looking forward to phasing out some of it, although I'm still fond of my leather couch. One of the suckier things about moving four times in seven years!

What Red calls "Early Hovel" we always called "Early Attic and Neo-Yardsale". :-) Up until about 5 years ago that was our decorating "style", if you could call it that, and we both loathed it. (DH actually does have an interest in decorating, nowhere near as much as I do but if a color is "off" it with drive him NUTS! LOL) Apartments full of cheap/scrounged, battered, often rickety junk and not a plug nickel to replace any of it. I have developed a passionate hatred of futon couches as a result of that era. ;-) We did have a "Frasier" recliner for about a year, but it went back out on the curb the day we brought a kitten home. I have a shortage of convenient relatives from whom to mooch ;-) inherit really interesting furniture (and a shortage of said interesting furniture, actually, since for the most part they much preferred getting rid of "that old junk" in favor of new matching sets that looked tatty within a decade), unfortunately.

Well, we always fell into the eclectic (mooched) style, but I have recently decided to steer in the direction of cottage style. Mostly due to pics of zuzuspetals wonderful rooms.

I was looking at her pix and had one of those epiphanies and realized I was decorating around hand me downs of other peoples styles. I'm getting rid of some lovely handmedowns and moving on to what I love. I've always been drawn to pictures of lighter brighter relaxed cottagey sort of homes, but with the handmedowns and our dark woodwork, I thought I couldn't do it. Well I'm going to go for it and see what happens. And, hey, if I get sick of it 5 yrs down the road, I'll change to something else. That's the glory of decorating (especially if most of your furniture is curbside finds).

Red, loved the part about dh thinking everything looked fine and why change anything. I can relate to that! I hear that on ANYTHING I want to decorate. "We just painted that not too long ago".....it was 10 years ago.

Dora Lou

I was "Hand-Me-Down Eclectic" for many years, but now that I'm married and we have a little money I'm solidly in "Hand-Me-Down-Estatical Chic".

I have some great pieces from different generations of family, super finds at antique/flea markets and curb side browsing, along with an amazing TWO upholstered pieces we bought new. OH! and two brand new ceiling fans!
I rarely shop for furniture at actual furniture stores. All of my case goods have been in a few homes before they came to me :)

If I had to pigeon-hole myself, I would have to pick Traditional. It just SOUNDS too narrow, though.

LOL Red! We are definitely stuck in the last category, with the new house. At least our painting is done now though! =)

Red, your categorizations are hilarious. Other than "early hovel", I found myself answering "yeah, that's me" to every one! Actually, I will admit to being traditional. For a while I was in denial about it (I thought traditional was too boring and predictible!) but realize that while I have a bit of a mix going on in my house it all has traditional roots one way or another.

What a refreshing thread! Red, hats off to you once again for being a great and funny communicator.

I think my style is Ever-Changing Bohemian Shock. :D

Oh THANK YOU texaspanhandler.............I thought I was the only one with a DH like that "What do you mean paint it a different color, that would cost at least $60" "It looks fine" or my favorite "Nothings wrong with it, why change it" speaking of all our 70's & 80's hand-me-downs LOL.

For more than half of our 9 year marriage we decorated in Apathetic Academic style. We were so busy we just didn't care what we threw together, and we lived in a succession of rentals that kept getting smaller and cheaper as my student loans (and degrees) increased. Our old house now sets the tone for what we have. It's generally an eclectic mix of things, probably leaning toward the more traditional.

My house started out as "hand-me-down", then I learned to fix things up that I sort of liked to make them work and replaced the things that had no meaning to me. We definitely have a country style. Very simple, homey and well, some would say "cluttered" but I like my little collections and finds so I don't care what others think.

I have some traditional pieces and some not too common pieces that I have used in the house for decoration purposes. I love antiques, but the simpiler Primitive antiques used back in the day for every day life, nothing fancy. I love painted wood, rusted metal and distressed items and finding new uses for them than what they were traditionally used for. :)