“I like mixing wood, but some people find it creepy,” says interior designer Gabriela Eisenhart, founder and principal of Atlanta-based design agency Silo Studios. “You can’t get that warmth and that extra dimension with any other decorating method.”
Of course she’s right. Mixing wood tones is a little scary for laypeople. It goes against everything we’ve learned, all the rules we think exist in the design world (spoiler: there really are no hard and fast rules to decorating).
When you see a picture of a Scandinavian style living room, it’s usually just light oak, or in a more traditional room it’s often just walnut, so we think we need to pick one wood tone and stick with it throughout.
But if you’re brave enough to try, mixing wood tones can give you some creative freedom and create elevated and layered color combinations. Rooms that look like they were put together not from a design-by-numbers manual, but by someone with flair and an eye for beauty. Here’s how to do it right, no matter what your decorating style is.
In 2012, Gabriela Eisenhart founded her first studio, Gabriela Eisenhart Interiors. To expand her reach, she partnered with a Los Angeles-based interior designer to launch WAKE + LOOM in 2016. In 2023, after more than a decade as an entrepreneur, she opened the doors to her third studio, Silo Studios, which she named after her two sons. Since then, with the support of her all-female team, Gabriela has transformed homes in Atlanta and elsewhere to make residents feel comfortable while incorporating coveted Mediterranean style into the design.
Why mix wood species in decorating schemes?
(Image credit: Marc Mauldin. Design by Silo Studios)
“Wood just adds such a beautiful natural texture that you can’t get anywhere else,” says Gabriela. “It adds warmth. The spaces I design tend to be quite clean and minimalist, but they are anchored by wood and given warmth by its texture and tone.”
Gabriela is convinced that a home only looks designed through the mixture of different wood tones and not as if it were pieced together.
“Mixing wood tones gives a room a much more organized feel,” she says. An example of this is the bedroom she designed above. “And look, I don’t like design rules. But I would say that when you feel confident enough to mix wood tones, rooms feel much more curated.”
She cites a recent bathroom renovation project as a prime example. “I use a lot of white oak,” says Gabriela. “And I just finished an organic modern bathroom with a lot of limestone and natural honed marble. Then there was a large white oak vanity that took up about 80% of the wall. When it was finished, it was all very beautiful and calming, but there was something missing, that extra element that would bring it all together.”
Gabriela went antique hunting and found a vintage walnut stool, “that was all weathered and water-stained and full of character, and suddenly the whole room seemed more collected.”
How difficult is it to mix wood tones?
(Image credit: Marc Mauldin. Design by Silo Studios)
Gabriela admits that this approach is not for the faint of heart, but if you follow her guidelines, you can achieve great success. “It can be difficult to mix wood tones because you have to be prepared to work with tonal differences,” she says. “For example, white oak and walnut are very different but still work, while white oak and weathered oak don’t go over well because they’re almost too similar.”
In this dining room above, Gabriela experimented with woods that are similarly toned but brought in different textures, which helped add that extra dimension she always strives for. “The dining room was tonally monochromatic, but because the textures are so different, it still has a lot of character,” she says.
What are the best wood tone combinations?
(Image credit: Marc Mauldin. Design by Silo Studios)
Gabriela says she’s very instinctive in her selection, “which I have to admit isn’t very helpful,” but she finds that white oak and walnut go particularly well together. The trick is that no one wood tone ever stands alone.
“I have a piano from the 1900s at home, an heirloom, and I knew I had to upgrade it somehow because I would never get rid of it,” says Gabriela. “It’s made of fine walnut, but my floors are oak.” To tie the two together, Gabriela found a piano stool in the same color as the piano itself, so the walnut piano didn’t look like a complete outsider.
Can you mix warm and cool tonewoods?
“The thought of mixing warm and cool tonewoods makes me a little sick inside!” says Gabriela. “When I think of cool tonewoods, I think of grey and ash woods, which I tend to avoid anyway. If I were to work with them, I would probably choose black over other woods.”
As a general rule of thumb, keep warm tones together—like reddish walnuts and cherries with sunny yellows from oak—and don’t let them get close to ash-toned cool woods like ash and maple, which look better in their own palette.
Which woods go well with oak floors?
(Image credit: Marc Mauldin. Design by Silo Studios)
Oak floors are very popular, whether you choose them yourself or inherit them – which layer should you lay on them?
Gabriela has already mentioned that walnut works well with oak, “as long as it’s not a single piece of walnut, and you should have about 20% of your furniture made of walnut for it to work,” she warns. “However, if you want a minimalist look to go with your oak floors, then play with different textures. You could place untreated oak next to varnished, smoothed or glossy pieces.” She took this approach in this room above, where the bench is raw but the ball ornament is glossy.
How do you incorporate vintage wood into a modern home?
Vintage wood tends to have a redder hue—from Queen Anne or Arts and Craft furniture to G-Plan’s dark stained mid-century pieces. The trick is that each wood used has a counterpart, so nothing stands out on its own.
“When I buy antiques, I just know when a piece of wood is the right one, it speaks to me,” says Gabriela. “I wanted it to be worn and I’d have to treat it with sage when I brought it home because it has a strange, dark history that I don’t want to know about! I want it to feel like it’s been there for 1000 years, but I’ll always find another piece in a similar or the same wood tone to match it.”
In the modern bathroom she spoke of earlier, she found a weathered walnut stool to complement the white oak vanity. She had some wall art framed in the same shade of walnut, “which brought everything together.”
Mixing wood types in the same room instantly adds depth and interest, but as Gabriela points out, it takes a little thought to get it right. Just follow her tried-and-tested advice and experiment for yourself in your own space to see what works in your home.
