From interior or exterior paint colors, textile patterns, and material palettes to architectural styles and elements, it’s common for home features to come and go depending on trends. We asked a few interior designers to chime in on which outdated home features have made, or are on the verge of making, a comeback.

Wallpapered and Color-Drenched Rooms

“After years of safe neutrals and minimalism, there’s a renewed desire for personality in interiors, spaces that people can feel emotionally connected to,” Phoebe Beachner, an interior designer with Hart Howerton, says.

This is why she believes that wallpapered and color-drenched rooms are back in vogue. When it comes to wallpaper, she says it’s particularly making a comeback in kitchen spaces.

Colleen Bute Bennett, founder of CBB Design Firm, is also seeing a lot of wallpaper these days and points out that certain old-school styles are especially popular at the moment, like floral and Waverly wallpapers that feel Victorian or are damask-like.

Closed Floor Plans

For years, homeowners have been taking down walls to create open and airy floor plans. But more recently, architects and designers have been getting requests to put them back up to carve out distinct rooms with clearly defined purposes. This also helps bring more structure to your space, so it’s easy to decorate and refresh when the time comes.

This shift might be coming about due to nostalgia, a desire to restore an older home to its roots, or a need to confine certain activities and items to certain areas. For instance, it’s unsightly having kettlebells smack dab center of the living room when there’s a place for them in the home gym or other activity room.

Some of the clearly defined rooms making a huge comeback include the formal dining room, the home office or study, and the living room or parlor.

Maximalism

Beyond wallpapering or saturating rooms with color, maximalism in the form of layering, adding detail, and decorating with objects and art that tell stories has returned.

According to Bennett, a maximalist feature that’s huge once again—after a period of dying off—is trim in all forms, styles, and colors. This includes picture frame trim, chair rails, crown and base molding, window and door trim, and other decorative panels such as wainscoting.

Beachner says the maximalism resurgence is also evident in homeowner or designer implementation of vintage pieces that add warmth, memory, and a sense of place, and bold animal prints and rich textures.

Built-In Seating

Something more of a forgotten feature that keeps popping back up, built-in seating is both an aesthetic and functional element.

Designers such as Heather Millward, principal of Millward Architecture + Design, are repeatedly getting this request in recent projects.

“Whether it be a custom sofa or an intimate banquette nook, clients love these customized space-saving solutions because they can maximize seating while incorporating clever storage options in tight spaces,” Millward says.

What’s more, built-in breakfast or window reading nooks are typically fitted with removable seat and back cushions. Simply replace the cushion covers when their colors or patterns go out of style—or just when you tire of the look.

1980s Browns

The 80s era has been influencing everything from movies and music to fashion in recent years, but when it comes to home design, most people would agree that we can leave that decade behind—with one exception: the color brown.

“I think we lived in browns as kids in the 80s, and we’re beginning to see that again everywhere,” Bennett says, who distinctly recalls the frequent appearance of brown corduroy.

She believes that browns have returned as a new neutral in place of gray. Expect to see it on surfaces such as painted walls and textiles, from furniture upholstery to rugs and window drapery.

5 Outdated Home Features That are Suddenly Back in Style by Sheila Kim | The Spruce