Art imitates life and life imitates art. Commercial designers and film set designers have been playing off each others’ ideas for decades, creating interpretations of popular design styles in waking life and on the big screen. Set design and interior design create a mood and tell a story about a place. Directors and interior designers alike illustrate their intentions for a space by selecting color, materials, furniture, and decor that will define the ambiance.
Here are six movies & television shows that interior designers love to draw inspiration from.
1. The Grand Budapest Hotel
The style of Wes Anderson’s “The Grand Budapest Hotel” is a colorful take on art nouveau that intermingles trends from the ‘30s to the ‘70s. The director’s most well-known trait is creating set design with impeccable symmetry and balance. Wes Anderson utilizes the Rule of Thirds to balance the shots in this film by distributing the visual points of interest horizontally & vertically.
In terms of color, The Grand Budapest Hotel has two complementary color palettes that are muted yet somehow bold in the same instance. The most heavily relied-on color in this film is pastel pink, which is usually accompanied by plum, red, and accents of gold. The other palette for the interior of the hotel is green, yellow, and neutral tones of beige & brown. This film has many hints of Art Deco decor, like carpets with flourish patterns and abstract floral patterns. To match this theme, the set designers included heavy drapery and curtains with luxurious fabrics and fringe.
The furniture on the set of The Grand Budapest Hotel ranges from mid-century modern to antique designs that could’ve been seen in Parisian hotels in the 1930s. There are intricately carved wood tables in the same lobby shot as mid-century modern armchairs with chrome sled legs, a typical contradiction for Wes Anderson’s eclectic style. Diamond-tufted, square-tufting, and two-tone upholstery on soft seating are very dominant in this film and add to the austere nature of the hotel.
Here are Venue Industries’ top furniture picks for mimicking the design of a Wes Anderson film set:
The Harry Potter film series has influenced a charming gothic design style called ‘dark academia’. Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry is decidedly adorned with gilded picture frames, lanterns, elaborate light fixtures, dark paint, illustrative wallpapers, and ornate area rugs. The walls of Hogwarts are designed to look like a stone facade, with exposed wood beams overhead, giving the space an even more rustic and aged appeal.
The color palettes used for each wizarding house contrast each other spectacularly. Gryffindor’s red opposes Slytherin’s emerald green, while Ravenclaw has navy blue and Hufflepuff boasts yellow. These hues can be seen throughout the set design of Hogwarts on banners and in each common room.
The furniture in Harry Potter films is reminiscent of medieval gothic styles, with detailed wood carvings and tufted upholstery. The common rooms have large, diamond-tufted lounge chairs and solid wood coffee tables along with heavy, tassel-bearing drapery. The Slytherin common room is designed with classic leather Chesterfield-style sofas, which have intricate diamond tufting on the French-rolled arms and on the back of the upholstery.
Conjure up an interior that looks akin to Hogwarts by specifying the following products:
Mad Men, an iconic series set in the 1960s advertising world, primarily unfolds within the stylish confines of Sterling Cooper, a prominent Madison Avenue advertising agency. The set designer meticulously curated era-appropriate furnishings, such as the Herman Miller Eames Chair, Steelcase desks, and Knoll’s Florence Sofa, to establish the offices’ refined aesthetic.
As you journey through the seven seasons of Mad Men, spanning from the 1960s to the 1970s, you can witness the evolution of office furniture. In the initial season, workplace design features wooden paneling on the walls, sofas with wooden veneer backs, lounge chairs adorned with biscuit tufting, and drum tables. Over the course of the series, Sterling Cooper’s wallpapers transition into bold, geometric prints, and the furniture undergoes a metamorphosis into futuristic, space-age styles. The soft seating in the show frequently boasts chrome legs, single-line tufting, wood accents, self-welts, and tapered wood legs.
Make a workplace feel like a trendy Madison Avenue ad agency with our following products:
The Shining is a cult classic directed by Stanley Kubrick, a director known for his elaborate and highly art directed set design. The film takes place at the Overlook Hotel, a spacious ski resort that has been closed down for off-season. The rooms at the Overlook Hotel use color & patterns to define emotional states in the characters. Many of the rooms have monochromatic color scheme, like the bathroom of the ballroom, which has red walls, sinks, and a patterned red & white tile flooring that is reminiscent of drops of blood. The color red can be indicative of the violent power within the antagonist, played by Jack Nicholson. Geometric patterns are largely used in this film to create bewilderment and panic. In the prominent Room 23, chevron patterns are used for the bedding, while a clashing arch pattern is used on the carpet. The notorious hexagonal pattern from the hallway carpet mimics twists and turns of the hedge maze outside of the hotel where the final scenes of this film take place.
The furniture in the shining is what you would expect at a 1980s hotel. Boxy armchairs and heavy wooden furniture with carved legs furnish the lobby, while sofas with french roll style arms line the expansive hallways. Diamond-tufting is a popular tufting choice for the furniture in The Shining, as it is representative of traditional values and European influences.
Venue Industries has a couple of bloody good products that are strikingly similar to furniture from the Overlook Hotel:
Blade Runner is a 1982 science fiction film directed by Ridley Scott that tells the story of a future where human clones are being decommissioned due to the risk they pose to society. The past clashes spectacularly with the perceived future in this major motion picture. The design style in this movie can be described as retro-futuristic. Inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright’s Ennis House, interiors in Blade Runner are otherworldy and maximalist in nature. Textured wallpapers, neon light fixtures, metal accents, reflective surfaces and contemporary furniture can be discerned in the dim lighting of each scene.
Incorporating influences from art nouveau, the set designers blended abstract and symbolic furniture pieces, such as Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s Argyle Chair, with elements of ultramodern design. One example of these avant-garde furniture designs that aided in the future noir design aesthetic was a horizontally-channeled leather banquette with built-in lighting fixtures seen in Deckard’s apartment. Additionally, large, intricately crafted wood furniture can also be spotted in Blade Runner’s interiors.
Here are several products that could work for a brutalist design concept:
Set in the future, Her is a quirky love story about a man who falls in love with artificial intelligence. The storyline follows the protagonist, Theodore Twombly, from his high-rise apartment building in the city to his open-office workplace. The design aesthetic in Her is minimalist and playful. Her relies heavily on color to express the characters’ feelings and emotions.
Theodore’s office is reminiscent of modern day workplace for creatives that would help employees destress. The interior of the office is a kaleidoscope of brightly-colored, glass space dividers, similar to 3Form, which cast pops of pigmented light. Another unique tactic the set designers used to experiment with color is organizing the books on the shelves by color, creating a subtle gradient.The interior is decorated with whimsical decor like geometric planters and 3D shapes hanging above desks creating a pleasant atmospher. The Eames Aluminum Swivel Chair can be spotted in a few shots, along with sleek upholstered benches, plastic bucket chairs and boxy lounge chairs –– all in the film’s signature shade of red.
Emulate the workplace from Her by specifying the following products:
6 Movies & TV Shows that Inspire Commercial Interiors
Art imitates life and life imitates art. Commercial designers and film set designers have been playing off each others’ ideas for decades, creating interpretations of popular design styles in waking life and on the big screen. Set design and interior design create a mood and tell a story about a place. Directors and interior designers alike illustrate their intentions for a space by selecting color, materials, furniture, and decor that will define the ambiance.
Here are six movies & television shows that interior designers love to draw inspiration from.
1. The Grand Budapest Hotel
The style of Wes Anderson’s “The Grand Budapest Hotel” is a colorful take on art nouveau that intermingles trends from the ‘30s to the ‘70s. The director’s most well-known trait is creating set design with impeccable symmetry and balance. Wes Anderson utilizes the Rule of Thirds to balance the shots in this film by distributing the visual points of interest horizontally & vertically.
In terms of color, The Grand Budapest Hotel has two complementary color palettes that are muted yet somehow bold in the same instance. The most heavily relied-on color in this film is pastel pink, which is usually accompanied by plum, red, and accents of gold. The other palette for the interior of the hotel is green, yellow, and neutral tones of beige & brown. This film has many hints of Art Deco decor, like carpets with flourish patterns and abstract floral patterns. To match this theme, the set designers included heavy drapery and curtains with luxurious fabrics and fringe.
The furniture on the set of The Grand Budapest Hotel ranges from mid-century modern to antique designs that could’ve been seen in Parisian hotels in the 1930s. There are intricately carved wood tables in the same lobby shot as mid-century modern armchairs with chrome sled legs, a typical contradiction for Wes Anderson’s eclectic style. Diamond-tufted, square-tufting, and two-tone upholstery on soft seating are very dominant in this film and add to the austere nature of the hotel.
Here are Venue Industries’ top furniture picks for mimicking the design of a Wes Anderson film set:
2. Harry Potter Series
The Harry Potter film series has influenced a charming gothic design style called ‘dark academia’. Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry is decidedly adorned with gilded picture frames, lanterns, elaborate light fixtures, dark paint, illustrative wallpapers, and ornate area rugs. The walls of Hogwarts are designed to look like a stone facade, with exposed wood beams overhead, giving the space an even more rustic and aged appeal.
The color palettes used for each wizarding house contrast each other spectacularly. Gryffindor’s red opposes Slytherin’s emerald green, while Ravenclaw has navy blue and Hufflepuff boasts yellow. These hues can be seen throughout the set design of Hogwarts on banners and in each common room.
The furniture in Harry Potter films is reminiscent of medieval gothic styles, with detailed wood carvings and tufted upholstery. The common rooms have large, diamond-tufted lounge chairs and solid wood coffee tables along with heavy, tassel-bearing drapery. The Slytherin common room is designed with classic leather Chesterfield-style sofas, which have intricate diamond tufting on the French-rolled arms and on the back of the upholstery.
Conjure up an interior that looks akin to Hogwarts by specifying the following products:
3. Mad Men
Mad Men, an iconic series set in the 1960s advertising world, primarily unfolds within the stylish confines of Sterling Cooper, a prominent Madison Avenue advertising agency. The set designer meticulously curated era-appropriate furnishings, such as the Herman Miller Eames Chair, Steelcase desks, and Knoll’s Florence Sofa, to establish the offices’ refined aesthetic.
As you journey through the seven seasons of Mad Men, spanning from the 1960s to the 1970s, you can witness the evolution of office furniture. In the initial season, workplace design features wooden paneling on the walls, sofas with wooden veneer backs, lounge chairs adorned with biscuit tufting, and drum tables. Over the course of the series, Sterling Cooper’s wallpapers transition into bold, geometric prints, and the furniture undergoes a metamorphosis into futuristic, space-age styles. The soft seating in the show frequently boasts chrome legs, single-line tufting, wood accents, self-welts, and tapered wood legs.
Make a workplace feel like a trendy Madison Avenue ad agency with our following products:
4. The Shining
The Shining is a cult classic directed by Stanley Kubrick, a director known for his elaborate and highly art directed set design. The film takes place at the Overlook Hotel, a spacious ski resort that has been closed down for off-season. The rooms at the Overlook Hotel use color & patterns to define emotional states in the characters. Many of the rooms have monochromatic color scheme, like the bathroom of the ballroom, which has red walls, sinks, and a patterned red & white tile flooring that is reminiscent of drops of blood. The color red can be indicative of the violent power within the antagonist, played by Jack Nicholson. Geometric patterns are largely used in this film to create bewilderment and panic. In the prominent Room 23, chevron patterns are used for the bedding, while a clashing arch pattern is used on the carpet. The notorious hexagonal pattern from the hallway carpet mimics twists and turns of the hedge maze outside of the hotel where the final scenes of this film take place.
The furniture in the shining is what you would expect at a 1980s hotel. Boxy armchairs and heavy wooden furniture with carved legs furnish the lobby, while sofas with french roll style arms line the expansive hallways. Diamond-tufting is a popular tufting choice for the furniture in The Shining, as it is representative of traditional values and European influences.
Venue Industries has a couple of bloody good products that are strikingly similar to furniture from the Overlook Hotel:
5. Blade Runner
Blade Runner is a 1982 science fiction film directed by Ridley Scott that tells the story of a future where human clones are being decommissioned due to the risk they pose to society. The past clashes spectacularly with the perceived future in this major motion picture. The design style in this movie can be described as retro-futuristic. Inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright’s Ennis House, interiors in Blade Runner are otherworldy and maximalist in nature. Textured wallpapers, neon light fixtures, metal accents, reflective surfaces and contemporary furniture can be discerned in the dim lighting of each scene.
Incorporating influences from art nouveau, the set designers blended abstract and symbolic furniture pieces, such as Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s Argyle Chair, with elements of ultramodern design. One example of these avant-garde furniture designs that aided in the future noir design aesthetic was a horizontally-channeled leather banquette with built-in lighting fixtures seen in Deckard’s apartment. Additionally, large, intricately crafted wood furniture can also be spotted in Blade Runner’s interiors.
Here are several products that could work for a brutalist design concept:
6. Her
Set in the future, Her is a quirky love story about a man who falls in love with artificial intelligence. The storyline follows the protagonist, Theodore Twombly, from his high-rise apartment building in the city to his open-office workplace. The design aesthetic in Her is minimalist and playful. Her relies heavily on color to express the characters’ feelings and emotions.
Theodore’s office is reminiscent of modern day workplace for creatives that would help employees destress. The interior of the office is a kaleidoscope of brightly-colored, glass space dividers, similar to 3Form, which cast pops of pigmented light. Another unique tactic the set designers used to experiment with color is organizing the books on the shelves by color, creating a subtle gradient.The interior is decorated with whimsical decor like geometric planters and 3D shapes hanging above desks creating a pleasant atmospher. The Eames Aluminum Swivel Chair can be spotted in a few shots, along with sleek upholstered benches, plastic bucket chairs and boxy lounge chairs –– all in the film’s signature shade of red.
Emulate the workplace from Her by specifying the following products: