Gone are the days of boring, cookie-cutter style houses. Today’s homeowners are finding ways to express themselves by designing their homes in a way that reflect their style. One increasingly popular trend is mixing textures on your home’s exterior, which makes your home stand out among the rest.
How to mix textures
You’ll want to pick 2-3 different textures for your home’s exterior, and no more than 2-3 different colors. Too much variation will appear chaotic, so it’s important to be thoughtful about your choices.
You can take a drive around your neighborhood to get a sense of what you like, use online design tools like Cultured Stone’s Visualizer tool, or talk to our GNH design experts to get started.
Think about what focal points you want to stand out on your home— dormers, gables, porches, bump-outs, etc. Use contrasting colors and/or textures to draw attention to these features. You may also want to switch up the siding on different levels of your home.
Not ready for a remodel? You can start small by adding contrast with your front door, shutters or trim.
Using Cultured Stone for texture
One texture you’ll definitely want to consider using is stone. With so many colors and textures to choose from, the possibilities are limitless. You can also choose between using natural stone or a manufactured veneer, such as Cultured Stone veneers. There are a number of benefits of using Cultured Stone veneers. Cultured Stone is about one-quarter the weight of natural stone and is generally easier and less costly to install. Because of its light weight, Cultured Stone can be installed on a variety of substrates, unlike natural stone which needs to be fixed to something structural. Composed of lightweight concrete, Cultured Stone will last as long as other concrete materials, which can be anywhere from 50-100 years. Cultured Stone products are virtually maintenance-free and come with a 50-year limited warranty.
Some consumers may worry that manufactured stones will be too repetitive in appearance, but Cultured Stone uses thousands of individual molds and no two stones are ever cast with the same exact coloring. In fact, Cultured Stone has the largest variety of colors and textures in any manufactured stone line, with more than 20 textures available in over 100 color combinations. Check out some combinations below!
Echo Ridge Country Ledgestone Credit: Symphony Homes
Artic Pro-Fit Terrain Ledgestone
Credit: Hearth and Home
Aspen Dressed Fieldstone & Aspen Country Ledgestone
These examples show how you can use different colors of Ledgestone to create vastly different styled homes. One the left you have Echo Ridge Country Ledgestone and an arts and craft style home, followed by a modern looking home in the middle with Artic Pro-Fit Terrain Ledgestone, and lastly the rustic log cabin style home with a combination of Aspen Dressed Fieldstone and Aspen Country Ledgestone.
Echo Ridge Dressed Fieldstone
Credit: Barrington Homes
This Echo Ridge Dressed Fieldstone gives the house a rugged and historic look like it has been here through the ages.
Gray Cobblefield
The Gray Cobblefield on this home is designed to mimic the architecture of 19th century rural America.
For more inspiration, visit the Cultured Stone Designs Gallery.