The Furniture Rule For Old Family Heirlooms That HGTV's Hilary Farr Swears By

Inheriting cherished family furniture and decorative pieces can initially feel like a precious gift, but over time, they risk becoming unused clutter in your home. For HGTV's design expert Hilary Farr, heirlooms should never go to waste. After all, what good is it to keep all of your old family heirlooms if you don't really use them? Farr's philosophy on old furniture is simple: All your inherited antiques should be reupholstered and restyled to fit your space and aesthetic. As Farr aptly puts it, "It's like putting fresh paint on a wall" (via YouTube). 

While working on one couple's home for an episode of "Tough Love with Hilary Farr," the designer had to find a way to repurpose armchairs and an old sofa, pieces that felt tired and outdated but still held great sentimental value for the family. To breathe new life into the antiques, Farr updated the pieces by reupholstering them. Using new fabric, Farr made the furniture look lighter, sleeker, and more elegant while preserving their vintage feel and sentimental importance.

If you have some outdated furniture and decorative items lurking in the corners of your home, it's time to take a page from Farr's book and give your retro pieces a much-needed update. As Farr demonstrates with her clients' furniture collection, there's no reason to toss out your precious family heirlooms just because they feel dated — you can always find a way to enhance older pieces to keep them feeling fresh and relevant to your style. 

When revamping an old family heirloom, the key to getting good results is to find ways to reimagine the piece while still maintaining the original character — if you aren't careful, you might change too much and take away from the sentimental or even material value. Consider what makes the piece unique, particularly the vintage elements that can't be recreated today. For instance, refurbishing wooden furniture is preferable to masking it with generic paint. And, as Hilary Farr shows us, reupholstering your family's heirloom furniture is a highly effective strategy for maintaining the silhouette while updating the overall style of the piece. 

One small adjustment with a big impact is adding new hardware to your vintage pieces — drawer pulls or furniture feet with modern metallic finishes, for example. This is an easy DIY project that anyone could do, and it will significantly elevate the look of your furniture. So whether you add new upholstery, apply new stain to wood pieces, or merely install some new knobs, you can revitalize your precious family heirlooms and transform them into pieces you can enjoy and use every day.