How To Mix Wood Tones: 5 Rules for Furniture That Goes Together

For a long time the safe way to buy wood furniture was to buy it all at once: the matching dining set, the bedroom suite, every surface in the same stain. That look is fading fast. This fall, designers are talking about rooms that feel collected rather than ordered from one page of a catalogue, and furniture is finally getting deeper in tone after years of pale oak.

The result is a question we hear constantly: can I put a walnut chair next to an oak table? Yes, you can. Mixing wood tones well is not about luck. It comes down to a few simple rules, and once you know them you can add pieces over years without ever worrying that something "doesn't go".

Why matching sets are falling out of favor

A room where every piece of wood is identical reads as flat. The eye has nothing to compare, so the grain and color of even very good furniture get lost. Mix two or three tones and each one looks richer, because the lighter wood makes the darker one look deeper and vice versa.

It also suits how people actually live: an inherited dresser, a table from the last apartment, a chair bought because you loved it. If you are deciding whether your dining pieces should match at all, we cover that in should your dining room furniture match?

Rule 1: Pick one wood to lead

Every successful mixed room has a dominant wood. It is usually the floor or the biggest piece, such as a dining table, a sideboard or a bed. Let that tone cover most of the wood in the room, add a second tone in a supporting role, and keep a third, if you use one, to a small accent.

Two or three tones is plenty. Four or more starts to look accidental rather than chosen.

A large storage piece is an easy way to set the lead tone. Ethnicraft's Pillar Sideboard is a good example: vertical panelling in a warm, deep solid wood gives the room one strong, grounded block of color that lighter chairs and tables can play against. It comes in 2, 3 and 4 door widths.

Rule 2: Match the undertone, not the shade

This is the rule that matters most. Wood can be light or dark, but it also has an undertone: warm (red, orange or yellow), cool (grey or ashy) or neutral. Woods of very different depth sit happily together when their undertones agree. Woods of a similar depth can clash badly when they do not.

A quick test: hold a sample against your floor in daylight. If one looks pink and the other looks green-grey, they will fight. If both lean golden, you can push the contrast as far as you like.

• Warm family: cherry, oiled oak, teak, walnut, mahogany.

• Cool family: whitewashed or grey-stained oak, weathered or bleached finishes, ash with a white pigment.

• Neutral bridges: natural oak and black-stained wood, which get along with almost anything.

Rule 3: Make the contrast obvious

The pairings that go wrong are usually the near misses: two mid-brown woods a shade apart, which look like a failed attempt to match. If you are going to mix, mix clearly. Light oak with dark walnut, or golden cherry with pale oak, looks deliberate.

The dining room is the easiest place to try it. Copeland's Sarah Trestle Extension Table is solid American cherry with a Shaker-style trestle base and a self-storing butterfly leaf, so it grows for holiday dinners. Instead of the matching cherry chairs, pull up Skagerak's Vester Dining Chair in golden oiled oak with brass details. Both woods are warm, the oak is clearly lighter, and the table becomes the centerpiece. A long Ethnicraft Bok Bench on one side, offered in oak, teak and black oak, gives you a third tone if you want one.

Rule 4: Repeat every wood at least twice

A single walnut piece in an otherwise oak room can look like it wandered in from somewhere else. Give each tone a partner across the room and it starts to look planned. The repeat does not need to be furniture: a lamp base, a picture frame or a tray all count.

In a living room, that might look like this. Copeland's Whitney Lounge Chair brings a strong walnut frame. Echo it with Woud's Nova Table Lamp, which has a solid walnut base under a glass shade, on the other side of the sofa. Then let a lighter wood carry the center of the room: the Copeland Sierra Rectangle Coffee Table comes in natural cherry as well as walnut, so you can choose whether it contrasts or repeats.

Rule 5: Give the woods a break

When two woods sit side by side, something in between helps. Black is the most useful neutral: a black-stained piece separates two tones without adding a third one to manage. Rugs and upholstery do the same job on a bigger scale, especially on a wood floor.

Small tables are the cheapest way to test this. Woud's Arc Side Table, with a rotating top that hides a storage compartment, comes in oiled oak, walnut lacquer and black-painted ash, so you can pick the tone your room is missing. Ethnicraft's sculptural Geometric Side Table is offered in oak, teak and black oak, and Skagerak's Georg Stool in FSC-certified oak or black oak doubles as a side table or extra seat.

In a hallway or kitchen, a woven runner such as Pappelina's Poppy Linen Rug breaks up a long stretch of wood floor and gives furniture in a different tone somewhere softer to sit. For more on choosing rugs, see our guide to living room rugs.

In the bedroom

The bedroom is where matching suites hang on longest, and where breaking them up makes the biggest difference. Keep the bed in your lead wood and let the nightstands contrast. Copeland's mid-century Catalina Nightstand is offered in natural walnut and several cherry finishes, so it can sit beside a pale oak bed as a deliberate dark accent, or warm up a room built around white linen.

Mistakes to avoid

• Near matches. Two woods a shade apart look like an error. Go clearly lighter or clearly darker.

• Clashing undertones. Red-toned cherry next to grey-washed oak rarely works, however good each piece is.

• Too many tones. Stop at three, floor included.

• Ignoring the floor. It is the biggest wood surface in the room. Choose furniture against it, not in isolation.

Order a sample before you commit

Screens are unreliable with wood color. Most of the brands above offer real wood samples for a few dollars, such as Copeland's natural walnut sample and Ethnicraft's teak sample. Lay them on your floor next to what you already own, look at them in morning and evening light, and you will know within a day.

If you like the warmer palette, our guide to decorating with earth tones pairs well with mixed woods, and Japandi style shows how far a few well-chosen wooden pieces can go. Or browse our dining tables and accent tables to find your lead wood.