Ralph Lauren-Inspired Fall Home Tour: Classic Heritage Decorating Ideas

Inside: Tour my home filled with Ralph Lauren-inspired fall decor, with plaid, leather, rich fall colors, magnolia, brass, and blue and white.

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Every fall, I pull out basically the same bins of fall decor and find new ways to work those things around whatever I already have in place. Blue and white usually stays, magnolia leaves are often a staple, and there are always enough pumpkins around to make it obvious what season we’re in.

But this year, I wanted to do something a bit different. I’ve been a little obsessed with the resurgence of the Ralph Lauren look, with its plaids, leather, deep greens and browns, aged metals, and preppy hunting and sporting touches. The more I thought about it, the more it seemed made for fall.

What I wasn’t quite sure about was how it would work in my home. I’ve spent a lot of time trying to make my villa feel lighter, brighter, and less brown, yet this look celebrates all the warm wood and rustic elements I’m constantly trying to balance out. Could my very Texas-style stained kitchen cabinets, Austin stone fireplace, and rustic wood mantel actually work to my advantage for once?

Fortunately, I found that I already owned a lot of what I needed. Once I started pulling nonseasonal decor like silver trays and wood accessories from the storage closet, I realized I could lean into this classic heritage style without completely changing the way I decorate—or relying on quite so much obvious fall decor.

I still brought out some pumpkins, of course. I’m not that seasonally restrained.

So this year’s fall home tour is a little richer and preppier than what I usually do, with more of that classic heritage influence. But it still looks very much like my home. Come on in and take a look around!

What Makes Fall Decor Feel Ralph Lauren-Inspired?

Ralph Lauren-inspired fall decor has a classic, collected look that mixes refined traditional pieces with more rustic elements and touches of sporting and equestrian style. Adding just a few seasonal touches to that mix creates a rich fall feeling without filling a room with obvious fall decor.

Ralph Lauren-Inspired Fall Decor in My Living Room.

The living room is where I leaned into the look the most. I didn’t want the room to scream fall, but I did want it to feel warmer and more layered, with richer colors, classic patterns, and just enough seasonal touches to set the cozy-season mood.

The easiest place to start was with the fabrics. On the sofa, I mixed my navy and olive patterned pillows with velvet, bouclé, leather, and herringbone in shades of cream, brown, navy, and green.

The leather pillow and herringbone throw brought in some of that menswear look, while the velvet and bouclé kept all those traditional textures from feeling too heavy. And that balance turned out to be more important than I expected.

My charcoal gray velvet sofa gave me fits when I first started putting the room together. The very colors that looked perfect for this style on their own looked blah and drab when I put them on my already dark sofa. After much pillow shuffling (and there was a lot of pillow shuffling), these lighter cream bouclé pillows finally gave me the contrast I needed.

I used the same trick on the chairs, pairing olive velvet pillows with all that light ivory upholstery. And I especially love the blue and green plaid throw. Navy and hunter green plaid has always made me think of Ralph Lauren, and since those are two colors already all over my home, it was an easy way to bring in that preppy heritage look while still keeping the room looking like me.

The black trays and contrasting marble-look bowl were already in place, and luckily they looked like they belonged with the style too. All I added here was a cozy fall candle.

On the ottomans, I filled a blue and white chinoiserie vase with magnolia leaves and set a brass pheasant on two vintage books (a fun use for my parents’ LSU yearbooks). Magnolia leaves are one of my favorite ways to bring in fall color without adding orange. They fit right into this year’s palette.

The entertainment center didn’t need much changing either. Things I keep here year-round, like the horse statue and leather box, already work nicely with the style. I left plenty of blue and white in the mix, then added some warmth with an aged brass bottle and brass urn.

I really love blue and brown together, and the mix of polished pieces with things that are a little worn and rustic is one of the things that drew me to this style in the first place.

I added another warm metal on the side table with a copper tray I found at Round Top. And that’s something I really like about this fall look: the horse, leather box, blue and white, vintage books, brass, and copper weren’t bought as “fall decor.” Against the velvet, leather, warm wood, and deeper fall colors, things I already owned just happen to work especially well this time of year.

And then there’s the fireplace. My Austin stone fireplace and rustic wood mantel have always brought a very Texas vibe to this room, and like the brown cabinets in my kitchen, they’re things I’ve often tried to balance with lighter, more polished pieces. But for this Ralph Lauren look, they suddenly felt right at home.

I still didn’t want to load the mantel with pumpkins and fall decorations. I left the blue and white vase in place for color and used two tall faux oak branches, stretching them loosely across the large mirror.

Their slightly unruly shape against the dark carved frame gave me the abundant fall look I wanted without covering the mantel with stuff. I have to confess, if I could still get more of these branches I probably would have made it even more dramatic. Sometimes stopping is the hardest part.

GET THE LOOK: Rich fall colors can get dark and drab fast, especially in a room that already has dark upholstery or a lot of brown. Mix the leather, wood, plaid, jewel tones, and aged metals with plenty of cream and lighter upholstery, and don’t be afraid to keep blue and white in the room. That contrast is what keeps the deeper colors from taking over.

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Ralph Lauren-Inspired Fall Decor in My Kitchen.

The kitchen was probably my biggest challenge with this look because there’s already so much brown in here. Between the stained cabinets, granite, floors, and all that wood, adding deeper fall colors can go from rich and cozy to a lot of brown pretty quickly.

But this was also where I started to realize I could decorate with all that brown instead of always trying to direct attention away from it. The warm, rustic wood that I usually try to balance out was actually a pretty natural backdrop for this heritage look.

For the island, I started with things that would lighten up all that wood. I used a blue and white pumpkin, faux green hydrangeas, and a white planter on a simple wood board, then finished it off with another brass pheasant.

I also loved having an excuse to use more of my copper. The copper pans are always here, and you can see the copper bowl filled with white pumpkins and pinecones in the background. With all the warm wood and richer colors this year, the copper suddenly looked like it had been waiting for this fall theme all along.

As much as I liked the deeper colors and warm metals, I still needed plenty of lighter moments to keep the kitchen from getting too dark. A white pumpkin under a glass cloche on a stack of blue and white plates was an easy way to add fall to the island without adding another dark color.

I kept that same mix going on the kitchen table. In a large rattan tray, I stacked some vintage white ironstone dishes with my white ironstone tureen, then added a small blue and white pot filled with greenery and a couple of white pumpkins.

I put the tray over a blue and green plaid runner, bringing some of that same preppy pattern from the living room into the kitchen. Between the plaid, rattan, ironstone, and warm wood, the table has enough of the heritage feeling I wanted without looking like I tried to turn my Texas kitchen into an English country house.

GET THE LOOK: If your room already has a lot of warm wood or brown, don’t automatically fight it. Let some of those tones become part of the palette, then break them up with cream, blue and white, greenery, and clear glass. Repeating a warm metal like copper can also make the existing brown feel like it belongs instead of something you’re trying to decorate around.

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Ralph Lauren-Inspired Fall Decor in My Entry.

The entry is where I leaned the most into the hunting and sporting side of the look. The black console made a great backdrop for the richer colors, warm wood, and silver, and this ended up being one of my favorite spots.

I didn’t use any traditional fall decor here at all. Instead, I relied on magnolia leaves, pheasant feathers, the horse, warm wood, silver, and a few hunting touches to make it feel like fall.

On one end of the console, I grouped a small framed hunting print with a horse head and a round wood vase filled with pheasant feathers.

On the other side, I brought in some contrast with a large silver vase filled with faux magnolia branches. I added a decanter to a vintage silver tray along with an antler. Filling the decanter with bourbon was a must since it so cooperatively fit both my fall color palette and the theme.

What I like most about this arrangement is the mix. The silver keeps the feathers, wood, and hunting pieces from getting too rustic, while those same things keep the silver from feeling too formal. That combination is really at the heart of what I like about this whole look.

I carried the same mix down to the lower shelf, where the white ginger jars were already in place. I added a blue and white jar, warm wood candlesticks, and a wicker demijohn to repeat some of the colors and textures from above.

GET THE LOOK: Hunting and sporting touches work best in small doses. Mix one or two with things you might already own—silver, warm wood, magnolia, blue and white, and woven pieces—and the result feels collected rather than themed.

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Ralph Lauren-Inspired Fall Decor in My Dining Room.

The dining room gave me another place to use the richer side of this look, but with a little more polish. The dark wood table, crystal chandelier, and traditional furniture were already a natural fit, so I could mix in some of the more rustic elements I’d used in the other rooms.

I kept the color palette mostly blue, green, brown, and cream, with blue and white taking center stage in the centerpiece. Blue may not be the first color that comes to mind for fall, but it’s in my home year-round, and I love the way it looks with dark wood and all the deeper fall colors.

The centerpiece took more trial and error than the finished table lets on. I started with blue and white ginger jars, magnolia leaves, and antlers on a large round aged brass tray. It was a pretty substantial arrangement, but somehow the whole thing just disappeared against the dark wood table.

It needed something light to make everything show up, and cream hydrangeas and pale pumpkins turned out to be the solution. Once I tucked those in, the blue and white stood out more, the magnolia looked richer, and even the antlers stopped getting lost against the table.

I especially like the antlers tucked in among the flowers, magnolia, and pumpkins. They bring some of that hunting influence into the dining room, but surrounded by all those natural elements, they don’t really feel like “hunting decor” at all.

I also wanted candlelight on the table because everything looks better in candlelight, especially in the fall. I used simple glass hurricanes and brought in another dose of rich blue with velvet napkins. The crystal, glass, cream upholstery, and candlelight also help lighten up all that dark wood.

This close-up really shows the mix I was going for: blue and white porcelain next to magnolia leaves, cream hydrangeas, pumpkins, and an antler. It’s that mix of polished and rustic pieces again, but this time as fall dining table decor.

GET THE LOOK: If a centerpiece seems to disappear on a dark wood table, adding more isn’t necessarily the answer. Try adding something light instead. Cream flowers, pale pumpkins, white dishes, or glass can give the darker colors enough contrast to stand out.

A Fall Look That Feels Right at Home.

I wasn’t completely sure I was going to like this richer fall look in my home when I started. There were definitely moments when all those beautiful browns and greens I’d gathered together looked less Ralph Lauren and more like the light had been sucked out of the room. And I’ve worked very hard to make my villa look light and bright and not brown, brown, brown.

But after some figuring out and finagling with this style to keep things light, I started to see all that brown a little differently. The stained cabinets, warm wood, Austin stone, and rustic mantel weren’t getting in the way of this look. This time, they were actually helping me create it.

And I think that’s what I like most about how it turned out. I didn’t lose my own style in the process. The blue and white is still here, the things I love year-round are still here, and I didn’t have to buy a whole new collection of fall decor to make everything feel different for the season.

Will I continue channeling my imaginary life in a stately country house on a horse farm, relaxing in its wood-paneled library year-round? Probably not. My true love is still Southern traditional: classic and collected, but lighter and more relaxed, with a little Lowcountry influence and plenty of blue and white.

But for fall? I may be ready to move into that imaginary country house for a season. It turns out my usual Southern traditional style and this richer heritage look have more in common than I realized.

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