Destination Design at Home
From elegant plantation-style to rugged lodge-like retreats, homeowners are creating personal resorts all their own

KLAMATH FALLS, Ore. January 11, 2006 —

The popularity of the Old World look is evolving into customized, personal style this year as homeowners everywhere are gravitating toward creating retreats of their own – no matter where they live.

“Destination” home design will be hot for 2006, say the experts from

JELD-WEN, the world’s leading manufacturer of reliable windows and doors. Whether the look is ranch rugged, safari chic or plantation peaceful, homeowners are getting away from it all with designs, textures and materials that reflect their favorite vacation destinations.

JELD-WEN experts believe that the popularity of destination style originates from two recent trends: the evolution of Old World style and homeowners’ desire to bring the outdoors in. Both naturally lend themselves to homeowners wanting to create a personal vacation retreat for their homes.

According to JELD-WEN, an example of the destination design trend includes formal plantation style, with luxury touches and ornate details such as mahogany wood and soaring windows and doors. Other homeowners are going for a more vacation beach home feel, which incorporates rustic, comfortable style.  Still others are leaning toward Mediterranean casual, with traditional European details reminiscent of Tuscan hillsides.

“Homeowners want to feel like they’re on vacation, right in their own homes,” said Shane Meisel, product marketing manager for JELD-WEN^® doors. “As people view their homes as retreats to escape the hustle of daily life, we see this trend growing stronger.”  

Dark mahogany wood is especially suited to traditional plantation style, and JELD-WEN offers windows and interior and exterior doors in mahogany so that homeowners can coordinate and carry the look they want throughout the entire home. The use of interior doors with glass and radius-style windows, as well as louver doors, allows air to flow and light to shine throughout the home in true Mediterranean style, creating a relaxed resort-like feel.

Oversized doors and windows and sidelights and transoms add exotic style, while distressed and white painted trim and finishes provide a more casual beach look. Windows also help lush indoor plants thrive and offer views to the outdoors, adding a resort-like ambiance.

Examples of destination design can be seen throughout the home furnishings market. Tommy Bahama’s recent expansion and Cabana Joe’s popularity prove that consumers are embracing relaxation as a way of life. Thomasville, a major national home furnishings company, offers animal prints and intricate tropical detailing in exotic style as part of the company’s Ernest Hemingway line of furnishings.

Still not every homeowner’s idea of the perfect vacation is by the seashore. Rather, many would prefer to reside by a lake, in the mountains or on the range.  For these individuals, destination style involves creating a lodge or ski chalet-like retreat, with rugged home furnishings, lots of wood and a sharp focus on the outdoors. 

Even city dwellers are incorporating lodge retreat looks with oversized doors, carved wood and grand scale windows to help bring the outside in. With this style, the emphasis is on natural materials and coordinating wood species to make a solid, bold statement. Planked, knotty wood JELD-WEN^® doors and heavy iron accents, including massive door knockers, hinges and straps, add authentic rustic style and a cozy, comfortable mountain retreat feeling.   

But no matter what favorite vacation style they are going for, experts agree that destination design is truly an escape from the ordinary, reflecting many homeowners’ desire to get away from it all, right in their own homes. 

“The great thing about this style is that it allows for so much creativity and freedom of expression. Whatever makes your home feel like your own personal retreat goes,” Meisel said.

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