You’ve just finished staining the concrete in your home and it’s just as beautiful and polished as you’d imagined it would be. But acid stains create dark rich earthy colors and you’ve suddenly realized you’re not sure how to match the rest of the room to your new floors. Don’t worry, we’ve got your back with these 6 tricks for styling a room with dark floors:
#1 Create contrast with white furniture and details

To really make your dark floors pop, choose white or very light-colored pieces, art, or even paint your walls white. The contrast of light and dark will give your room drama and a refined character that will look like it jumped straight out of a magazine! A white couch or a large print of a line drawing will give your room character and give your dark floors something to work with.
#2 Paint your window trims and doors white

If you don’t want to sit on white furnishings but still want to get that dramatic contrasting look, give yourself a DIY project and paint your doors and window trims bright white to give the eye contrast without injecting too much white into your space. The white doors and windows against a newly stained concrete floor is a divine look.
#3 Choose a bright and cohesive color palette
Another way to make your dark floors work for your room is to ditch the white and instead choose complementary bright colors for a subtle and cohesively styled room. An easy way to do this is to consult a color wheel – the color that is directly opposite another color is a complementary color and will match perfectly! So if the concrete staining job has left you with a gorgeous dark brown floor, choose blue hues for furnishings like a beautiful robin’s egg blue couch or navy curtains. And if you’ve chosen a dark red stain, bright pops of yellow will make your room look bright and perfectly styled.
#4 Give the room another focal point

If you want the floors to be a backdrop instead of the main feature of the room, making a large piece like the dinner table or couch a brighter and more demanding color will make the dark color of your floors an appealing backdrop that won’t interfere with the room. It won’t drown it out, instead, it will further enhance any brightly-colored piece you choose to go over it.
#5 Match your walls to the floor

If you really loved the concrete staining done on your floors (and why wouldn’t you?), get bold and choose a wall paint that echoes, but is not exactly the same as, your floors. By doing this, you make a room dramatic and classy as well as warm and cozy. Choose complementary colors for your furnishings and sprinkle some bright pieces throughout the room for a light and personality-filled room. It’ll be a room with character, embrace it!
#6 Have fun with texture

Using rugs and carpets to style a room is an easy way to give your room character and color without committing to colored furniture. Use wooden furniture on top of your rugs to make the room earthy and warm. But don’t stop there – consider the texture of your carpet and use something else to mimic that same texture. If you have a large shaggy rug with a beautifully dense texture, consider using cushions that mimic that same texture to tie the room together.