I'd take a note from the Shaker style of country - a clean minimal style without geese, pigs or other animals wearing ginghams. In fact if you go back a generation or so, country was about simple living and not collections of non-functional items.

It's a guest room, so a beautiful basket filled with potential needs of guests would be wonderful. A pretty clock, interesting books with pretty book covers and one of those covered glasses for guests to keep water on the bedside table.

Think like a guest - what would you like - I know I'd like fairly empty table tops so I can put my stuff on them, some place to leave my suitcase open so I can access clothes, maybe some empty drawers to store things?

Sky

CHICKENS!!!! Chickens everywere!!!!

heh heh Ok but not dressed in gingham. I reserve that for the swine family alone.

One thing I quite love that looks great in a primitive decor (verses "country") is antique (or reproduction since the antiques are now sky high in cost) game boards. You can use them on the wall for a faulous art display, and then maybe have one set up on a table or dresser. You can see how basic they are in the link I'll include here. They'd be easy to make and antique yourself if you are at all handy that way.

I also like littl details like a milking stool...perhaps a butter churn (let the kids play with it!) or one thing I alway loved when I had country/primitave decor, an antique wheel chair (my nieces and nephews LOVED that thing to roll around in). Anyhoo, check out these and see what you think...

Here is a link that might be useful: Game board examples

Well I think you are already on the right track and if I could see pix I may say you really didn't need much else. I did an image search with google and found this site. For some reason it started with the last pix in the group of bedrooms, but after checking maybe 15 other rooms I liked the last one the best anyway. You may want to look through them all, but it's dinner time here soon so I bookmarked them for later. Country has evolved from the cute animals of the 80s into a more minimalist look by what I've seen lately. I thin you'll find your style and the new country will work quite well together.
Hope this all makes sense. I'm still in pain from the news this morning of Dan Fogelbergs passing and just trying to get through the day checking the boards and don't feel like proof reading. Sorry.

Here is a link that might be useful: Modern Country Bedrooms

As you describe your room, I thought of Shaker Boxes, beautiful and almost modern. Think Shaker, not Country! (Ick...no geese!) Guest rooms are really mostly about function. Clear surfaces. Places for belongings. Good lighting for reading. You're fine!

Here is a link that might be useful: Hancock Village Store

Yes, definitely more Shaker than country. In addition to the Shaker elder's chair, there's a Shaker mirror - both from Shaker Workshops - and the nightstands are somewhat Shakerish, although not reproductions of anything that actually existed.

Amysrq, I spent a large part of the past year driving up and down the Mass Pike, and visited Hancock Shaker Village, but only purchased cooking herbs. What I really like from their online store is the seed box puzzle.

{{!gwi}}I had also been thinking about a tray made like a Shaker box, because I would typically place a tray with glasses and water in the room. (Because my kitchen is kosher, guests are sometimes afraid to take anything, even a water glass, from a kitchen cabinet.)

Igloochic, I used to have a milking stool. It was eliminated during a previous downsizing. I'm not at all sure there will be much floor space once the furniture is all in place (there is no bed in the room yet), so I'm going to wait on anything that can't fit on a shelf or tabletop.

Justgotabme, thank you for the link. The last room wasn't the only one that I liked, but in general the last few were better than the rest.

You're in New York, Cuz! You could be a little Adirondack-y perhaps?

I would stick to natural and plain, and could you do some plants? Maybe some aspidistras in rough glazed clay pots?

Kumquat trees by the window are lovely in primitive or country-ish rooms , with a comfortable reading chair to the side. You could even do an Adirondack chair with comfortable cushions and throws.

Cruising websites for British lodgings today, I stumbled upon an AMAZING bedroom - they had done thin (button-tufted) cushions and tab tops, in a print fabric and attached them above the bed (a la headboard) with a strong, well mounted curtain rod. They placed pillows in front of those.

I wish I could remember the name of the place, because that room was lovely.

You're in New York, Cuz! You could be a little Adirondack-y perhaps?

Well, two of the largest Shaker communities - Watervliet, near Albany, and New Lebanon - were in New York, and closer to here than the Adirondacks.

This room is not nearly large enough for an Adirondack chair, at least not if there also has to be a bed in the room.

I have seen cushions with tabs on a curtain rod used in place of a headboard. The space below the windows would also be good for an upholstered headboard attached to the wall, like they are always doing on TV. (Does anyone do that in real life?)

"Country" is a very broad term these days and it doesn't have to embrace farm animals. There are all kinds of styles that could be called country, like English Country, Primative, French Country, Euro Country, Modern Country, Shaker Country, Pottery Barn Country, and on and on.

I'll bet you can update your decor without spending too much money. You might try googling "modern country decor" on the web, and also on Images for ideas.

Here is a link that might be useful: How to Update Country Decor

Okmoreh, I think the tray with glasses and water idea is great! They do that curtain rod/cushion headboard thing in France a lot. Madura has the goods, both in Westchester and Boston if you go that route. I have a padded headboard that just sits between the wall and the bed....never even bolted it on. You'd never know.

Here is a link that might be useful: Madura

Okmoreh and everyone else who still believes that "county" is still baskets, clutter, ruffles, farm tools & barnyard animals: please flip through past & current issues of Country Living Magazine and Country Home Magazine. There has been a rebirth of "country" that is nothing like your perceptions!

"Country" can still mean what you are imagining... but that is now the exception and not the norm. The new definition for "country" is the word "comfortable". A mix of old and new combined for actual living. The things you love being used and not just having something for decoration.

When you try too hard to look perfectly "Shaker" or "Primative", you can quickly make a room look like a stage set and not as a room for living in. Items in the room shouldn't have to match... just look like they serve a purpose to be there... added over time as needed.

OK... I've stepped off my soapbox! :)

I think I have a subdued country look in my house. Many of my accessories are spare or black or old or all three! Some of the things I like in my great room are my black picture frames, simple iron lamp bases, ink drawings, Wallace Nutting photographs, a spittoon, a copper vase, a glass urn filled with acorns, an antique child's boot and Hitchcock type chairs with cane seats.

I don't care if country is "in" or "out". I couldn't decorate any other way!