I am so not an expert---so, just an opinion here. If I walked into a house...say a cape cod...I would be totally delighted if the inside was unexpected. I love surprises like that...

Plus...it's your house. If you wanted to strip it and furnish it with pom poms and bean bag chairs then I will stand up for your right to do so and help you pick colors. I may not like it, but then I don't have to.

Agree about the location to some extent though...

TL;DR version: You'll be fine.

Definitely no need to have the outside of a house dictate the inside. Consider all the super modern interiors in Italian palazzos or French Haussmann style apartments. Congratulations on the new house.

Totally onside with Rita's comment. I was going to say the same thing about old European homes and apartments furnished with Roche Bobois sofas, Bulthaup kitchens and other super modern/high-end decor and technology.

Although the reverse never works...I was once on a house tour that included a very architecturally modern home but a lot of the furniture was quite traditional. Which was a bit of a letdown.

I love Scandinavian design and I think it would look wonderful in a Cape Cod style home.

I’m going to disagree a little in that I don’t like houses where the interior is entirely unsympathetic to the exterior, or to the location. So with that in mind I’d try to identify features of the house you like (in our current 1930s foursquare, there is some lovely trim work) and try to make your choices play nicely with those features. This can be through color, or style, or proportion, it need not be copying exactly. If the house interior doesn’t have any features, then look to the style of the house and what people might consider ‘typical’ for that style, and pick things from there to work with.

(For example, I think Scandanavian can play very nicely with some of the colors you’d typically think of being used in a Costal Cape Code, so you could probably do more Scandanavian style furniture but primarily use colors and wood tones that feel more coastal-Cape-Cod-y, like blues and grays. If you don’t like those colors then find something else about Coastal Cape Cod you can use as a guide when looking at which other style items you pick.)

The idea is to get somewhere that looks like it isn’t fighting with the house, even though it’s not exactly what would be ‘typical’ for the house. Europeans sometimes do this very well with mixing very old and very modern, and there it tends to be down to colors/materials (so stuff doesn’t clash horribly with the older stuff) and proportions.

That said, don’t forget that there are some rooms we do more expect to be ‘funky’ than others. So if you’re a little hesitant but want to go all out somewhere, then consider going wild either in private spaces like bedrooms (which most guests don’t see) or in the powder room if you have one - there’s definitely an idea that powder rooms can be the place you go a bit crazy because it’s so small and pretty boring otherwise.

The powder room is where you often see people using more interesting wallpaper or tile (especially since you need less of it to do the room so you can go for more expensive stuff) or I knew someone who went a little Cherub crazy in hers and her whole powder room had an Italian old world feel with cherubs here and there - like cherub light switch plates, who knew? To be fair, I never saw her bedroom so maybe that was a bit wild too. :D (She was in general a collector - she had a TON of Santas and Santa stuff she brought out every year - so the cherub thing was something you went ‘okay, yeah, I can see this being a thing she would do.’ Which probably helped it work.)

And to be totally clear, if you are someone comfortable saying ‘I don’t care, I’m doing what I want’ then go for it. If you love your house it’ll show even if it’s an adjustment for people at first. But since you’re saying that isn’t really your thing, there are ways to do non-typical without it being shocking, which sounds more like what you’d be comfortable with?

I don't mind if the interior doesn't match the exterior as long as the house hasn't been critically injured in the process. To come into a cape and see Scandi is just fine (you might have seen that in the early 60s, after all).

But to come into a cape and see a big blank NYC loft is a horrid shock. Just don't disembowel the house a la Fixer Upper and you won't go far wrong. And don't destroy to fix up. In other words if you have a nifty old bath with wonderful old tile, add modern wallpaper or something, but leave the tile and fixtures alone if they're in good condition. You lose value if you mess with those things, anyway, these days.

I hope you come back and post your interiors when you finish. I love Sandi design too...:)

I have seen modern decor in a 1800s Parisian townhouse ... the ornate moldings and fireplaces were looking down their noses at the parvenu leather and steel, which was ignoring the stuffy old fashioned bits. And the Persian rugs were trying to make peace with both sides.

It was stunning. Jaw-dropping.

The key was, the designer didn't wimp out. It was really GOOD modern furniture, totally classic designers, quality workmanship. To stand up to the power of the surrounding room it had to be totally moderne.

So if you like Swedish, go Swedish.

There is a big difference in attempting to erase a home’s identity through structural alterations and removal of style identity clues and just placing a different style of decor on the interior.

Don’t attempt plastic surgery. Attempt some clever makeup tricks.

Agree with..well everybody lol..I'd put it like this: more permanent elements (woodwork, tiles, stones etc..walls and openings obviously)-should take the house and location in the account and should be most authentic to it-or very expertly done, with highest consideration (I did see very streamlined modern interiors including cabinetry etc, designed into very old, great buildings-some I loved, some, I didn't so much, but it was obvious they gave it tons of thought and it cost ..well I didn't pay for it but I highly suspect a LOT)

Less permanent elements like decor-one can be much freer in it. Still takes lots of consideration of course but one can end up with very interesting result..smashingly interesting, sometimes.

And yes, as mentioned before..the better the bones of the house, the more it can support of that homeowner's freedom in decor. It's like a beautiful person with a very interesting face. You can imagine him being almost anyone ..still staying himself.

Anyone see the movie Beetlejuice? Just don't do that to your house and you'll do fine.

Before:

After:

Before:

After: