Seven Spaces That Capture the Japandi Interior Design Aesthetic

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While you might frame it as a trend, Japandi is much more of a design philosophy. Shaped by two cultures that prize quiet elegance, quality craftsmanship, and the beauty of restraint, Japandi blends the blends Japanese minimalism with Scandinavian warmth and high functionality. Whether expressed through sculptural oak furniture, imperfect ceramics, or rooms bathed in soft natural light, the style encourages a slower, more intentional way of living.

The following spaces—from minimalist apartments in Helsinki to warm wood-clad homes in upstate New York—offer a cross-section of how Japandi is being interpreted by today’s most thoughtful designers. Read on to learn more!

What Is the Japandi Design Style?

Japandi is a hybrid of Japanese and Scandinavian styles, developed around a shared interest in simplicity, natural materials, and functional beauty. Though the two regions are geographically distant, their design philosophies overlap: both prioritize craftsmanship, uncluttered spaces, and a close relationship to nature.

Shared Values, Distinct Histories

Where Scandinavian design emphasizes lightness, pale woods, and softness, Japanese interiors bring in darker tones, lower profiles, and the influence of wabi sabi. This approach to interior design values imperfection and impermanence. Japandi doesn’t merge these traditions into a compromise; it sets them side by side. One sharpens the other.

The Look: Neutral, Natural, Unforced

This design style is usually built on a palette of neutral colors, with materials like linen, stone, clay, oak, and ash. You’ll find clean lines, organic shapes, and a balance of open space and tactile texture. Furnishings tend to be low and deliberate, with natural light used to emphasize volume and shadow.

From Tradition to Contemporary Practice

While the term “Japandi” is relatively new, the values behind it are not. They can be traced back to 20th-century designers like Alvar Aalto, Arne Jacobsen, and Shiro Kuramata, who all shaped what we now recognize as modern design. Today, studios like Norm Architects, Keiji Ashizawa Design, and Joanna Laajisto are extending the style into contemporary interiors—from private homes to hospitality spaces across Europe, Japan, and the U.S.

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A Long View on Living

In recent years, Japandi interiors have become common in international publications like Elle Decor, yet the combination of Japanese minimalism and Scandinavian simplicity resists trend cycles. In fact, designer Amanda Brooke recently described it as “a lasting language of design.” It’s quiet but impactful. What stays consistent is its respect for space, silence, and the objects we choose to live with.

Seven Spaces That Capture the Japandi Interior Design Aesthetic

This Midcentury Home by Cathie Hong

For interior designer Cathie Hong, renovating her own 1960s redwood home in Los Gatos was a chance to distill the Japandi interior design ethos into something personal. The original structure, complete with double-height ceilings, exposed beams, and walls of glass, had excellent architectural bones.

Hong layered in natural materials, sculptural furniture, and warmth to create a space that feels both grounded and quiet. White oak cabinetry, terrazzo counters, and minimalist lighting define the Japandi-style kitchen, while art by Korean-American fiber artist Mimi Jung and painter-printmaker Kyu-Baik Hwang adds depth without noise.

Throughout the house, Hong’s careful palette of soft neutrals, tactile wood, and clean lines makes room for life without crowding it. Custom built-ins serve multiple functions. Bathrooms embrace wabi sabi interior design with blush-toned ceramic grid tile and simple oak vanities. There’s nothing performative here—no trend-chasing or decorative excess. Just a calm, deliberate balance between Japanese and Scandinavian styles, scaled for a family of six and shaped by a designer who knows exactly how she wants to live.

Read more about the project here in Architectural Digest.

This Fora_Space by Norm Architects

Tucked inside a restored heritage building in London’s Holborn neighborhood, Fora’s Chancery House, designed by Copenhagen-based Norm Architects, embodies quiet luxury through a lens of Japanese design. The project transforms a traditional office into a layered, human-centered environment, and does so without abandoning the building’s historical texture. From the handmade terracotta floors to the smooth oak millwork and soft plastered surfaces, every material decision reflects a Japandi interior sensibility: grounded, minimal, and built to last.

Across images, the workspace reads more like a serene domestic interior than a corporate setting. Sheer curtains diffuse natural light, neutral color palettes keep the atmosphere calm, and low-slung furniture echoes Japanese and Scandinavian styles with its restrained silhouette and tactile materials. Norm Architects’ focus on wellbeing and simplicity resonates throughout, from the inset seating steps to the modular desk areas framed in pale wood slats. It’s a workplace by way of wabi sabi: dignified, deliberate, and deeply livable.

This Indoor-Outdoor Seating Area by Studio McGee

Studio McGee’s take on the Japandi style is often more atmospheric than doctrinaire, and this sunken outdoor seating area shows how the design language can be stretched without losing its clarity. Framed by rough plaster walls and softened by cream-toned cushions, the space blends the elemental calm of Japanese minimalism with the ease of Scandinavian living. This courtyard feels at once ancient and modern; it is carved, quiet, and deeply tactile.

Natural materials anchor the entire scene: limewashed stone, bleached wood, and textured linen. The fire pit glows softly against the neutral palette, while woven pillows and raw ceramic vessels add a hand-touched counterpoint to the clean architectural lines.

This Surprising Farmhouse Interior by Tara Benet

Tara Benet’s modern farmhouse defies expectations by merging rustic structure with the clean-lined restraint of Japandi interior design. The living space opens up to a panoramic view, but it’s what happens inside that feels most expansive: white oak floors, crisp millwork, and a thoughtful blend of sculptural and functional furniture create a sense of effortless calm.

Benet’s restraint is strategic. The space leans on a neutral palette but doesn’t fade into sterility; dark accents and curated objects lend weight and rhythm. A branchlike artwork by the fireplace echoes the Japanese reverence for nature, while twin glass coffee tables introduce clarity of design. The layout is rigorous, but not precious; very gesture serves both form and function.

This Attic Conversion in Ullanlinna by Joanna Laajisto

This attic apartment in Helsinki’s Ullanlinna district, redesigned by Finnish interior architect Joanna Laajisto, captures the essence of Japandi interior design. The pitched ceiling and angular walls create an unconventional canvas, but Laajisto leans into the geometry. Pale oak parquet grounds the space, paired with a simple palette of white walls, sculptural lighting, and carefully edited furnishings.

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There’s a clear dialogue here between Japanese and Scandinavian styles: the woven seatbacks, the raw leather sling chairs, and the shoji-adjacent spatial lightness all point to that shared sensibility. Every material choice speaks softly—travertine, oak, wool, glass—and nothing overstays its welcome.

Bellustar Tokyo by Keiji Ashizawa

Designed by Keiji Ashizawa, the sushi restaurant at Bellustar Tokyo hovers quietly above the city. Located on a high floor of the Pan Pacific Hotel, the space trades spectacle for subtlety. Every surface—plaster, stone, and warm hinoki wood—is finely honed but never ostentatious. The long counter, carved with crisp geometries, anchors the room and directs all attention toward the chef’s movements, framed by a panoramic view of Tokyo’s skyline.

Ashizawa’s design is deeply rooted in Japanese minimalism, but the restraint here aligns equally with Scandinavian values: clarity of form, natural light, and a reverence for honest materials. The corridor leading in is hushed and shadowed, giving way to a dining space that feels like a clearing in the clouds.

This FL Residence by TakaTina

Designed by Brooklyn-based studio TakaTina, this upstate New York residence looks out over a forested lake through soaring windows framed in warm cedar. The project draws directly from both Japanese and Scandinavian principles, balancing structure and stillness with an intuitive sense of proportion. Materials are spare and natural: oak flooring, blackened steel, and raw linen. Each element is treated as essential.

The fireplace, raised slightly above the floor and centrally placed, gives the room an almost ceremonial quality. Low-slung woven chairs nod to midcentury Scandinavian forms, while the exposed beams and delicate slatted partitions recall Japanese joinery.

What Do You Think of the Japandi Style?

What unites these seven spaces is a shared attitude. Japandi interiors ask us to notice the details: the grain of the wood, the angle of a chair, the light as it shifts across a textured wall. They remind us that simplicity is not emptiness but refinement, that comfort can be quiet and luxury can be humble. As these designers show, Japandi is less about following rules than about honoring principles: balance, beauty, and the art of living well. What do you think of the style?

Written by the DesignDash Editorial Team
Our contributors include experienced designers, firm owners, design writers, and other industry professionals. If you’re interested in submitting your work or collaborating, please reach out to our Editor-in-Chief at editor@designdash.com.