Move Over Unexpected Red, 2025 Is All About Chrome Interiors

I’m in the midst of styling my new apartment, which mostly means dedicating all my free time to scouring online marketplaces for new items. My screen time is up, my Pinterest boards are a-flowing, and my wallet is hurting. Normally I would say that my interior design style is a mishmash of spooky art, high-end bespoke pieces (courtesy of my woodworker husband), and random hand-me-downs from various friends and family that have found a new home in my space. But recently, there’s been one theme that runs through all my wishlist items: I want them to be chrome.

Let’s be specific: I want metallics in all shapes and sizes. Chrome, aluminum, and steel are all fair game. The only through-line is that these pieces must be silver-hued, and have to make me believe that my beige-box-apartment is really an industrial warehouse, complete with epoxy concrete floors and glass-block windows (can you tell I’ve been bingeing Severance?). While other interior home trends are leaning into pops of color and antiquey vibes, I’m suddenly all about what’s modern, cold, and ideally suited to the home of a super-villain. And I’m not the only one.

“Tubular chromed steel furniture designs of the 1920s and ’30s are having an undeniable moment right now,” says Henry Parsons, a designer at the Office of Charles de Lisle. “These pieces have had a streak of uninterrupted popularity since Marcel Breuer’s Wassily chair was re-released by Gavina/Knoll in the late 1960s and are receiving attention from a new generation of aesthetes. Interest in the Bauhaus and the early foundations of this style seems to be particularly strong among current collectors.”

Calling chrome interiors a “trend” is definitely a misnomer, given that some of the designs we’re loving today have been popular for decades. But it’s nevertheless having a resurgence in 2025 that’s worth paying attention to. “It’s interesting to consider the cyclical nature of this trend; elements of the 1960s – ’80s revival felt self-consciously retro, while the 2025 version seems to be more loosely based on what this furniture signifies in a cultural context,” Parsons adds. “I think the clarity and optimism of the modernist movement is striking a chord with younger furniture buyers in search of pieces which feel both fresh and historically relevant.”

If you’re someone who, like me, knew little about the history and instead saw a leather-and-chrome chair and thought, That looks pretty, don’t write yourself off just yet. So much of what we’re seeing today is either a callback to important designers like Breuer, Mies van der Rohe, Le Corbusier, and Eileen Grey, or else a straight re-edition of some iconic pieces. And there’s a reason why we might be more drawn to it now. “The purity of form and industrial nature of the materials in these pieces is the opposite of so many of the directionless, maximal interiors we’re seeing on Instagram and TikTok,” says Parsons. “First and foremost, it’s about a distillation of sensibility. It’s hard not to see parallels between a Breuer chair and another iconic mid-1920s design: Coco Chanel’s little black dress. Both are shorthand for a certain kind of cosmopolitan, restrained elegance.” Quiet luxury, anyone?

Or maybe we’re all just tired of millennial beige. “By the early 1930s, you see variations of these pieces replacing the florid period-revival furniture in Hollywood film sets as an indicator of wealth and sophistication,” says Parsons. “A few years later, locally produced versions begin to appear as status symbols in Chinese cigarette posters, Hungarian films, and Tokyo dance halls. As a ’90s kid, I’ve internalized Breuer and Le Corbusier pieces as what you would see in a sleek office atrium or at your parents’ cool friend’s loft. Having such a long run as signifiers of a particular urbane sensibility speaks to their timeless appeal.”

Whether you’re also in the process of redecorating, or you’re looking for an investment piece that looks modern but has a great history behind it, don’t fight the chrome trend. It may feel current, but if if Coco Chanel’s little black dress is any indication, we don’t think this is going to go out of style anytime soon.

Table of Contents

Toggle

Ted Synnott Volume Side Table

Tom Dixon Pose Task Light Silver LED

Cassina LC2 Petit Modele Sofa

Blu Dot Plateau Medium Table

Now 20% Off

Soos Atelier Shiloh Coffee Set

Now 22% Off

Util Plié Wall Unit Extension

Eternity Modenr Wassily Chair

Love Ecru Aira Stainless Shelf

Now 19% Off

Tatjana Freund is Hearst’s Fashion & Luxury Commerce Editor, covering beauty, fashion and more across multiple brands. Previously, she worked at ELLE.com and Marie Claire. She’s a fan of whiskey neat, podcasts that give her nightmares, and one time Zoë Kravitz laughed at a joke she made.