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Crafting the right look for your home exterior takes time and careful thought—especially if you want to take advantage of the latest style trends. Opting into contemporary styles and colors for your siding shows off your home in its best light, while at the same time you can enjoy strong, durable protection against moisture and time.
Since you’ll be living with your new siding for many years, it’s worth considering what you like most in today’s trends and landing on something you know you’ll love. Start envisioning the possibilities with our list of the latest modern trends for siding styles and colors this year.
Styles that Create Fresh Modern Designs
Mix and Match Patterns
Contemporary home designs are all about blending different looks, materials, and colors to create strong visual interest. When it comes to siding, you can use different styles together on your exterior to draw attention. A few ways to achieve an attractive mix-and-match look include using:
- Wide vertical planks and narrow trim boards for a charming farmhouse board-and-batten pattern
- Vertical boards on the bottom story of your home, and horizontal boards on the top story to emphasize height
- Horizontal siding on the bottom level, with vertical siding on gables to catch the eye
- Traditional lap planks on the main exterior, matched with shingle siding to create accents on dormers
Double Down on Texture
Today’s home styles lean into playing with textures on siding. Why? Because different textures can catch the eye and make your home “pop” from the curb. They create interesting patterns of light and shadow, yielding dramatic effects.
James Hardie siding offers several different textures to choose from—allowing you to mimic looks such as woodgrain, brick, and stucco. From smooth panels to fine sand to rough textures, you can easily make your home stand out. And textures may be mixed and matched, just like siding board styles, so you can get as creative as you like.
Focus on Eye-Catching Accents
Modern exterior styles take advantage of what makes your home unique—which means focusing on helping accent features stand out. This can be accomplished by adding a specific type of siding (usually vertical panels or shingle siding) just on fixtures like dormers and areas above the garage. The visual pop of that special siding will make visitors take a second look to admire your home.
Go Eco-Friendly
Materials that are environmentally responsible is a definite continuing modern trend. Choosing Hardie siding makes this easy. Fiber cement is a nontoxic manmade product consisting of Portland cement, cellulose fibers (a plant-based material), and water. It lasts for decades, so that it doesn’t end up in landfills as often as other products. Installing fiber cement siding is one way to lower your environmental impact—and every little bit helps.
Bring Cladding Indoors
Use siding planks to generate a unique look in areas other than your home’s exterior walls. Shiplap is a highly popular choice for interior rooms, especially in entrance areas for a seamless style that draws visitors in. Some homeowners add planks to one wall while keeping other walls in the room a more traditional style. Designers are using oversized siding boards inside the home to allow exterior and interior to look different, yet blended.
Top Color Choices for Contemporary Siding Looks
Go Bright with White Siding
Classic shades of white are still going strong as a popular home exterior color. White is attractive on many different architectures. Plus, the clean, calming appearance of this color choice is refreshing and timeless. Right now, the trend is leaning away from snow-white shades in favor of warm off-whites—so look for a soothing off-white for your siding. Features like trim can also be white, though you can choose a dark or bright color to generate a visible accent. Hardie hues like Snow Owl and Moonflower White achieve this warm off-white look beautifully.
Create Bold Contrast
If you want your house to draw the eye and make a statement, sharp contrasting colors for your siding is one way to achieve that. The key here is to opt for hues that fall on opposite ends of the color wheel or that create triads of colorful drama. Examples include:
- Bright white for the main siding, like Hardie’s Summer White, with a rich shade like Anchor Black for trim
- Main siding in deep Black Walnut paired with trim in sandy White Meringue
- A carefully chosen palette of grays and neutrals—such as pale Gull Gray on the main siding, with a dark shade like Inky Indigo on trim
Ground Your Home in Black and Gray
Dark siding remains a look that many homeowners are gravitating toward. Deep grays and blacks immediately give a house a distinct, dramatic feel that can’t be overlooked. Just as with white, the entire exterior can be black or gray—or different parts of the home can be lighter colors to create visual contrast.
Choose Comforting Earth Tones
Relaxing, warm earth tones are making a comeback this year, and for good reason! Shades such as moss green, bark brown, sandy beige, and similar earth tones match well with outdoor landscaping. These hues are natural in style and blend well with genuine wood, brick, and stone, which means they look great on many different architectures. Example Hardie colors include taupe-based Cobble Stone and woodsy Heather Moss.
Enjoy Lasting Modern Style with Hardie Siding Installed by Our Expert Team
No matter what look you’d like your home exterior to showcase, you can enjoy decades of high performance and low-maintenance beauty to boot when you invest in long-lasting, weather-resistant James Hardie siding—installed by our well-trained team at John McCarter Construction to deliver top results.
Get inspired for your new siding by exploring our gallery of finished exterior remodeling projects—and picture the beautiful, lasting transformation you can have for your home.