Gisele Bündchen uses this layering technique to ensure her neutral living room is anything but boring

Ever the style icon, Gisele Bündchen's home is just as effortlessly chic as the veteran model. 

In a recent dance video, the Brazilian-born, Miami-based fashion icon showed off her modern-yet-cozy living room, featuring soft touches from a fuzzy rug and cool accents of a circular mirror and glass coffee table. We were especially drawn to the layering of textures going on on the ground; the rug sits atop a light beige, tiled floor.

Of all the ways to add texture to a space, rugs reign supreme in their ability to both add visual appeal and cushion otherwise cold and hard surfaces. Experts say that they can be the centerpiece to build a room around.

'A living room rug is like a reoccurring thread in a story or the chorus of a song. It is the glue that holds a scheme together,' says Martin Waller, founder of Andrew Martin. 'While adding texture, warmth, and a sense of lived-in realness to the room, it also unites everything in terms of color and structure.'

Martin Waller

Martin Waller is the founder of Andrew Martin and he remains at the heart of the brand to this day. He has produced 23 books, appeared on television in the UK, US, China, India, Russia and the Middle East. He has written extensively about travel for a variety of magazines, including the Financial Times, and has served on the advisory boards of Molton Brown and KLC Design School. In 2017, he was named in The Evening Standard's list of 1000 Most Influential Londoners.

Martin says that picking a rug color is a good way to determine and build a room's palette and coordinate a space.

'It also helps to position pieces in a room,' he says. 'Use the edge of a rug to align a sofa, for example, or the frame of a picture on the wall. So, where a rug may not necessarily be the focal point of a room, it will still quietly do the work, leaving the statement pieces to dance in the spotlight.'

Layering a rug over tiles adds an extra textured element; soft rugs such as Gisele's are highly complementary against stone or tiled floors.

'Tiles are increasingly being used as decorative pieces of art in the home,' Martin states. 'Be it your kitchen, bathroom, hallway, or even on the stairs, using tiles within any scheme shows off their beautiful textures and patterns while at once uplifting a space. Mixed media, including combinations of ceramic and stone, are becoming increasingly popular to create contemporary inspired geometric layouts.'

Try mixing and matching a woven, rattan rug with green tiles, or a fluffy white one with neutral flooring a la Gisele.

Below, find a selection of textured rugs that are sure to spruce up any bare ground.