Need opinions on decorating our new house "artsy" or antique?

My husband and I just bought a brick Victorian that is over a hundred years old. It has been slightly butchered, as the former owners painted the brick on the outside white, made the once functional fireplace "decorative" and painted the original woodwork and built-ins white. We are going to fix all of that. But when I look at houses on our street, which is in a historic district, a lot of the people decorate their homes with things that look like or come from the period these homes were built it (wallpaper, antique chests, old photographs). While I want to restore the house itself to what is must have originally looked like (pull up carpet off the hardwoods and all of the other repairs I listed), my preferred style of decorating has always been that I like painting rooms brilliant, beautiful colors. I don't like a lot of color, our furniture is fairly simple, but it obviously more modern looking. And a lot of our artwork is stained glass or bright oils. My husband and I have very similar taste and we have always gotten compliments on the apartments we live in and how they are decorated. So the question is, do you think in buying an older home you have to decorate with older antiques and that is the correct way to do it, or can our furniture and art be more modern and more like what we favor, including paint colors on the walls, even if we bring back the original hardwoods and fireplace and woodwork?
FIY, there are no covenants from the historical association that says we have to do anything to our home or can't do anything. This is all a matter of choice on our part.

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