One of life’s greatest pleasures may be moving to a new home, but it can also be a time of uncertainty, particularly when it comes to decorating. How can you decorate your home to best showcase your personal sense of style? If done properly, your house will be comfortable and cheerful. A hodgepodge of furnishings, materials and paint colors that never meld into an aesthetically acceptable whole will result from improper execution. You’ll be far more effective if you plan ahead and follow the same steps as seasoned interior designers.
Start outside of the furniture store
It is common knowledge that it is best to avoid food shopping when you are hungry since you will make poor decisions. The same advice holds true for furniture stores: don’t make a hasty purchase just because your home is empty. No, a couch is necessary. But you’re stuck with it if you choose the pink-striped sectional purely out of aesthetic preference and without taking the size of the space into account. Because the remainder of the space must be constructed around a giant sofa, it will always look out of place.
Armed with a metre stick and a notebook, begin in the room you wish to furnish.
Understand your measures
It’s crucial that the furniture is scaled properly for the space. A huge sectional sofa can completely occupy a tiny space, whereas thin seats may be virtually undetectable in a large loft. Measure the length and width of any space you plan to decorate, as well as the ceiling height and any potential obstacles like stairs, columns, radiators, and other obstructions, before you begin decorating. In order to plan for window coverings, it is wise to measure apertures as well as the wall space under, above, and to each one’s margins.
According to David Kleinberg, the founder of New York-based interior design firm David Kleinberg Design Associates, “the first error most people make is that they acquire things that are the wrong size. Sofas that don’t fit the room, couches that can’t fit through doors, too-small seats, workstations that are too big, and nightstands that hang into doorways. You can help yourself by taking precautions to prevent such issues.
Design a Floorplan
Using the dimensions of your rooms, create a flooring plan that offers you a thorough perspective of the entire property. The president of Mark Hampton, the interior design company established by her father, Alexa Hampton, in New York, believes that every project “should start with a floor plan.” You must feel at ease in the environment.
Making a floor plan the old-fashioned way involves using paper, a pencil, and a ruler. But the majority of designers in the industry utilize drafting programs like AutoCAD. Somewhere between these two extremes are programs like Magicplan, Floor Plan Creator, and RoomScan Pro, which are made to make it simpler for homeowners to build floor plans (some even automate measurements using the camera on your smartphone, but double-check those numbers).
After you’ve decided on the main layout of the room, you may experiment with how the furniture will be positioned. Just make sure to scale the footprint of each piece to the specifications of the sketch before you do so.
Determine your style of living
There are no perfect answers in this difficult segment. Rooms might be formal or casual, old-fashioned or contemporary, and aesthetically pleasing or chilly. You should make every effort to decide how you want to live in a certain place, Ms. Hampton advised. What is your strategy? How big is the population there? Are there any kids around? What idealized visions do you have for your future life?
A home should be set up differently from one for someone who dines out every night if they frequently host large dinner parties. A person should have a different living room than someone who just wants to watch TV and sleep if they want to organize expensive fundraising events.
Follow in the footsteps of the professionals
To build your individual style, look at home décor books, periodicals, and internet sites like Houzz, Pinterest, and Instagram. Brad Ford, an interior designer in New York City, advises putting together a collection of your favourite images and deciding which aesthetic most appeals to you.
Look at the details after you’ve found some images you like, Mr. Kleinberg suggested. As a contrast to sections where solids are present and where color can be effectively used or not, he advised focusing on parts where the pattern is used. Additionally, it will include information on everything from the kind of furniture you want to the various window treatment options.
Stick It Down
Use painter’s tape to mark where the furniture will go on the floor and against walls in the actual space to further develop your floor plan ideas.
The founder of the New York interior design firm Tilton Fenwick, Anne Maxwell Foster, explained that we box out various aspects with blue tape on the flooring. The rug will be where? Does it require cutting? What portion of the coffee table can be seen? Even if we have a furniture layout that is precise to the last sixteenth of an inch, it still helps to walk around and picture everything in the space.
Establish a Budget
The math is straightforward: If you lavishly spend on an exorbitantly expensive chair, you won’t have as much money left over for the entire house. Mr. Ford advised you to ensure that all of your financial decisions are prudent. A budget provides a plan for dividing the expenses of products among rooms. You can still make an exception, he said, if you locate a special dining room table, but you’ll need to carefully consider other areas where you might be able to save money in order to pay for it.
Set the Phases in Order
Ceiling painting, drywall finishing, and hardwood floor refinishing are filthy jobs. It’s better to finish this kind of work before adding any furniture or decor to the home, if at all possible.
When you initially enter the home, present a positive image
Establish a Position
Do not hesitate. “That room is the powerful moment when someone gets inside your home,” said Tilton Fenwick Suysel dePedro Cunningham, the head of the interior design firm. It may tell you a lot about the wearer and their sense of fashion.
As a result, a wall decoration that might be overdone in a bedroom may be ideal in a foyer. She advised selecting a bold color, lacquer, or wallpaper that you would be hesitant to use in a large living room in order to provide a “Wow” effect. Additional benefit? Since foyers are frequently small, it is frequently possible to add eye-catching wall hangings and finishes without going overboard.
Adapt Creation to Your Routine
With a few key furniture pieces and accessories, you may simplify your regular arrival and departure routine. “It’s not normally a large place, so you’re working with a limited number of components,” said Mr. Ford. According to Mr. Ford, a console with drawers is great if you’re the sort who wants to drop it all as soon as you step in the door because it’s a good place to hide your keys and mail. Instead of drawers, a bowl, tray, or another decorative container might serve as a catch-all to help keep things organized.
Consider the Weather
Being the first space people enter after leaving the outside, the entryway has to deal with a lot, including ice, snow, precipitation, mud, or whatever Mother Earth decides to deliver. In order to stop them from spreading to other parts of the house, you must address these problems at the front entrance.
The main living areas—whether they consist of separate rooms or a single, open-concept space—set the tone for interactions between a person and their family and friends
Establish the color scheme
Digital images can only roughly capture the appearance of teal objects. Despite the fact that you can observe colors, patterns, and metal surfaces online. Wherever possible, order color chips, fabric swatches, and material samples to be sure that the final products will meet your expectations. Mr. Kleinberg advised ordering samples from the majority of merchants as being the best course of action. He went on to say that when viewed on a screen, “some colors mix together,” making it difficult to distinguish between cool and warm hues.
Control the Walls
The notorious tendency of paint colors to change color depending on the illumination (and seems to change between the paint store to home). After being applied to four walls, this impact only gets stronger. This is why picking a paint color after seeing the chips in a store is never a good idea. Check the largest chip you can find in the area you plan to paint, at the very least. Even better, paint sizable sample patches on walls or movable boards so you can observe them all day.
Baseboards, mouldings, doors, and other trims can be painted in a coordinating color to match the room or in a contrasting color to stand out more—typically an off-white in a room with colored walls. The paint used on the walls and the trim sometimes have very different sheens. A semi-gloss sheen will make mouldings more visible and durable.
You should also decide how you want to address the ceiling. It can be painted either white for a tidy appearance or the same color as the walls for a warm appearance. Applying a matt or flat finish is acceptable because smudge-causing items or dirty hands don’t commonly come into touch with the ceiling.
Finish with Accessories and Art
The final step in designing any home is to add art and accessories, and there really isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach to this. In a maximalist context, layers and entire collections of art artefacts might be on exhibit, yet in a minimalist setting, it might simply be a few things.
Consider how such places are decorated, going back to the origins of inspiration. Is there a single vase on the table, or are there bowls, boxes, candles, and books all about as well? Is there a single piece of art hanging above the sofa or a free-form gallery wall?
Bedroom decoration ideas
Plan your furniture
The room is called a bedroom because the bed occupies the majority of the furniture there. It merits being placed in the centre of the room, perhaps with a headboard in one corner and walkways on the other sides.
Make it Soft
Since the goal is to create a calm and welcoming ambiance, it is typically not a good idea to use vivid colors or graphic wallpaper in a bedroom. Mr. Olsen said that anything that feels violent should be avoided. While I like using vibrant colors when designing, I like using softer tones in the bedrooms, including muted blues, greens, and yellows.
Some interior designers even redecorate bedroom walls for a genuinely delicate touch.
Make your bed
There are many different ways to make a bed, and using a top sheet has recently been the subject of a contentious debate. How formal or informal you like your bedroom to be greatly rely on your particular preferences.
All that is needed to make a bed is a gorgeous duvet, a few pillows, and a fitted sheet over the mattresses. For something even more formal, you will need additional coats.
Control the Light
It’s crucial to be able to control both natural and artificial light.
You should be able to completely block out the sun if you are sensitive to it when you are sleeping. The ideal way to do this is with a blackout roller blind or a Roman shade with a black liner. However, the edges of the shade typically allow some sunlight to reach the area. To stop it, add draperies with a dark lining.
At night, many lighting layers are helpful. Even while an overhead light can swiftly illuminate the entire room, the right ambiance might not be achieved. Usually, the lighting from two bedside lamps is cosier. Many designers use wall-mounted lamps that are hardwired or connected to an outlet in addition to table lamps that are placed on either side of the bed. While the table lights cast an ambient glow, the wall-mounted lamps provide reading light.
Kitchen and washrooms
Check the cabinets and counters
It takes a lot of work to replace kitchen counters, but switching from a cheap material like laminate to an expensive one like marble, granite, or quartzite may radically change how a bathroom or kitchen looks.
Kitchen backsplashes are another location with lots of potential. You can add or remove a backsplash using your preferred ceramic, glass, metal, or cement tile even if you opt to preserve the current counters. As long as they are clean and in excellent condition, it is frequently possible to paint kitchen cabinets and bathroom vanity cabinets a new color for a different look. If the cabinets have an antiquated design, you might be able to keep the existing cabinet carcasses and only change the doors. Often, it is more economical to replace the complete sink when it comes to inexpensive bathroom sinks. Prefabricated vanities with matching tops and sinks are offered by many companies.
Concentrate on What You Touch
The appearance of a kitchen or bathroom can be significantly changed by simply replacing the cabinet handles with new hardware. You shouldn’t skimp on the faucets in your kitchen and bathroom either as you use them every day. Choose products with heads that offer the functionality you require as well as grips that feel secure as you turn them.
This argument also holds true for bathroom accessories, such as high-quality towel bars, robe hooks, and toilet paper holders, which might all give the room a modern look at a reasonable cost.
Textiles can be given new life
Your towel bars are useless if they are holding towels that are torn or mismatched. Instead of recycling your old towels and wet wipes, purchase new ones that are only one color (you deserve it). Towels with prints are a lovely finishing touch.
At the end of it, Home should feel like home!
