Interior Design

When decorating our homes we usually breakdown each room: bedrooms, bathroom, kitchen, living room etc. Then we start to think about colours, materials even down to things like the lighting and cupboard handles. But there are areas of our homes that are often overlooked because we spend less time there.

But there are places in a house like the staircase, hallways and utility rooms which are incredibly valuable aspects of our home and are  crucial in the overall running of our home. Especially hallways or entry points as this is usually where guests first interact with your home.

Here are three places almost everyone overlooks when fixing up their home and how you can bring them to life.

Staircase

A staircase takes you from a to b, from the living quarters to your bed, so why shouldn’t it be given just as much attention as the rest of the house? And updating or starting a staircase from scratch isn’t as expensive as you might think thanks to kits being sold from places that sell staircases online in the uk

There are plenty of ways that you can style your stairs, from contemporary space saving options using winder staircase kits to ornate railings, there’s no reason why you can’t make a feature of the stairwell.

This winder staircase looks delicate saves on space.

You could even open up the underneath of the stairs to utilise this space with shelving for books or even a study area. And what about the wallspace? You could always use this area to create a featurewall.

Hallways

Entryways to a home tend to become a dumping ground for muddy boots, bags and coats and leave little room for any interior design. This is a shame because it’s actually the very first impression a guest has with the inside of your home. Not that your sole aim is to impress your friends and family, but making more of a feature of this part of your house can really change the mood of your home.

Instead of leaving this space to have no personality, why not inject some colour with bright, storage solutions for shoes, pegs for coats and even shelving for greenery. You could even put up a series of prints and create a picture wall to initiate the dialogue of your home straight from the front door.

Utility rooms

The utility room is usually a secluded room shunted to the back of the house where no guest need venture. But it is still a very important room and one that keeps the household ticking over. So why overlook style for function?

To make the space more interesting, you could draw on the rooms utilitarian function and use some wire mesh adjustable shelving, metal drying frames and matching washing machines and dryers.

You could even use curtains to separate your space and conceal the washing machine and tumble dryer.

Have you done anything interesting in your home lately? I’d love to hear about it in the comments.

As much as you might love your home, there will be a time where you think it could do with some improvement. You might not have the time for substantial structural improvements, but that’s okay, there are plenty other little changes you can make that will change the way you see your house, and look forward to coming home after a long day.

These little changes can be completed in a day, or over a weekend, some may cost money – but not a lot – while others will be free of cost. Despite how small they are, you might just be surprised at how much of a difference this will make towards your home.

REARRANGE

Take a look at any room in your house. It has probably looked that way for so long that you just assume that there is no other way to improve it, right?

Wrong.

Rearranging furniture in your home, such as sofas, beds, or cabinets can have a massive effect on the way the room appeals to you. Moving that big sofa away from one wall and placing it in the centre has the potential to unleash an unimaginable amount of space that you had never considered before.

Furthermore, locating the centrepiece, the main event, the item of interest in each room. This is typically something you are very proud of, be it the best photograph you have ever taken, or a collection of trophies from your children’s title-winning football season. These are the things you want people to pay attention to whenever they come round.

But do they grab attention? Sometimes, sure, but often, they are placed too out of the way to really pique interest. Rearranging by merely moving them from one shelf to another can grant further action zones within the room and show off how successful you and your family are.

GET OUT OF THE LIVING ROOM

You’ll spend a lot of time in your living room, that’s cool, we all do. Why else would you have spent a small fortune on a new TV? But being in the living room – or any room you spend most of your time – for so long can quickly cause it to lose its lustre.

This is natural. It’s why it is advised to only use your bed for sleeping and not working or eating. It’s a psychological thing where your body stops associating bed with rest and instead associates it with, well, everything else. And that is bad for winding down at the end of the day.

Changing up where you spend most of your time – and not just moving from one room to another to repeat the same process – can have a massive effect on mental wellbeing. Furthermore, it will stop you relying solely on the living room – or again, any place – to be the source of relaxation. That can happen anywhere.

LET THERE BE LIGHT

You’re probably thinking ‘Yeah like I need more lights pumping up my electricity bill’, however, light and happiness are related. This is particularly true during winter months where the days are shorter and can have hinder and potential contentedness you are aching to experience.

This light can be placed strategically around the home, but it is essential to focus on those areas that are often doused in shadow. Additionally, to run the risk of contradiction, investing in less-powerful lights for those rooms of the house that you want to feel more relaxed in – such as the bedroom – can have a massive effect on helping you wind down before going to bed.

Bedside lamps can be used when reading in bed after a long day and mean you don’t have to get up when it’s time to sleep to turn the light off. This will further increase you wind-down levels and make for an easier, more peaceful sleep.

You won’t know how much of a difference ideas such as these make until you try it. While you may have gotten used to how everything looks and are perhaps reluctant to change (because it’s way too much effort to move everything back if it doesn’t work) the potential for freshening up the atmosphere of your home will invigorate and allow you to see your home as if it were new.

Little changes making big differences is the key to keeping you active in the upkeep of your home. Seeing the same thing every day for years on end can quickly lead to boredom and restlessness, so give it a go, and reap the benefits of entering a house that you know is home but still feels fresh.

They say there’s no place like home, and for many of us, this statement rings true. Home is a place where we can relax and be ourselves. When you’re designing your home’s interiors, it’s always important to consider the purpose of each room and how you want to feel when you use that particular space. In an office or studio, you want to be inspired and motivated. In the kitchen, you may wish to create a sociable space where you can hang out and catch up. In the bedroom, it’s important to feel calm and design an area where you can chill out, switch off and embrace the peace and quiet. If your bedroom is more hectic than heavenly, and you’re keen to create a tranquil haven to retreat to after long, busy days, here are some suggestions to inspire you.

Using colour to set the tone

Colours can have a significant impact on the way we feel. Certain shades can energise and uplift us, while others can make us feel calm. In the bedroom, it’s beneficial to opt for tones that facilitate relaxation. Avoid colours like orange, yellow and purple and opt for blue, white and grey. Pastel tones can also work well. If you want to add colour without making a bold statement, keep the walls understated and use accessories to add interest. Monochrome is a really popular choice for bedrooms. If you’ve got white walls, you can use soft furnishings, vases and frames to add grey and black tones. When you’re searching for inspiration for colours, have a look at some samples, get some ideas from the Internet and interior magazines and think about the kind of style you want to go for.

Image from https://www.flickr.com/photos/inbounduk/21269128425

Making your bed the star of the show

Most of us spend the majority of our time in the bedroom sleeping. When you walk through the door, and you catch sight of your bed, how do you feel? Do you feel relaxed and overjoyed that you’ll soon be climbing under those covers or does you bed leave you wanting more? If you’re keen to make more of a statement and ensure your bed is the focal point of the room, take a look at some designs and styles on sites like John Ryan by Design or think about ways you could breathe new life into an existing frame. If you’re a creative person, and you don’t want to buy a new bed, you could always embrace the upcycling trend and use your talents to make a unique headboard or an eye-catching frame, for example. Once you’ve got your bed sorted, use linen and accessories to bring attention to it.

Adding subtle lighting

Lighting can be used to brighten up a room, but it’s also a really useful means of setting the tone. In the kitchen, you probably want as much light as possible, but in the bedroom, it’s best to keep things muted and subtle. Low-level lighting creates a romantic ambience, and it will help to prepare you for a well-earned rest. Stick to bedside lamps or fit a dimmer switch so that you can turn down the lights and create the right mood when you’re ready to hit the hay. You could also use LED candles or even fairy lights to add cosiness.

Image courtesy of https://www.pexels.com/search/lamp/

Embrace the darkness

As humans, we are programmed to sleep at night and wake when it’s light. If you’ve got light streaming through the windows and you’re trying to wind down and doze off, you may struggle. Ensuring that the room is dark will create the desired atmosphere and make it easier to get to sleep. If your room isn’t pitch black at night, you could add a lining to your curtains or invest in some blackout blinds.

Celebrating plant power

Plants can bring a beautifully fresh and natural aesthetic to the bedroom, but they also have benefits for your physical and mental health. Studies show that having plants at home can improve air quality and help you feel less stressed. With so many people struggling to relax due to stress, adding some plants to your boudoir could prove beneficial. Research suggests that exposure to plants can lower your blood pressure, combat stress and improve your mood. If you’re not a gardener, don’t worry. It’s very easy to care for houseplants. All you need to do is choose a spot with access to natural light and water your plants every couple of days.

Image via https://www.flickr.com/photos/emilysnuffer/10270509044

Decluttering

Take a walk into your bedroom. How do you feel when you open the door? Do you feel happy, relaxed and peaceful or do you feel anxious or on edge? If your room is full of stuff, there are clothes and shoes scattered all over the place, and you can’t see the floor for dust, now is the time to embark on a decluttering mission. Clutter can make you feel stressed, and it can make it difficult to switch off and get to sleep. Invest in some storage boxes or fit some shelves to enable you to tidy your belongings away or display them in a stylish manner. A tidy room makes for a tidy mind. If you’re guilty of hoarding things, try and be ruthless. If you’ve got clothes you haven’t worn for years or ornaments that are gathering dust in boxes, have a clear out. Decluttering can be very cathartic.

When you’re heading up to your bedroom to read a book, listen to some music or catch forty winks, you want to feel completely calm and relaxed. If your bedroom is full of stuff, the decor is garish or drab, or there’s no space to chill out, now is the time to overhaul your boudoir to bring a sense of serenity. You don’t have to spend a fortune to achieve a stunning transformation. Choose soothing colours, keep the room dark and tidy and set the tone with ambient lighting and an inviting bed. Finish the look with some carefully-selected accessories and some houseplants. Hopefully, you’ll have a stunning sanctuary in no time.

Over time, it can be easy for the home to become disused in a number of ways. One of the clearest and commonest ways for this to happen is for individual rooms to stop being used as they are meant to be. This means that your kitchen is no longer just a space for eating, or your bedroom has become more than just somewhere to sleep. This happens gradually in most households, but by the time it has occurred it usually means that the home as a whole has lost much of its charm. It then becomes necessary to find a way to reclaim those rooms, so that the home can improve again.

The Bathroom

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We’ll start with an easy one. The reason the bathroom is usually easy to reclaim is actually twofold. Firstly, it is not usually quite as prone to being disused as many other rooms are. Secondly, it is often the smallest room of the home, making any changes that are necessary easier and quicker to carry out. To begin with, take a look at the decor. It is perfectly possible that the passage of time has rendered the decor of your bathroom outdated. This can happen sooner than you think, and it is definitely worth looking into. With any luck, you will only need to give it a quick lick of paint to get it back to the level of standard you want.

You might have noticed that storage has become a problem in your bathroom. Usually what happens is that the bathroom is at first only used for storing those items which are relevant to it. But then after a time, you might end up having to store other things in there as well. This could be random items from around the home, or you might have even started putting more and more ornaments in there too. After a while, this can result in a bathroom which is no longer functioning in the way you would hope. It can feel more cluttered and messier than you would like, and this can take much of the potential relaxation out of using the bathroom. The obvious solution is just to de-clutter the room – and you might well find that this makes a huge difference.

Starting with the bathroom in this way will have a way of making you feel much more in control of your home, and you will then feel more ready to move on to some of the other, larger rooms.

The Bedrooms

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Psychologists often claim that you should use the bedroom for two things, and these things alone: sleeping and sex. But how many of us have noticed that the bedroom starts to be used for much more than just these things? It normally doesn’t take too long for any bedroom to become a general kind of dumping ground for random items, much in the same way that the bathroom can (as we have just seen). However, the bedroom is altogether different because we are often prone to leaving it alone for much longer, for whatever reason there might be behind that. If you want to reclaim your bedroom you will first need to tackle any of the clutter you might have developed in there, as with the bathroom. But that alone might not be enough.

Are you having trouble sleeping? Many people do these days, and among the most common reasons are: a messy bedroom (which we have just discussed), and an uncomfortable bed. This, then, is another of the really profound and useful ways in which you can take back control of your bedroom. If you feel that you could do with a new bed, why hesitate any longer? Go out and treat yourself to a new mattress, and see what a difference it makes to your bedroom.

The Dining Room

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We now move on to a room which is particularly notorious for these kinds of troubles. If you are fortunate enough to have a dining room, it is probably not long before it becomes overtaken by stuff from around the home. Before you know it, you have wrapping paper, Christmas decorations and old bookshelves all piled up in the corner. As before, clear these things away as soon as you can – but also look to regaining the room as it was meant – for dining.

You might not even have a dining table in there. If not, consider getting one. It has a way of bringing both function and style to the room, and it can be a great addition to the home regardless. You will then want to think about decorating the table for use in its official sense. Tablecloth experts will be able to provide you with ones which will stand the test of time, meaning you won’t need to replace them any time soon. You’ll also find it hugely stylish to treat yourself to some good quality cutlery, and perhaps even a centrepiece. All of this helps to reclaim the dining room for what it is really meant for.

With that, you should have a dining room to be proud of again – but there is one more room which you might want to look into.

The Kitchen

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The biggest culprit in all of this is the kitchen. This is the room most likely to be overtaken by belongings from elsewhere, and before you know it you are finding it much more difficult to even cook a simple mean in there. This can actually have a surprisingly devastating effect on the home, and the family. Without being able to take control in the kitchen, your food intake genuinely suffers – a particularly big problem if you have a family. Fortunately, it is possible to reclaim your kitchen. Declutter it and make space, and make the most of this opportunity to bring out many of your kitchen goods into the open. This will make the process of cooking easier, and it will lead to you having a much more enjoyable use of your kitchen.