Every interior designer has some time tested and proven tricks up their sleeve. Whether it’s about mixing and matching colours, making tiny rooms look larger or hanging drapes the right way, here’s a compilation of some of the best-kept home décor secrets that are followed by the pros. Now you can borrow from these trade secrets, and take your own home décor up a notch!
Start with a Floor Plan
Space planning is always first on any professional designer’s list. What is the functionality of each room, and what is the furniture you plan to use? Make sure that you are not cramming too much furniture into a too-small room. Any thoroughfares should be at least 3 feet wide, and there should be enough space to comfortably fit everything in, without making the room look congested.
Stick to the Colour Palette
While it’s actually perfectly fine to mix styles and themes of décor, what ties it all together, in the end, is your colour palette. Before you start decorating, narrow down the family of colours that you would like to work within each room. Choose elements that go well with your chosen palette, and keep it simple for a cohesive look. Three to four colours are plenty for each room.
Light Vs Dark
Colours play an important role in our perception of space—light colours recede, while dark colours constrict. This means that if you paint your walls white, they would appear to be further away than they really are; whereas if you paint them in any dark colour, they appear to seem closer to you.
Again, white walls reflect light and bounce it around the room, making your spaces appear brighter. Dark walls absorb the light and your room will appear to be shadowed.
Rule of thumb: For a clean, spacious look, keep your colour palette light!
Play with Mirrors
Another tip to make a room appear brighter and more spacious is to play around with mirrors. If you have a long room with just one window at the end, you can make the light from the window reach the other end by strategically positioning one or several mirrors around the room. Each mirror will reflect the light to the next one, till it reaches the darkest corners of the room.
Have One Focal Point
Every room must have a focal point which anchors the décor theme and creates a visual flow around the room. You can hang a lovely mural above the sofa to create a focal point, or paint one wall a solid bold colour and create a buzz around it! A gallery picture wall will work just as well.
An architectural element such as a bay window with a lovely view or a fireplace can also draw attention and work as the focal point. It’s also important that a room should not have more than one focal point, or it will appear disjointed and too busy.
Never Compromise on Comfort
While style is important, in the end, it’s all about liveability! So bring on the comfy cushions and the hanging bucket chairs, pouffes for your feet, and cushions for your back. Your home should be your haven of personal comfort and relaxation, an oasis of calm that shields you from the stress of the outside world! Aim at nailing the perfect balance of comfort and chic.
Textures, Prints and Patterns
The interplay of textures, prints and patterns is what really makes space stand out. Choose fabrics and materials that blend well together to create visual poetry; a rough stucco wall against the velvety feel of raw silk, the glint of a glass jar against the softness of a bunch of daisies, or the roughness of a shag carpet against the warmth of the wooden floor beneath.
Prints and patterns help to create accents and define the aesthetics of a room. Match a chevron striped cushion against a plain beige sofa or a vivid wall mural against a blank white wall.
Go Green!
Every designer will agree, you can never have too many plants in your home. Plants refresh your spaces — and restore your sanity! Group ferns, palms and leafy shrubs together in variegated pots and planters for interest. Place little pots with succulents on your tabletop, or set up a terrarium in a glass globe. Leaf prints and posters on the walls can add to the botanical theme.
Hang Drapes Near the Ceiling
A stunning set of drapes can transform a room in an instant, so make sure that the drapes are never an afterthought! A trick that many designers use to advantage is to hang drapes from the ceiling, rather than just above the window. This creates an illusion of height and is a useful hack if your room has a low ceiling.
Similarly, to create the illusion of width, extend the rod a foot beyond the frame of the window. This will also allow the maximum light into your room when the curtains are drawn.
Upcycle and Refurbish
Sustainability is the new buzzword in the home decor space these days. Every designer’s look book has ideas for upcycling and recycling old furniture, and for salvaging value from waste. Before you make that trip to the furniture shop, do take a look around what you already own. Vintage hand-me-downs have sentimental value and hold a treasure trove of family memories. If a lick of paint is all it takes to restore that faded old chair from the attic, start painting!
Ramp up the Glamour in Your Bathrooms
Never neglect your bathrooms—as your own private space where you can relax and unwind at the end of a tiring day, they should always be the last word in luxury! Just a little bit of thought can transform your bathrooms from plain boring to wow, without breaking the bank. Use bold colours, stylish wallpaper, and spa-touches to make your bathrooms feel extra luxe.
Not everyone has a natural eye for beautiful spaces. But we’re here to help! Whether you’re redecorating just one room or going in for a major décor overhaul in your home, if you’re ever in need of any handholding, the HomeLane experts can step right in. We’re just a call away!
