Not all homes have bountiful areas of space in which you can place all the ornaments and wall decorations you desire. Sometimes, you have to be economical. Luckily, this is a good problem to have for the most part, because creativity is often best when constrained with parameters. That’s how the best art is made.
So, if interior design is an art, how do you decorate a smaller home? Well, while you might not be able to use a huge amount of space as your canvas, you could use the fixtures of a household to create each room’s visual profile.
But how might that work in practice?
Let’s consider that, below:
Tiling
Tiles with interesting patterns or bold colors can act as visual anchors in a room, which help to catch your eye and give the space a unique profile. If it was good enough for many of the Ancient Romans, it’s good enough for us. Even in neutral patterns or profiles, textured tiles can add a subtle sense of detail without feeling overwhelming. Extending the tiling beyond its usual boundary, like up an entire wall or across an accent strip can help you showcase a unique visual profile.
Material Furnishings
At one time, the furnishings you had in the home told you everything – richer individuals would use the highest quality wood and beams to showcase their home’s taste and capacity. Thankfully great furnishings are more affordable than ever. Choosing from rich woods, metals, or mixed materials like leather and woven fabrics adds variety and depth and helps a room set the visual profile and tone. You can use this as a baseline for your wider trimmings – for instance, if you use darker woods, then lighter furnishings can help you balance the space and let light travel.
Natural Light Use & Tones
If you make the most of natural light, it can change the whole atmosphere of a small home, and luckily that’s for the better. Light streaming in from a window has a way of making rooms feel larger and more inviting especially if you direct it using mirrors or getting furniture out of the way of the window. Using sheer or light-colored curtains can also help the available light, giving a more open and airy feel. This can also be used alongside your general tone profile to help a room seem brighter even during the darker seasons. Though of course, window cleaning is a central provision to keep those results year-round.
Neutrality & Busy Color
Many people think you can’t have intensive color in small spaces because it just makes the area feel smaller. In reality, you can certainly have color, you just need to balance it. A smaller home can actually benefit from a few well-placed bold accents, like a piece of art, a colorful cushion, or a standout vase that shows your taste and becomes something of a focal point because of the limited number of decorations. The contrast against a neutral background keeps things lively without overwhelming the space if you do it right.
With this advice, we hope you can more easily decorate a home with its fixtures alone.