How to Style the Neglected Areas of Your Home

How to Style the Neglected Areas of Your Home!

If you have a passion for decorating and home re-design, you’ll be no stranger to the urge to repaint your living room every year. You may even find yourself stopping in your tracks to look in the window of glossy kitchen showrooms! Decorating your home can be a creative person’s heaven, especially if you love a project and enjoy a challenge.

You may have re-decorated your bedrooms, living room, kitchen and dining room several times too. Though there is often one major part of your home that you might not have thought of. The hallway and landing! Hallways and landings often become dumping grounds. You’ll find shoes, coats, bags, items that don’t fit into other rooms and unwanted bits of furniture.

Are Yours?

These are often the most overlooked part of your home when redecorating, and this is understandable. Who wants to spend time and money on re-doing a part of the house that you don’t spend a lot of time in? Especially one that’s tricky to do?

With this in mind, however, the hallway and landing often set the tone of the rest of the house, so if the overall look is important to you, you should consider how your linking areas of your home look to visitors and guests. It doesn’t have to be too expensive or complex with some thought and planning. The benefits of re-doing your hallway and landing are numerous. Coming out of your bedroom in the morning to a brightly coloured landing can make you feel fresh and awake. Especially if it’s filled with lots of light. Similarly, welcoming guests into a warm entrance and hallway is a satisfying feeling too. No more hurrying visitors into your dining room to escape the mess of your kids’ shoes in the hallway!

De-Clutter

Consider how these areas of your home look at the moment. Then think of the amount of furniture and miscellaneous items you have in them. What do you need? What can go? This is your chance to sort out anything that may have been dumped in these grey areas without permission! Organise piles to throw away, give to charity, and get the whole family involved to tidy away the mess. These smaller areas of your home should only have in them what they absolutely need to.

Brighten It Up

Once cleared out, you might need to refresh the space entirely. Opt for white, cream, and brightly coloured paints in order to freshen up the space and make it seem more spacious than it actually is. Consider every aspect to get the most of the area – do you have ugly cornicing, a large loft entrance or an awkward bannister? Invest in a loft hatch that fits flush with the ceiling to keep features to a minimum in this smaller space. Refitting a bannister will be a pain, but if it gives you a lot more space and updates the feel so it’s more modern, it will definitely worth it! It all depends on how badly these spaces need refreshing, and your time and budget to do so.

Organize

You will need to streamline your possessions you have in your hallway to see the most dramatic difference. Keep only the essential coats and shoes in there that you need to, and invest in ways to organise everything. A slim-line built-in coat cupboard can be a lifesaver and can make the space seem larger, especially with lots of bulky coats. A shoe rack of similar design can also be ideal if you have a big family. These sorts of things keep chunky items out the way and will make the space look bigger, especially if you keep things bright and light. Umbrella stands, drawers for hats and gloves and key racks will also have the same effect and keep everything minimal for spaces like this.

Play with Lights

Play around with colour, texture and light to find the perfect balance for the space. Usually, light will do you a favour in both spaces. If you can incorporate a skylight into your landing, then it will benefit you to do so as the natural light will make the space appear bigger, especially if it’s a narrow space. Patterns can be cluttering, but not if done in muted tones and contrasted with block colours.

These tricky areas of your home are all about balance and will need a lot of thought to keep the décor looking up-to-date and minimal. Play around and see what works for you and your home!

Have you ever thought of revamping this area of your home?

Let me know, til then–cheers m’deres!