How to Make a New Build House Feel Like Home
One of the downsides of moving into new build homes is the tendency they have to feel slightly cold and sterile. While efforts might be made to warm the place up before you arrive, there’s no substitute for shaping your environment with a few decorative touches and thereby ensuring that it meets your needs and sensibilities.
Let’s take a look at a few effective ways via which you might do exactly this.
Layering Textures and Soft Furnishings
If your home lacks softness, then it might feel a little bit like a hospital waiting room, or an office. The right textured fabrics can be an instant and reliable source of warmth and personality, especially when they’re contrasted with the hard edges and glossy surfaces elsewhere in a given room.
For maximum contrast, you might pick out a few different materials, including velvet, leather, and linen. Rugs, cushions, throws and curtains can all be effective. Think about devising a colour palette that matches your personal style. It’s often easiest to pick the right furniture first, and then to pick your colours for the walls.
Personalising with Art and Accessories
There are few better vehicles for your own personal taste than the artworks you choose to display on your walls. Look for pieces that offer personal meaning, and that complement the rest of your decor. Artwork doesn’t have to just mean landscape paintings: sculptures, posters, and wall-hanging mosaics can all serve a purpose. You can even rotate these based on the time of year and thereby give your living space a great seasonal vibe.
Bringing in Greenery and Natural Elements
Bringing in houseplants and fresh flowers can help to bring something of the outdoors into your living space and help to make it more visually stimulating. You might also lean into the so-called ‘biophilic’ movement, with the introduction of other natural materials like wood, stone, and rattan. These materials come with ragged lines and imperfections that will disrupt the clean edges of the average new-build home.
Lighting for Ambience and Character
For much of the day, especially during winter, you’ll be relying on artificial lights. It’s important that the light in question doesn’t just come from a single source. By layering overhead lighting, task lighting, and accents, you’ll be able to fill out the space, and eliminate those harsh shadows. You’ll also be able to create distinctive effects. The use of dimmers, automation, and LED strips can significantly expand your options.
