How Can You Enhance Your Home’s Aesthetic?

It doesn’t take much to become a bit disillusioned with our homes’ interior design. A trip abroad, a visit to an art gallery or a dinner party with friends often leaves us with fresh eyes when we come home. This leaves us thinking “what can I do to make this more like that?” or “this could really use a change, but what?”.

If you’re not very confident in your decision to make a change to your home’s interior aesthetic, we’re here to help. First you have to determine what your home’s aesthetic style is. Is it industrial, rustic, mid-century, bohemian or scandinavian? Do a little bit of research, then follow some of this advice to improve your home’s interior.

• Add textiles and texture

The first and simplest advice is to switch out old rugs for new, and get some new accessories like cushions and lampshades to play with textures a little bit. If you’ve determined your home is more rustic than minimalist, think of faux furs and big knitted blankets.

Matte, muted and natural textures suit the mid-century modern styles best. Think of adding wooden elements as well as throws in beige tones. You want to avoid jarring and unnatural shapes and materials.

• Take away clutter

This applies for every different aesthetic. Look around and pick out the pieces that no longer bring you joy, or that don’t fit in with the look you want to create. Give yourself the space to bring in elements that add to your space in a positive way. If it doesn’t fit, perhaps there’s a better place for it.

It’s best to let a few decorative pieces speak for themselves than to stuff everything you have into one place. Some styles do allow for randomness and variety – like bohemian. Here, you can indulge in clutter at times – so long as you don’t go overboard!

If you decide you’d rather stick to a minimalist or farmhouse style, you will want to avoid overcrowding rooms with furniture and decorations. Choose a couple of statement pieces and stick with them.

• Add plants

This is especially true if you have a bohemian or farmhouse aesthetic, but the types of plants you get will also add or detract from the interior style you choose. Tall leafy plants always add interest and texture to a corner of a room and fig trees are especially popular with many modern designs.

The more plants the better, if you’re looking at a messier style like bohemian or tropical. These styles demand a lot of tall and robust plants. So long as you don’t mind a little bit of maintenance, they really do add a lot to a space.

For a mid-century modern look, make a careful and sparse selection of plants. Ferns are popular in this style as are small vases of flowers (they can be fake, so long as you don’t let them get dusty!). Scandinavian interiors also use sparse greenery though a few statement potted trees work very well here.

• Remove damaged furniture and fixtures

This is a bit of a no-brainer if you’re going for a sleek style such as mid-century or scandinavian, but is not always appropriate. If you’re going for a rustic or shabby-chic aesthetic, you might embrace a slightly damaged piece of furniture, so long as it’s not so damaged to be out of place or dangerous.

However, you may have to be harsh with yourself about what fits and what doesn’t. Get some second opinions on it either from friends, family or from your social media followers. Sometimes it takes someone else’s words to realise what really isn’t working aesthetically in your home.

If you truly can’t bear to part with a piece of vintage furniture that’s splitting at the seams, you may have to re-think the style you want to go for. Not everything goes with vintage-style furniture, but if you can build an interior design around a beloved piece, why not! The most important thing is that the style you choose makes you feel happy, comfortable and relaxed.

You also may feel embarrassed at having damaged fixtures, too. Sometimes these can be slightly modified to embrace the shabby-chic aesthetic, as people often do with slightly peeling painted window frames. If, however, your windows are leaky and downright broken, you’ll want them replaced. You can find out about how to replace your windows here.