Simple ideas for refreshing your house without buying anything new
When we move into a new house or flat, we often end up putting much of our furniture and accessories in spots dictated by the space; many is the time I’ve cursed the radiator that prevents the dining table from being in the perfect place or the wall that would be ideal for the sofa except it means the door wouldn’t open... Annoying layout compromises are unavoidable. Another snag is sleepwalking into a bad or obvious floor plan. Victorian terraces are a great case in point – there are very few options for sofas in a ground floor terraced sitting room. Most people put it along the long wall between the door and the window without even considering alternatives and perhaps this is the best place for it, but, I have also seen smaller sofas look great slap bang in front of the window, facing down the room. I encourage you to shuffle it all around and have a go.
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Even if you’re not moving big things, think about chairs and views. I don’t really like sitting with my back to a window. If you have a few smaller chairs in a sitting room, try swapping them around and see how it feels. What can you see from the chair? Are you making the most of the space or view? Look at the relationship between your furniture. Try the rug underneath instead of next to the coffee table, fill the empty space at the end of the sofa with a small table. Do you have too many chairs in a room? Too much stuff is as bad as too little.
If you don’t feel like lugging furniture around, make a floor plan of the space and work out where pieces could otherwise fit – just rotating your dining table 90 degrees could make a huge difference. Don’t think of furniture as rooted, just because it has been in its current position for thirty years, doesn’t mean it’s in the best possible place.
When I sketch interiors, it’s always from one angle which is lovely for a photograph but not a true representation of life in a room. However, it can be really helpful to look at interiors in this way, as a series of individual vignettes. Choose a few angles and scrutinise them without looking at the rest of the room. Could a spot benefit from a picture or a plant? Does one side of the room have all the decorative glory while the other is a wasteland? Think of each vignette as an individual composition and try to balance it out. This is a good way to make smaller things work hard, like lamps (try swapping shades), pictures (move them around), or collections (find a new way/place to show them off).
These sound like small things but they can make you see a familiar room differently and will deliver a genuine new found enthusiasm for a space that is perhaps starting to feeling less like a home and more like an open prison. What nicer way to idle away a few hours? As architect William Smalley says of what was formerly a guilty procrastination, ‘There were precisely three possible arrangements of the Habitat bed, desk and floor cushion in my teenage bedroom, and yet I avoided many hours of homework trying them out. Renewed joy every time’.
Adrian Brisco1/4Is your table in the best spot? This one would also look rotated 90 degrees to run alongside the sideboard behind it.
Ngoc Minh Mgo2/4Tired of your old upholstery? A jolly blanket, quilt or piece of fabric tucked around the seat cushion can reinvigorate a sofa or armchair.
Michael Sinclair3/4Big scale greenery can have huge impact on a room - grab the secateurs and get yourselves a handsome bundle of foliage or a small bough to liven up a dull corner or a mantlepiece.
Elsa Young4/4Look at your rooms as a series of individual vignettes and make each corner work hard with well arranged pictures and the corner of a pretty textile.
