Vintage bicycle Posters

DIY Wall is Art

The thing about DIY wall art is that it doesn’t have to be perfect, actually sometimes it’s better that it’s not perfect, so when you are pencilling in your design for this unique feature wall idea, don’t worry if you ‘color outside the lines’ later.

The method for the wall art for this feature wall idea works with an accompanying piece of furniture to really catch your eye. A geometric design is drawn and then painted on the wall, and on the table the same design is mirrored, but in inverted colors. In this example, an off white wall has been painted with a red outlined and white filled flower design. A table in front of this feature wall is then painted block red, with a white flower pattern.

This is a bold wall art project to undertake and will make a striking statement in your home when you either match or contrast the wall art colors to those of your home’s existing decor.

Typically an accent color is one which is a punchier, brighter color than the rest of your relatively netural palette and gives your decorating style the final, personal, finishing touch it needs. However, while a yellow accent color adds style and impact to a charcoal based home, accent colors don’t always have to shout out to have an impact.

Instead, consider using a more refined and subtle accent color in your decorating scheme and use it in more subtle ways, you will actually find you will have more place for a refined color than an attention grabbing one. For example, in an olive green and white decor, hot pink or a rich red are probably the impacting accent colors of choice.

However, to use more refined accent colors look along the same palette at a rich royal blue accent color for example. This gives you a range from a bright royal blue to use in a throw rug, to a charcoal colored piece of wall art to display.

Racy Vintage Furniture

This is a piece of old vintage furniture which has been given a whole new life’s purpose with a clever coat of paint. In its previous life, this vintage chair was probably a green or yellow color and relegated to the garage, or the outdoor setting at someone’s home. To give this old vintage chair a new lease on life, many people may have just given it a lick of white paint and set it in their child’s room as an unimportant piece of furniture.

However, to avoid a bland child’s room the red has been picked from the other accessory colors of the room to add a speedy touch of style in a racing stripe. Some simple masking off of the stripes and you can turn an old vintage chair into the next generation’s most prized possession, you may even see your son racing to his desk to do his homework now that he has a racy vintage chair with a truly unique story to tell.

Organised By Color is Stylish

Everyone has a filing system and an organisational theme which makes sense to them. where one person will file a bank statement under ‘B’ for bank, another will file it under ‘F’ for finances. Unfortunately it is often just as likely that one person will file their bank statement under ‘B’ and several months later go looking for it under ‘F’ making for a futile search.

Therefore, organize your home in a way which your mind will instantly remember and embrace, and one which makes for a stylish system too – organise by color. Many people believe that our minds learn in color and therefore organising your home, your desk drawers and your kitchen cupboards by color is surely a system every part of your brain can get on board with.

It is also a system which is pleasing to the eye when you move through your home as you can see immediately that everything is in its place and your eye can take a relaxing journey through the color spectrum.

When you are choosing and displaying the finishing touches in your home you can breathe a sigh of relief because you know you are on the home stretch of your decorating project. However, even when you are creating the final unique displays which differentiate your home from a furniture show room or a display home, you need to make sure that is really what you are doing.

Therefore, try and avoid repeating three in a row…of anything, a shape, an item, as this gives any display a very formal feel and is not going to give your home the relaxed and friendly feel you were after. However to avoid this can be as simple as choosing three of the same colour photo frames in different colors, or throwing three of the same colored cushion onto your couch, but each in its own shade.

Having said that, using odd numbers when you are creating a display can help ensure it doesn’t look too uniform and rigid. Choosing differing heights and styles in your vignettes adds important interest and contrast.

Bedrooms should always be decorated to be calm and neutral sanctuaries where you can go to escape the world, and become refreshed and ready for another day out there. Therefore, you don’t want to go adding too many colors or textures to your bedroom decor as this can make the space busy and anything but relaxing.

There are of course the essentials in the bedroom, one of those being the bed, but that doesn’t mean your bed has to be accompanied by bulky and imposing furniture. Most homes are painted white and if you are living in a rental or a new home then you are likely decorating a white bedroom. Therefore, add simple white bedside tables to add minimal distractions around your bed and veto the bed head all together.

Instead, hang a white sheet from the wall behind your bed, the entire height of the wall. Since the sheet of fabric is the same color as the wall, it is unimposing, but floaty and dreamy, just perfect for relaxing at the end of a long day.

How many people have an old globe sitting in the study or in the kids’ room which is covered with dust so that even if the kids wanted to, they couldn’t locate the Pacific Ocean or Hawaii?

Well remove that globe from its stand and turn it into educational hanging art for your kids’ room. Cut a hole in the top and bottom of the globe and thread through and suspend a light globe and cord. When your new lamp is turned on the whole world will light up for your kids and when your globe lamp is off, it will still look very funky hanging from the ceiling.

You can even get the kids involved in this art project – fully supervised of course – as this ensures that they will always be fascinated by their globe lamp because they have had a part in creating it.

Texture is important in decorating to add interest and personality to your home as a furry throw cushion can liven up a sterile looking leather couch, while the right rug can subtly soften hard, glossy floor tiles.

However, while texture is important, as with anything, it must be done in moderation, and it must be done cohesively. This means that in your decorating you choose one texture theme rather than mixing them all together. For example if you have fluffy throw cushions and a sheepskin rug don’t add a metallic throw rug to the couch, choose a mohair or knitted woollen throw instead.

If you’ve gone for an earthy texture by using sea grass matting as a rug under the dining table, and have a woven table runner, add earth cotton curtains to your dining room, rather than ones with an intricately embroidered pattern.

Do you get given tea towels by well meaning relatives who think you’ll actually use the souvenir in your kitchen? While your collection of tea towels may not match your kitchen, or if they’re just too good to get wet, turn a unique tea towel into wall art.

It doesn’t have to have been a gift as there are plenty of funky tea towels out there. Some have clever sayings and others have cool pictures. And you don’t even have to choose a tea towel, perhaps you have an off cut of fabric, or bought a length of fabric because you liked the pattern, but are unsure of what to do with it…

At any art supply store you can find a canvas, stretched over a wooden frame. Choose one which is at least 2 inches smaller than the fabric on each side. Position your fabric over the canvas, showing off your favourite piece of the picture or design. Then simply tack the edges in place on the reverse side and display.

The kitchen is a room which can easily look cold and sterile if you’re not careful in your decor and color choices when decorating your home. However, here is a little advice to help you create a sunny and welcoming kitchen in your home.

This example admittedly borders on kitsch but that is a style which will never be accused of being boring. Our advice is to start with a bold color for the walls like a bright, rich blue and couple that with yellow accents and a spattering of white, and there is your color base.

Choose yellow accessories like tea towels and add vases of fresh yellow flowers to the bench top or table. Make sure your crockery follows the blue and yellow theme and you can even repaint your kitchen chairs or stools to match the yellow and blue theme too – you probably have some paint left over from the walls anyway.