Cold Weather Tips: How to Brighten up Your Place During Gloomy Winter Months
Jeff "King of the Castle"
Come wintertime, our homes should ideally transform into a warm and cozy refuge that can shelter us from the chilly weather outside and keep the infamous winter blues at bay. The cold season brings a unique charm that urges us to take a pause and spend more time indoors, and it’s certainly easier to reflect on these changes and enjoy the winter magic when you have a home that feels safe and comfortable and pleases the eye.
However, with the temperatures taking a nosedive, the days getting shorter and less natural light flooding our living spaces, keeping interiors bright and inviting and creating a welcoming atmosphere can be a real challenge. That can have a direct impact on your mood and well-being and make you wish winter could end sooner.
But you don’t have to wait for spring to come to enjoy a positive and uplifting ambience in your home. With a few clever interior design tips, you can banish the winter gloom and make your house look and feel bright and cheerful despite the moody weather.
Keep it simple
Mess and clutter can make even the most spacious rooms look small, stuffy and dark. So, if you’re craving lightness and brightness, instead of filling up every nook and cranny of your house with furniture and accessories it’s best to keep décor at a minimum.
Getting rid of unnecessary items and embracing simplicity can help you reduce the visual clutter and create a sense of calm and harmony. This design will not only make the space look open and airy but will also ensure a seamless flow between different areas of your house.
And if you’re worried that oversimplifying things could make your place feel dull and inhospitable, you can use vibrant artwork and colorful accent pieces to spice things up and add interest and personality to your interior design.
Mirror, mirror on the wall
One doesn’t get too much daylight during winter months and that can make interiors feel rather dark and cold and cause dips in mood and motivation. But you can make the most of the few hours of natural sunlight by hanging mirrors strategically in key areas of your home. The mirrors will catch and spread the light throughout the house, brightening dark corners and making the space look much lighter.
Reflective surfaces have a similar effect, so you can integrate furniture pieces made of shiny materials like glass and metal or décor items with gold, copper and silver accents and place them where they can best catch and reflect the light.
Mind the landscaping
It’s not just furnishings and decorations that can impact your home ambience but also the scenery that greets you when you look outside the window. Wondering how your home’s exterior can affect your interiors? First of all, if your garden is left unattended during winter, chances are plants will grow chaotically and start blocking the flow of natural light into your home. And even if your house doesn’t get swamped by wild greenery, an unkempt and overgrown garden makes for an unpleasant sight.
A bit of pruning and trimming can fix the situation and keep things under control. You can also use outdoor planters to make the most of your space and style your garden however you see fit. If you pick low-maintenance plants and learn gardening basics, you can have a nice-looking garden all year round.
Skip the curtains
If sprawling overgrown plants can create a sun-blocking exterior curtain, drapes can do the same thing from the inside. Thick heavy curtains in dark hues can create a particularly dark environment and make a room feel more enclosed. So even if they serve a very practical purpose, you might want to remove them during winter and put them up again when the sun shines brighter in the sky.
And since we’re talking window treatments, you should also make sure your windows are clean to let the sun in. The winter weather with all the rain, wind and dust can wreak havoc on your windows, so you might have to clean them more often during this time of the year.
Invite nature indoors
The natural world slows down during winter with many plants growing more slowly or slipping into hibernation, which means there’s less green vegetation to feast your eyes on. However, you can still enjoy nature’s wonders and create a spring-like atmosphere by incorporating small potted plants and flowers or evergreens into your home décor.
You can also bring outdoor planters inside to protect them from the winter cold and green up your interiors. However, make sure you learn about each plant’s particular needs so you can ensure a smooth transition and prevent transplant shock.
Enjoy a white winter
Not all winters come with abundant snow, so if where you live the cold season is painted in hues of grey rather than white, you can compensate with interior design. A fresh coat of paint is known to be the fastest and easiest way to give your home an instant makeover. In this case, you can paint one or more rooms in shades of white or cream.
The light will bounce off the white walls making space appear larger and creating an airy atmosphere. As long as you’ve got the time and skills, this is a project that you can easily tackle yourself. it’s also important to use a variety of lighting fixtures like ceiling lights, wall lights, spots or downlights depending on each room’s requirements to make sure every space is properly lit.
The cold season brings dark, wet and gloomy days, but with these tips, you can escape the winter blues by turning your home into an oasis of warmth and comfort where you can enjoy bright energy and good vibes all winter long.
