If you’re furnishing a condo, the first thing we have to say is: lucky you! You get to unleash your creativity and to design the kind of space where you can feel at home. And then the choices: is the style to be beach house or traditional? Florals and pastels or leather and dark wood? Velvet and damask or linen and chintz? Formal and grand or light and airy? Planning furniture in a room can be a fun and creative project.
Choosing a home furnishing style
With so many choices when it comes to home furnishing styles, you can give your imagination free rein. Nothing says carefree like beach condo decor. Or do you want the cozy comfort of a farmhouse kitchen? A traditional dining room with mahogany table, damask-covered chairs and velvet draperies? Your ideas for furnishing a home say a lot about you, your values and even your goals.
Furniture stores offer different styles to suit almost every taste, and you can indulge yourself imagining that sleek leather sofa or that Queen Anne style wing chair in your living room. Some basic furniture shopping tips might help you as you go about furnishing a condo:
- Do you prefer to shop at sales? The best furniture sales typically happen around Valentine’s Day and Memorial Day.
- Remember to measure your room to make sure your new furniture will fit. Especially with large mattresses and sectional couches, it’s easy to make mistakes.
- One way to recognize high quality furniture is that the welding is less apparent, the sanding and finishing are better, and the hardware is concealed. Even nuts, screws, and bolts are painted to match and should be rust-proofed.
- To prolong the life of your leather furniture, it’s best to keep it out of the sun. It should also be placed away from heat sources, which can dry it out.
- Furniture with legs made of plastic, rubber, or metal can hurt your floors and rugs. The furniture legs don?t look as nice, and won’t last as long.
On trend: reclaimed and barn wood
Maybe it’s because everyone’s concerned about the environment. Or its the new trend in creating art from found objects. For whatever reason, recycling is in and especially furniture made from reclaimed wood. The wood can be reclaimed from old buildings, furniture, doors, and even bridges.
Furniture made from barnwood is especially popular. The wood has aged and acquired a richness and patina that is difficult to duplicate by artificial means. And not only do you have a new/reclaimed piece of furniture, that piece of furniture has its own history.
Beach condo styles
Whether or not it’s really a beach condo, you can use coastal decor to create the effect of a water view. Sea grass, driftwood textures, sandy neutrals, and sea blues all recall the ocean and its serenity. Using sheer, lightweight curtains can keep the beach house effect throughout the house, bringing the airy feel of the beach to your bedroom.
Perhaps the best advice to give someone who is furnishing a condo is to have fun with it. Since you’ll be living with the results, you should pick furniture, colors and fabrics that make you happy, relaxed, and calm. That’s what a home should be.
