Do Decorate With Style-Don’t Ruin It with Overdone Touches

1. Color choices should never be based on paint choices, so never paint your walls first. Choose your décor based on the color of the fabrics and style of the furniture you place in the room. Carpeting and floor coverings are next in line, followed by the color of the walls. After painting the wall and it is not having the desired affect of pleasing your overall color scheme, simply change the colors of the wall; it far less expensive than changing the furnishings.

2. While your favorite color may be purple, decorating a room entirely in purple is a bit staggering to the eyes of guest. It is better to use softer palettes as the main color in a room, and add simple touches of complimenting colors to achieve an overall affect of elegance. Using a focal point of color like to draw the complimentary colors from, is a wonderful way to pull a room together that will be pleasing and gentle on the senses of your guest.

3. Just as you would never set a table for guest where they are too separated for conversation in a polite manner; never place your furnishings against the walls of a room. It places too much distance between guests and gives a cold, clinical feel to a room. Instead, use smaller seating arrangements that provide welcoming appeal of closeness and intimacy. Place colored Flokati rugs in areas of the room and draw your furnishings towards focal points like fireplaces or small tables to gather around. Leave the television in another room; it is best used for game day parties, not entertaining company in informal or formal settings.

Mismatched furniture never adds any sense of style to a room. If you cannot replace the furniture, paint or stain it to match the other pieces in the room to tie them together. If redoing the upholstery is not in the budget, use decorative slipcovers in quality fabrics to bring new life to tired out of date upholstery themes. Use area rugs to bring out the touches of color in the slipcovers and draw eyes to the floor and forward to the seating arrangements.

4. Museums are wonderful places filled with cluttered collections of centuries. Collections have a place in museums' but not in your home décor. Placing a few touches of a collection here and there, if they match the décor of a room, are beautiful personal touches that provide a sense of real people occupying the rooms. Never place entire collections in a room; it tends to overpower the message of elegant simplicity. Change them out now and then to provide variety in the appearance of your personal touches.

5. Set the moods of your rooms using candle light or lamps to provide atmosphere, and intimacy for your guest. Candle light also gives a warm glow that can draw colors off the walls and pull it up from area rugs, use every available item in the room to enhance another item, and your rooms will offer luxury and warmth to every surface. Add a candle table centerpiece to your table settings and light them even if you are not sitting at the table, this will create a great atmosphere.
Most of all follow the number one rule of decorating; choose items you are comfortable with, not just because they will look wonderful in a picture like a magazine spread. You live in this home it should reflect you as a person, and blend with your personality and with your family.