How To Create a More Inviting and Welcoming Home Space

We love flipping through the pages of architectural and interior design magazines. The photos are breathtaking, and the houses are inspiring. But when it comes right down to it, the featured interiors don’t often look lived in or hospitable.

It’s one thing to create a home that looks like a photo shoot set, and another to craft a space that is so appealing you’d want to sit and stay a while. Learn how to create a more inviting and welcoming home space.

Start Outside

Neighbors and guests get their first impression of your home from the outside and form an opinion even if they never venture in. You do want them to want to come inside for a visit, though! To entice your visitors, start your décor at the end of your driveway. Choose a seasonal magnetic mailbox cover to add color and interest to an otherwise bland metal mailbox.

Add an artistic touch to your front garden with yard decorations that express your style, convey your interests, or highlight an upcoming holiday. Outdoor flags with seasonal messages or designs, art poles with matching birdhouses or topped with a birdbath, or whimsical garden sculptures make your visitors smile before they even ring the doorbell.

Set the Tone at Your Front Door

When visitors step onto your front porch or stoop, greet them with a welcome mat and a hanging front door wreath or decoration. If you have the space, add a few artistically decorated planters filled with colorful annuals in summer and evergreens in the winter. Don’t neglect lighting, which allows your guests to see your doorbell or knocker as well as your cheerful décor.

Bring the Outdoor Welcome Inside

When the outside is spruced up, you’ve set an expectation that the inside will be even more inviting. Add wall décor that picks up on themes of nature or seasonal décor you’ve used outside on your art poles, garden flags, or mailbox covers.

At Studio M, we offer artist-designed home décor items that will charm your family and friends alike. From nature-inspired wall hangings to ornaments and figurines, you’ll find unique items to give the rooms in your home that touch of creativity and artistic flair that expresses your style.

Trinket trays and wall hangings can send warm, funny, or even saucy messages to make your visitors smile. Home décor that breaks the ice with whimsy and good humor creates a welcoming and inviting home space. And when you add the beauty of unique artistic designs that capture the loveliness of nature, you’ve set a tone of calm and harmonious surroundings that elevate your living space from the merely practical to the comfortably hospitable.

Mix in Home Accessories

To create a more inviting and welcoming home space, add interest to your rooms with artful home accessories. Ornaments aren’t just for the holidays! You can decorate a potted tree with hanging sculptures of birds or little angels that watch over your living space. Try a few bird-shaped bells that ting softly when you walk by or a gratitude bell commemorating a teacher or a special friend.

Use Plants, Wood, and Water

Human beings crave a connection with nature. Bring a little of the outdoors in with plants. Use large potted trees, hanging baskets, vines that trail across window frames, or vases filled with fresh-cut flowers to add some greenery and color to every room.

Not just any vase or planter will do: Studio M offers planters with artist-created designs that fill a corner with color and form, giving your indoor plants a beautiful base to draw attention. You won’t find these designs anywhere else. Our exclusive licensing partnerships with our global community of artists mean that you don’t have to scour house sales or thrift shops to score a unique treasure: we have them right here!

Adding reclaimed wood shelving, driftwood décor accents, or even a small electric fountain with the sound of burbling water extends the calming, natural note of your interior surroundings.

Setting Up for the Seasons

Changing seasons and holidays offer opportunities to enhance your surroundings to make your home more welcoming and inviting. Switch out your mailbox cover and garden flag to reflect spring flowers or fall leaves. Add holiday themes to your welcome mat or door décor. Inside, you can choose wall art or figurines that are in accord with the time of year.

No Heart Without Art!

You know how when you throw a party, everyone seems to end up in the kitchen? Include the heart of your home in your overall décor scheme. Decorative mugs, spoon rests, trinket trays, or pitchers featuring artistic designs will give your kitchen extra warmth and a personality beyond food preparation.

Use Natural and Warm Lighting

Rooms blessed with an abundance of natural light should take advantage. Open drapes and blinds to allow indirect sunlight in, but keep them closed in the middle hours of a hot summer day to avoid overheating your rooms.

Illuminate darker or shadowy corners with soft light from floor or table lamps. Save overhead lighting for the kitchen where you need it to prepare meals.

Color

Color preferences are a highly individual thing. Some designers emphasize warm colors for a cozy, homey feeling, while others favor neutrals or cool colors to convey calm and provide an unobtrusive background for furnishings. Accent walls were in, and now they’re out again.

The bottom line? Choose paint colors that make you happy! Use them in gentle tones that set a mood without jolting the senses. Add complementary colors sparingly, in accent chairs or throw pillows. When you’re satisfied with the look of your rooms, your visitors will feel welcome. If the host is relaxed and happy, the guests will be, too.