pacious rooms
If you love the wide open spaces and want the light and airy atmosphere, here are some tips on achieving that sense of spaciousness in your rooms.
- To create a feeling of largeness in your room, eliminate the shadows that tend to slice a room up into smaller spaces. Work on lighting the room with a soft, even light. Avoid ceiling lights as they tend to make the ceiling feel lower. Diffused, ambient lighting will tend to enlarge the room.
* Keep the surfaces free of heavy textures. Smoother surfaces tend to reflect more light and make the room feel larger.
* Avoid heavy textured flooring. Choose tile over patterned or textured carpeting. Reflective and shiny surfaces such as mirror and chrome also can be used effectively.
* Soft colors and monochromatic color schemes. Use cream, beige, gray or cool pastels on your walls and floors to make them recede. The ceiling should always be the lightest color in the room.
* Limit the use of patterns in the room to create a more airy feeling. A typical application of a pattern might be to reserve it for an accent piece.
* Selection and placement of furniture in a room is crucial in defining the space. Keep the largest pieces against the walls whenever possible.
* Choose furniture colors that are the same or similar to those selected for the walls and floors.
Cozy rooms
If you want a cozy and comforted ambience, here are some points to consider a more intimate space.
* Create spaces through the use of directed light. Lighting from the ceiling will seem to lower it. A reading lamp or down-shaded lamp will cast light only in its relative vicinity. Use incandescent rather than halogen or florescent lamps for a warmer glow.
* Choose strong colors for your walls and floor. They will tend to bring them in closer towards one another.
* A dark floor with walls of brown or deep red, blue or green tones will help create the feeling of a smaller, cozier space.
* Heavy, soft textures add warmth to a space. Use rougher textures for the hard elements in the room; iron instead of chrome, brick instead of glazed tiles.
* The use of pattern in a room can also lend a sense of coziness to the space. The subject of mixing patterns in a room will be covered at some future time.
* Choose dark finishes and fabrics to create a sense of the piece being larger than it actually is. Heavy textured fabrics and large patterns will add a cozy feeling to a sofa or chair.
* Place pieces away from the wall and use tall pieces to divide and define smaller spaces within a room for greater intimacy।
