(Top: Borno chair and Altino coat stand. Bottom: Osanna sideboard)
Nobody was more surprised than me earlier this year when I decided to ditch the clutter and add some more contemporary things to our home; I got rid of five bin bags crammed full of ‘stuff’, gave away a load of my vintage knick-knacks and completely cleared out my craft supplies. We’ve now got more space, more clean surfaces, and it takes me way less time to do the cleaning- result!
The run up to Christmas is the ideal time to have a bit of a sort out – with all that extra space you could have a bigger tree, more decorations and metres of fairy lights (no such thing as too many fairy lights in my book…) Today I’ve teamed up with the lovely folks at Vivendo to bring you a quick guide to reducing clutter and giving your home a more modern feel.
1. Ditch everything you don’t need, don’t like or don’t use – this is a great time to donate to charity shops, as a lot of people (me included!) often head there for Christmas presents. You might hate Jamie Oliver’s cooking, but someone will love his latest recipe book!
2. Freshen up the room by painting the walls white – all of our walls are white, and it not only makes the space feel larger and more contemporary, it also acts as a great canvas to add prints and photographs as we like, without having to worry about clashing colours.
3. Once you’ve cleared everything out, invest in some seriously good storage. Sideboards are hugely popular at the moment, and they offer a lot of space inside to hide away DVDs, computer games and other stuff you’d rather not see. I’m in love with the Caseo wooden sideboard in light grey (my new favourite colour!), which has beautiful clean lines and plenty of room to store everything.
4. If space is short, consider ditching the coffee table and opting for a side table instead – this will give you more room to move around, and if you’ve got children, more space for them to play. I really like the Reton set of three tables, which are constructed from wrought iron and finished in white – they all stack together, so you can easily add or take them away as you please.
5. Make use of your walls by adding some simple shelving – string shelves are huge at the moment, and have the added bonus that you can string hanging plants from the side brackets, creating a wonderful focal point in the room. The Spera bookcase is great for mounting on the wall – the cube design is really popular at the moment, and it can be used either vertically or horizontally, depending on your needs.
Many thanks to Vivendo for collaborating on this post.