I'm excited that I've finally decided on a
colour palette for our room. I've been struggling because I live in a rental
house which has a light sage green colour on the walls, and if it was up to me
they'd be a beautiful fresh white. The green isn't an awful colour, it
definitely could be worse, but it still puts restrictions on what colour scheme
I can use, and what works. The photos aren't really showing the colour of the
walls too well, but in real life they are an obvious minty, sagey green colour.
I'm using lots of black (my favourite, of course), with peach tones, darker
blues, and pops of gold. I thought I'd share some tips on how to style in a
rental when you have coloured walls.
1. Don't buy a tonne of decor items to fit
your rental wall colour that won't fit in with another colour when you move.
Please excuse the orange coloured wooden
dresser. It's actually not in our bedroom at all, but our bedroom has such poor
natural light at the moment I couldn't take a good photo in there haha! Please
forgive it. :) Our bedroom has white and pale natural wood furniture.
2. Find some colours that you like, that
also work with the wall colour.
As I've said, I'm not a huge fan of green.
So I'm not about to buy anything green to go with the walls. Instead, I've
found colours I actually love, like black, peach and gold, which go with the
walls harmoniously. That way when I move and no longer have green walls, I
still have items that are in colours I actually enjoy.
The thing that really brought my ideas
together in my head was actually this colourful postcard from a friend in
America! I already knew I liked peach tones, but when I received the postcard
my ideas became a much clearer vision.
3. Decide on a colour palette and stick to
it.
Once your ideas have come together to form
a colour palette, stick to it. I think the biggest thing for me was looking
around at things I already have and asking why I have them. This ties in with
de-cluttering your home. Often, I'll have a piece of furniture or knickknack
that someone gave me, that I only have out of convenience or feeling guilty
about letting it go. But a room will look so much better when you get rid of the
things you don't love, and bring in things that match your theme and colour
scheme. I'm going to work on this one slowly over time instead of doing a big
"makeover" all at once and getting rid of a bunch of things and
buying new ones. It's just something to keep in mind.
I love the peach and gold cushion that I
just bought recently, and I love being able to incorporate my Blacklist studio
Sea Love poster. The gold triangle canvas is something I painted myself a while
ago, and while I wasn't too sure about it, I think it fits in pretty nicely
with the rest.
4. Keep it Simple.
Don't overdo it. Sticking with mostly
monochrome accessories and keeping things quite minimal means you won't have a
bunch of things that don't go together, and a bunch of things that might not
work when you eventually move house. This depends on whether you're going to be
staying in the one rental for a long time of course. But if you're moving every
year or couple of years, you don't want excess decor and homewares to lug
around with you wherever you go. Stick to a few items that you really love.
I thought I'd also share with you a
moodboard I made for our room a little while ago, before the postcard arrived
and gave me a bit more clarity. The background colour is very close to the
actual colour of the walls. The quilt cover set is one we own and are actually
using right now. I like the peach and gold and black in this, but I think that
darker blue hues will be better than the pastel blues here.
Do you struggle with rental walls you
can't paint a different colour? How do you decorate around it? I'd love to know
how you get around this obstacle! :)
Nina xo