How to Make a Home Feel Cozy: 8 Simple Ideas
This week I am going to give a full breakdown on how to make a modern home feel cozy. By the end, you will have learned how lighting, color, and textures can be strategically used to make your space feel extra warm and welcoming. You will also learn how to make larger spaces feel intimate and inviting.
Table of contents
1. Doormat
A fitting welcome home is a cute doormat that matches your interior design style. If you're more relaxed and easygoing, a stenciled doormat will work.
But if you're the type that wants to look a bit more put together and sophisticated, then consider layering rugs to create a really interesting combination.
Whatever you end up going for must set the tone for what to expect when you come inside the home.
2. Entryway
Come up with a dedicated entryway space where you can remove your shoes, hang your jacket, store your keys, and so on.
This is also a great opportunity to make your guests feel at home by offering them some house shoes or slippers. As a guest in many houses, one thing that I've always deeply appreciated is when the host offered some house shoes so that my feet wouldn't get cold when walking barefoot.
3. Color palette
Your color choices are also very important. Colors are known to have a big impact on our moods; hence, you only want to use optimal colors in any room.
Before you get to the point of choosing your color palette, ask yourself the following questions.
What is the function of this space? What mood do I want to create in this space? How do I want people to feel? And lastly, which colors will help me to achieve the mood that I want to evoke within this space?
4. Scents
As you must have realized by now, great interior design is about creating and evoking emotions and sensations in the people who are using that particular space.
You can achieve this by making use of the senses, especially three of the senses, namely sight through visual stimuli, touch through tactile stimuli, and the sense of smell through olfactory stimuli.
Scents and smells are some of the biggest stimuli to humans and yet, they are usually overlooked when people are thinking about the overall design that they want to incorporate into a space.
Scientifically, it has been proven that scents trigger and reinforce memories in humans. This means that when a memory is paired with a scent, there is a greater chance that it is stored in long-term memory. Scents can also affect people's moods, so be sure to use the correct scent in the correct room.
5. Mixture of old and new
To give your space more personality, mix and match new pieces with old pieces.
This can be anything from small family heirlooms that you inherited or thrifted finds. The key here is to mix items in order to create a comfortable, lived-in, and cozy look.
I like to add some cultural elements as well, like finger baskets and stone sculptures, to break up the rigidity of having only brand-new things within my space.
6. Light bulbs
I am a big fan of playing around with lighting in your home. Lighting should always be layered in a room in order to make it feel cozy and inviting. Lighting can really change the way a room looks and feels, and it can even change the perception of color.
Depending on the light that you're using, some colors might appear to be brighter than they actually are or duller than they actually are. So before you pick a new light bulb, I want you to keep in mind two things; lumens and Kelvin.
Lumens are a measure of how much light you're getting from a bulb.
Kelvin is the temperature of the light being emitted.
7. Adding in textures
Textures are used to enhance the overall appearance of your room. Textures, like colors, can be divided into warm textures and cold textures.
For example, raw, natural, and rough textures are more likely to give a space an intimate feel because they reflect less light. This makes the surfaces feel rustic and gives them more visual interest and weight. These kinds of textures are on the warmer side.
On the other hand, we also have cold, smooth, or shiny textures. Glass, mirrors, or steel make a space feel cooler but with a sophisticated feel. Some textured materials are a big commitment, for example, the wallpaper that you choose, the towels that you use, or even certain finishes.
However, if you want to add texture without making a big commitment, there are simpler ways to add depth and interest. You can do this by adding throws, pillows, area rugs, baskets, candles, and even plants.
8. Comfort zones
If you have a large room, you can make it feel more intimate by breaking it down into smaller, dedicated zones with different uses.
So, for example, if you have a very large living room, you could break it down into three different zones, like a TV area, a sitting area, with seats that are facing one another to foster conversation, and a perfect reading nook.
How to make a home feel cozy
The secret to learning how to make a home feel cozy is remembering to use visual, tactile, and olfactory stimuli to create a great design experience.
Color, light, texture, and scent are all among the things that can affect your mood and impact how you feel within the space, giving you that cozy home feel you’ve been craving. So always be aware of how you can use those factors to your advantage.
Lastly, if you have a large space or a large room, always remember that you can make it feel more intimate and cozy by breaking it down into different zones with dedicated uses and functions.
What can you do today to make your home feel cozy? Share your plans down below.
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