spring Archives - Page 2 of 2

A Modern Easter Dining Table

White hyacinth and card with handwritten Happy Easter

Christmas is a distant memory, but for many of us, it will have been the last time we had a proper celebration. Rectify this by planning an Easter feast and other delights over the long weekend! But this means you’ll need to create a stunning centrepiece – and menu! – to serve around your rustic dining table. We’ve got some great ideas!

1 Embrace the rustic woodland look

Nature so often has the answers and this is true any time of the year, but certainly at Easter. Spring is the season where everything comes back to life after winter and so use this as part of your Easter dining table decoration.

Collect the fallen twigs and when you lightly prune the branches of your trees and shrubs, keep some of them to make a beautiful and rustic display for your rustic dining table. Add small egg-shaped Easter decorations along with synthetic moss to give it an extra colour and texture.

2 Add white accents

We are used to Easter being about pastel shades as well as brighter hues, but if you feel you want a more neutral and minimal style to the table, using white accents will do just that.

From white serving wear to white accessories, such as a white tablecloth, you really can create a truly simplistic and classy looking dining table.

3 Invest in an extendable dining table

Family gatherings are fantastic, but not if someone is perched at the dining table on a wonky stool or your guests don’t have elbow room to enjoy the delicious meal you are serving.

So why let this carry on? Invest in a new table, adding your own Easter touches before your guests arrive. Extendable tables work well in any home – you’ll have the smaller size table for everyday, but extra space for occasions such as an Easter feast – as do round dining tables for being inclusive when you have a larger party to entertain.

As for seating, the best and most versatile dining seating must surely be the dining bench. Opt for a simple wooden dining bench that can double as a handy seat in the hallway or a plush upholstered dining bench, perfect for the industrial dining table.

If the dining bench isn’t doing it for you, then there is no denying just how comfortable fabric dining chairs are. Your guests will linger for hours… exactly what you want!

4 Use spring flowers

Spring is the time that the garden comes alive, but even if yours doesn’t have an abundance of flowers yet, you’ll find a larger selection of blooms at your local florist.

And there is nothing more welcoming to the eye, especially at Easter, than beautiful flowers as a centrepiece for the dining table. Or if you want to be bang on trend, create a display using dried flower options. Dried grasses and wild flowers have made a comeback with interior trendsetters swapping fresh bunches for dried bouquets.

But don’t just limit them to the dining room. Cluster flowers in vases on side tables next to your armchairs or sofa. They also make a wonderful addition to the console table in the hallway too.

Stylish Ways to Decorate your Home for Easter

Coloured mini eggs in white pot on reclaimed wood table

We decorate our homes for Halloween and Christmas, so why not Easter? With the coming of spring, we welcome colour and life back into our lives, so why not celebrate? Here are some tasteful decorating ideas to bring a touch of Easter joy into the home….

Easter tree

Winter brings some wild and windy weather, which means lying in the garden is sure to be a broken branch or two. Before you shred them into your garden waste, collect and trim them to arrange in a large, heavy-duty vase ready to decorate your hallway storage unit or reclaimed wood dining table.

There are many different ways you can decorate your Easter tree. You can buy shaped ornaments for the tree and you can make your own too. Wash the inside of broken eggshells and when dry, paint the outside using specialist craft paints.

Choose pastel colours including a cheerful sunshine yellow. When dry, arrange artistically on your tree.

By creating and decorating your own tree, you can choose the colours that best suit your interior décor and reclaimed wood furniture. But there is no denying that by adding pretty ribbon bows and colourful decorations, the Easter tree will make a fitting addition to any room.

Extend a welcome with an Easter wreath

The hallway is a space that sets the tone for the rest of your home and so an Easter wreath on the front door is a great way to welcome friends and family in. These are available in the shop, but for a more personal touch, you can make your own Easter wreath too.

Easter in a teacup

Using synthetic moss and some well-chosen decorated Easter ‘eggs’ or even mini chocolate eggs, create a simple and pretty botanical themed scene using teacups as the ‘planters’. Think about where you’ll display your crafts before you start. But this lush green display would look great on the living room sideboard, nestled next to your beautiful leather chairs or on a small console table in the hallway – you can then pinch a mini chocolate egg on your way out!

Make a spring statement

If you are unsure about introducing Easter colours into your home, then making a statement that spring has arrived is a great alternative. If your purple lavender isn’t in full bloom, you’ll find the artificial variety a fantastic alternative. As well as creating striking arrangements in vases for your storage shelves, they make a real impact on your reclaimed wood dining table. They’ll also bring a welcome softness to industrial furniture too.

Make paper blooms

You can be as artistic as you like when you make your own paper blooms, and as a family project, they are a great activity to do altogether.

Opt for subtle colours that complement your industrial furniture in the living room or dining room and for the farmhouse styled home, opt for nature’s colours such as pastel greens and yellow. If flowers are a little obvious, make paper birds and hang them from the ceiling for a contemporary spring decoration.

Use a cake stand for an Easter table centrepiece

Again, using a mix of bought items as well as those you can make yourself, using a vintage cake stand as part of your Easter setting on your reclaimed wood dining room is a great idea. Simple ideas are sometimes the best – wrap small boxes finished with ribbon and add painted eggs clustered around the edge. Finish with some gorgeous bright fresh flowers and you have everything you need to make a simple but joyful centrepiece.

Bunting

Nothing says a celebration more than bunting! Use pretty and bright hues to add some colour or if you prefer a more understated style, a pale yellow or white will still add a celebratory ambience to a space.

Spring Clean Your Hallway in 6 easy steps

You may still need a warm outer layer in spring but the heavy boots and winter coats can be safely stored away now that the first shoots of the season are visible. For the hallway, this is a welcome update and a chance to give it a fresh new look. The first impressions in the hallway do matter, so here’s how to spring clean your hallway…

STEP 1 – Thin out coats, bags, hats, shoes and boots

The hallway bench and other shoe storage ideas have seen you through the winter but now is the time to minimise all the winter clutter so that the brightness of spring can filter into your home. Wash and thoroughly dry coats, hats and scarves or have them dry-cleaned and then pack away in the spare bedroom wardrobe or blanket chest until they are needed again.

STEP 2 – Declutter the hidden stuff too!

The storage bench seat has offered immeasurable storage solutions over the winter months but there will be stuff gathered in the bottom of the hallway storage bench that really don’t need to be there.

Odd gloves, hats and dried pieces of mud from boots make their way into the corners, so give it a good clear to make room for spring and summer atire. The same can be said for the console table drawer or the sideboard cupboard that has offered so much. Recycle or repurpose items that you will no longer use rather than throwing them away.

STEP 3 – The hallway lighting

Dust and grime gather in the most awkward of places and although it may be a place through which people pass and not loiter, you’ll be amazed at just how dirty some hallway accoutrements become. The hallway pendant light, for example, should be taken down and washed, if possible, or carefully cleaned until sparkling again.

STEP 4 – Clean the hallway mirrors

A hallway mirror is somewhat essential. In a smaller space, it allows for light to be reflected, giving the hallway a larger, more spacious appeal to it. The layer of dust that has accumulated on its surface will not have been noticed in the gloom of winter but with the arrival of spring, the sunshine has a habit of naming and shaming the errors of our housekeeping… with cloth in hand and a quality streak-free cleaning solution, clean the round wall mirror and any other reflective surfaces you have in the hallway.

STEP 5 – Deep clean the floor and staircase

The one aspect of the hallway that takes a real battering over winter is the floor. You’ll have vacuumed and mopped several times over the winter months but again, spring sunshine has a habit of showing us the layers of dust that we haven’t seen. Start by vacuuming behind hallway furniture, as well as the staircase and other areas in the hallway. Go chemical free and use a homemade cleaning solution – bicarbonate of soda in warm water with a generous splash of lemon juice for scent – mop the floor, wipe down skirting boards, surfaces and door handles so that every part of the hallway is sparkling clean.

STEP 6 – Switching up the accessories

During winter, a scented candle in a storm jar in the hallway was perfect for giving it a welcoming and pleasant scent but you can switch up the scent by adding fresh, blooming flowers to the narrow console table from springtime onwards. Just as you do this, swap your accessories too, to give you something new to look on your reclaimed wood table at as you leave and enter your home.

The Lazy Guide to Spring Cleaning Your Home

Whole lemons and halved lemons on white surface

Cleaning may be therapeutic to some but for others, keeping on top of the dust, dirt and grime in the home is a chore. And with a change of season on the doorstep, the dreaded spring clean is once again upon us. However, you can give your home a new lease of life without hours of scrubbing and cleaning. Here’s the lazy guide to spring cleaning your hoe. We won’t tell if you don’t…..

Embrace symmetry

The thing with winter is that we tend to ‘huddle’ in our homes, cowering from the winter chill under many layers. And that means the symmetry or balance in a room can be knocked off-kilter as furniture is moved so that we bunch together for warmth. Simply moving your reclaimed wood furniture so that the room is symmetrical once again really works in giving your home the lift it needs in spring.

What does this mean? Balance your modern sofa with a side table at either end and a reclaimed wood coffee table placed front and centre, for example, or cluster things in threes on the rustic shelves or wood bookcase in the living room.

Clear surfaces

This goes for all rooms but in the kitchen, the bathroom and areas like the slimline console table in the hallway, as items tend to gather on tops of furniture. Whittle down these items so that you can see ‘space’ on work and tabletops.

Streamline the coat rack in the hall…

… and store away heavier winter boots and shoes. It’s amazing the difference it makes to the appearance of your home when you streamline items. Bulkier coats should be washed or dry cleaned and then safely stored away until the chill of autumn winds arrive.

Nourish the leather sofa

The sofa is the place where the family will pile onto at the end of the day and has probably had its fair share of spills and stains over the winter period. Look after your prized brown leather sofa by giving some love in the shape of cleaning it with nourishing leather wipes or cleaner. It’ll carry on giving you years of service if you do so.

Switch up the scent in a room

Scented candles are perfect for winter, especially those with spicy or musky scents. With the arrival of spring, lightening up the scent in your home by introducing floral notes. Stick with lighter perfumes for your large candles as the times isn’t right for anything too heady or perfumed just yet.

Get to grips with storage

The beauty of reclaimed wood furniture is that it is designed and made into ‘new’ pieces of furniture with the modern home in mind – and that means clever storage solutions. And so with spring knocking at the door, get organised with your home storage so that it is always tidy and aesthetically pleasing. A storage chest acting as a coffee table in the living room is a perfect example or a wooden blanket box in the bedroom hides a multitude of messy sins.

Give the hallway some stylistic attention

And finally, first impressions count, so we head back to the hallway. Giving your hallway a bit of style is a great way of making it look like you have spent hours cleaning and ordering your home to give it the warm and welcoming vibe you want it to exude. Add pretty table lamps and update the central light with a pendant light or new shade for a fresh new look this spring.

7 ways to prepare your living room for spring

At last, the gloom and chill of winter are finally giving way to spring. As the soil warms, spring bulbs blossom with the trees and shrubs awakening from their winter hiatus with delicate new buds. The birds serenade us with their morning chorus and all seems right in the world now that the sun is shining once again.

For the interior of our homes, that means clearing away winter bits and bobs so that spring can flood in. Here are seven ways to let spring bounce into your home.

1. Bring out the vases

Adding fresh flowers to your home will always change the scent and appearance of a room and so with spring on the doorstep and warm sunshine pouring through the window, add colour and gentle scent with bunches of fresh flowers, placing them on your oak side table and rustic TV stand. Choose spring-like flowers such as freesias, as well as generous bunches of roses in pretty pastel shades.

2. Get rid of winter clutter

The way we live in our homes changes with the seasons. We spend winter cocooned in the warm embrace of the living room but now is the time to cast off some of these layers, so spend time decluttering the living room. A coffee table with storage is perfect for storing away the thick wood blankets, whilst keeping them close by for cooler evenings, this is spring after all.

3. Spruce up the display unit and bookcases

Again, this is about creating an aesthetic appeal that sits with the warmer months of spring and summer. Switching up ideas will always give a room new life so that the living room has a chance to ‘breathe’ again. It could be something as simple as arranging books on the reclaimed wood shelves in pockets of colour, putting away accessories and replacing with different ones for the coming months. Replace those rich and warming candles that kept you cosy all winter and replace them with lighter and brighter scents.

4. Create new displays

They say a change is as good as a rest, and so with the change of seasons why not give your home a new look simply by having a change around. You may still light a fire of an evening but you may no longer need the sofa and armchairs placed so close to the fire so why not move your reclaimed wood furniture around so that you have a fresh new layout to the room?

5. Tone down the fireplace

Staying with the area around the fire, because we use it daily during winter, the area becomes cluttered with essential items from firewood, coal buckets and utensils for keeping the fire burning in the grate. In spring and summer, confine these to a cupboard or storage area where they can be hidden away and streamline and de-clutter the fire and mantelpiece. It will always be a feature of the living room but in spring it doesn’t have to be the main or only feature.

6. Clean the windows and freshen up the drapes

Again, heavy bundles of curtains at the windows over winter give your living room a warm and cosy feel and helps keep out the cold. But in spring, it can feel like overload. Maximise the first few rays of spring sunshine by cleaning the windows and washing or dry cleaning the curtains. And clean any mirrors in the living room too to bounce that spring light around the room.

7. Change over the cushions and rugs too

As well as freshening up all the linen in the living room, you may also want to consider changing the cushions covers and even the living room rugs for ones that are lighter in both colour and pattern. Replacing cushion covers are a great way to update a living room or old sofa. Spring tends to be the season of pastel colours, so why embrace this new lightness into your home?

Are you ready to embrace spring? We know we are!