Staying in on the weekend? Try some budget-friendly home improvement projects
With then much time spent at home, many of u.s.a. are paying more attention to our environment – and discovering that we don't like what nosotros encounter.
Now might not exist the time for a gut renovation, given the social distancing measures still in identify and shifting rules regarding construction in different areas and apartment buildings. Only it's a good fourth dimension to remember near smaller home improvement projects.
If you're willing to tackle the piece of work yourself, at that place are changes you tin can make that won't cost much but will have a big effect on the appearance and comfort of your home. A few designers recently shared some of their favourite upkeep-friendly DIY projects.
Paint TARGETED AREAS
Painting has long been touted as one of the least expensive ways to make a big aesthetic alter. Only in that location'southward a caveat that'due south often left out: Painting all the rooms in a home, from ceilings to baseboards, is a massive undertaking that can require weeks of neck-craning effort.
For more immediate gratification, take a targeted arroyo to introducing a new pigment colour.
"Pigment a modest infinite – say, a bathroom – a brighter or bolder colour that makes you happy," suggested Rebecca Atwood, a Brooklyn-based textile designer and the writer of Living With Color and Living With Pattern.
Or apply a favourite color to all the trim in i room, or all the interior doors, to change them from background elements to decorative features. "We all think about the colour of our walls," she said. "But we don't think plenty virtually the doors."
Robert McKinley, a New York interior designer, offered another suggestion: Choose paint with an uncommon finish. In his beach house in Montauk, New York, most of the walls are white, but the den is painted with a cloudy, deep-ruby lime wash from Domingue Architectural Finishes.
"The lime wash basically gives the look and experience of a plastered wall, but anybody tin do it," he said. "I mean, talk about changing the room – it made this simple, white room into the virtually special room in our house."
Add WALL PANELLING
Dwelling-comeback TV personalities similar Chip and Joanna Gaines accept been highlighting the appeal of shiplap and other kinds of wall panelling for years.
Panelling is relatively easy to install, said Joanne Palmisano, an interior designer in Shelburne, Vermont, and an author of Stone York Rental and other books on designing with salvaged materials. And a little panelling, she noted, can go a long manner.
"A lot of times we use it as a headboard panelling wall," she said, rather than panelling an entire room. "It gives it this dramatic feel and look."
When she renovated Main and Mount, a motel in Ludlow, Vermont, she used a handful of green-painted vertical boards in guest-room niches to create heart-communicable storage areas. Ms Palmisano has even used reclaimed Shaker-way cabinet doors to create a panelled headboard wall.
The best installation method "depends on the look you're going for and what's behind the wall," she said. In nearly cases, it involves identifying where the studs are, cut the boards to size and securing them with a nail gun.
If you need help, she added, "There are so many YouTube tutorials."
Modify THE Calorie-free
"Lighting is an piece of cake set up" – and one that can significantly alter the feeling of a room, said Tara Mangini, a founder of the Jersey Ice Cream Company, a design business firm.
Ms Mangini'south firm has been offering Zoom design consultations during the pandemic, and she oftentimes sees a certain problem: "And so many people are in houses where they're just living with the same lighting that the contractors put in: It's a flush-mount calorie-free with one bulb that'southward too brilliant."
Besides as replacing flush-mount fixtures with more flattering pendants or chandeliers, Ms Mangini said, she besides tells people to add fixtures closer to eye level: "Add some lamps and sconces, which is also a really great fashion to bring in character."
If you employ plug-in sconces, installation is easy. Just mountain them on the wall near outlets. Sconces are particularly useful abreast beds or sofas and above counters or desks.
Compared to a single, bright ceiling light, having multiple lower-wattage fixtures "creates a mood," Ms Mangini said.
Peel AND STICK A Design
Wallpapering is another job that might sound easy but can apace become problematic when the paste spills and the paper bubbles and sags. One option for a simpler installation is peel-and-stick wallpaper, which is effectively a giant sticker for your wall.
"I'm embarrassed most how often I utilize information technology," Ms Palmisano said. "Simply it'due south a actually easy manner to make a dramatic change in a room."
Another advantage: Removal is almost every bit piece of cake as installation. "If information technology's put on right, it can last a long fourth dimension," she said. "But if you modify your mind, or you're renting, you can take it off before you move, commonly without damage."
And if yous desire to cover ugly flooring in a bathroom, mudroom or kitchen, there are skin-and-stick vinyl flooring tiles – an quondam product that companies have improved with new patterns and colours.
During the pandemic, these products have surged in popularity, said Ryan Breau, the web marketing manager at WallPops, a company that sells peel-and-stick wallpaper, floor tiles and backsplash treatments.
"Year over year, in Apr and May, we saw a 350 per cent increase" in sales, Mr Breau said. "People were at home without much to do. With just a utility knife and a measuring tape, they could do something really impactful to their environment."
OVERHAUL YOUR HEADBOARD
The bed is usually the focal point of the main bedroom, and the headboard is typically its virtually distinctive element. If yous have an upholstered headboard that you don't dearest, reupholstering it is an easy DIY project.
"You just need a staple gun," Ms Atwood said. "Y'all're stretching the fabric taut and staple-gunning it to the dorsum. Information technology'due south just like stretching a canvas."
Different reupholstering a sofa, re-roofing a headboard requires a minimal amount of fabric, she said, and you could even dye or print your own. (Ms Atwood'southward book Living With Blueprint includes instructions for a DIY shibori-dyed headboard.)
If you don't have a headboard, you can brand your own, said Ms Palmisano, who has made them out of plywood covered with carpet padding and simulated leather.
Information technology doesn't even need to attach to the bed frame. "You lot just make a wall cleat," she said, or buy one, to mountain the headboard directly to the wall behind the bed.
BUILD A BAR
If new pigment, lite fixtures and wallpaper aren't plenty to make you happy with your interior, Mr McKinley suggested adding a bar. In his Montauk house, he and his wife, Kate Nauta, removed a door from a minor closet to convert information technology into a space for mixing drinks.
"We did it ourselves," he said, by installing a couple of low IKEA wall cabinets topped by a counter finished in back-painted acrylic. In a higher place, they added sconces, a mirror and a vintage wall shelf to concur bottles.
This sort of improvement has multiple advantages during lockdown. "It looks and then cool," Mr McKinley said. And information technology's well equipped to ease anxiety.
By Tim McKeough © 2022 The New York Times
Source: https://cnalifestyle.channelnewsasia.com/entertainment/budget-friendly-home-renovation-projects-241656
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