Advice & TipsGeneral

Choose Your Wallpaper with These Useful Tips

Your walls will define a huge percentage of your home’s interior. Although monochromatic, white walls are the choice of many, this doesn’t have to mean that this bland choice is the right way to go. Opting for covering your walls with wallpapers can turn out to be a beautiful choice, but you can also end up rendering your home a disastrous, tasteless Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory lookalike. In order to equip with a quality indoors outlook, we’ve come up with this guide, which will hopefully help you select the perfect wallpaper for your walls.

Color

Okay, first things first – color is by and large the main thing that defines a room: it sets the mood, it takes a lot of feel for matching and it tends to bring out a secret, hidden personal decorator in everyone. There is more to the science of color-choosing than it may appear, though. If your target room isn’t all-that-big, make sure you approach picking your pattern with cool-color backgrounds in mind, such as blue, green or violet. Soft colors, such as the mentioned, tend to bring out a feeling of tranquility for those that dwell in the room. Warm colors, on the other hand tend to feel dramatic and fresh – colors such as yellow, red and orange make for a warmer feeling inside a room. For darker rooms, opt for dramatic colors.

Light

Although colors matter more than a lot, there is no color without light; and there is no such thing as an appropriate color, without the appropriate lighting. When it comes to wallcoverings, picking those that will reflect light around the room in spaces like dark hallways, rooms without windows or those that face North is definitely the right way to go – think about wall covers with light colors and/or metallic or iridescent inks. Smooth surfaces are also always a good way to go in terms of light reflection. On another hand, dark colors absorb light, closing down on the room – unless you have a huge room with quite a high ceiling, avoid these wall coverings.

Style

It’s not all about light and color, when it comes to choosing the fitting wallpaper – you have to match it with style – quite literally. If your furniture around the room is formal-looking, opt for matching wallcoverings, such as those with large-scale patterns and dramatic colors. Conversely, however, polka dots are a great type of a small motif that can bring out even more fun in an already fun space. While a patternless room can bore people out very easily, a room with too many patterns can cause exhaustion to one’s eyes, so matching is the key thing, when it comes to your indoor wall covers.

Patterns

There’s more to wallcovering patterns than you might think. Even though you might not be aware of this, stripes and vertical patterns in general tend to accentuate height, dignity, formality and vitality. When it comes to horizontal patterns, however, they tend to bring out a feeling of width, quietness and tranquility, making narrow rooms seem wider. Do not underestimate the power of borders – these are also available in a lot of styles and motifs – from pastoral views, to wildlife images.

The perks of texture

One of the main perks of wallcoverings lies in the fact that their texture successfully hides wall imperfections. This is great, seeing as how a wallpaper is significantly cheaper than having your entire wall redone. With this in mind, patterns with surfaces such as grass, burlap, vinyl, and string cloth do the best job in the department. If you’ve always desired a wooden wall, rest assured that you can find many realistic walls covers simulating it. Furthermore, you can even get papers simulating the look of marble, fabric, leather, animal skins even, in addition to those resembling wood. Always keep in mind, however, that you’re looking to match the walls with furniture and appliances, as well as a room’s purpose, definitely not the other way around.

Finding a perfect wallpaper for your home’s interior is a task a bit more complicated than it might seem, although it proves for a valuable and a generally interesting experience. Think about your color, lighting, style and patterns in order to provide your house with an interior that it deserves!

Diana Smith

My name is Diana. I'm a full time mom of two beautiful girls simply in love with interior design and DIY projects. Since I spend a lot of time at home (especially in the kitchen) I always look for low cost ways to improve the space for me and my family. Sometimes is just a small change like colorful curtains or new sofa pillows and sometimes I try to find a good way to organize small space.