As we barrel towards the holiday season, we naturally start assessing whether our home is ready for entertaining, whether for family-friendly Halloween get-togethers or adults-only New Years Eve soirees. While we love a good total reno and the chance to transform a home into a drastically different gathering space for friends and family, sometimes such a big change isn’t in the cards (or the budget).
Over the years, we have also identified the power of making smaller changes, swaps, and upgrades to create an inviting, appealing atmosphere. Here are six design details from past Sara Hillery Interior Design projects that will make an unforgettable impression on your guests and will hopefully give you a happiness buzz whenever you walk in that space as well.
Showstopping Foyer
Make a big impact on your guests from the moment they walk in with a fresh, tidy, and intentional foyer. This space incorporates both bright and soft whites and adds greenery to ease the indoor/outdoor transition. A playful blue and white striped wallpaper plays well with the lighter, peaceful blue shades of lighting fixture and side table.
Entryways often get clogged with shoes, coats, and bags, but making the effort to create a curated foyer translates to more space in the home to truly express your style and will set the stage to showcase your home to guests. Another plus side: you’ll enter your home after a long day and feel instantly refreshed and welcome.
Custom Architectural Details
One of our favorite ways to bring texture into a space without drastically altering it structurally is to add architectural details. Incorporating moldings instantly makes a room feel intriguing and elegant, and we love the diversity of options and that they can be added from floor to ceiling depending on which area you’d like to highlight.
To add depth to this room with a largely monochromatic color palette, we incorporated panel wainscotting and fluted pilasters around the fireplace, crown and baseboard molding at the ceiling and floor, and casing around the door.
Unique Powder Room
Powder rooms are among the most fun to play with since we like to be daring in small spaces! They are often the perfect room to try dramatic paint colors or wallpapers, but putting some thought into smaller details goes a long way here in general.
Little touches such as a whimsical mirror, funky light fixtures, an interesting faucet, a small bouquet of flowers, even a decadent smelling hand soap can have maximum impact and will have your guests stealing these ideas for their own powder room.
Bar Niche
For consummate entertainers and wannabe mixologists, a stocked bar is a necessity. Why not make every celebration feel just a little more festive with a splashy bar niche like this one? The vibrant color, abundant gold details, crisp marble countertop, wallpapered ceiling, and glam beaded light fixture will make every martini feel like a party! Multiple cabinets contain bottles, glasses, and other bar accessories for when the party is (at least temporarily) over and keep the space looking clean and organized.
Pops of Wallpaper
Wallpaper can get dismissed from design plans because of its past reputation for being fussy and costly to install. There are now easier-to-apply options available, and we’d also argue that the visual impact is worth a little struggle: wallpaper can make guests feel like they are inhabiting a work of art!
Wallpapers come in myriad patterns (we especially love floral and botanicals) and textures. Depending on the size and color of the print, patterns can really bring a “wow” factor, or they can create a soothing, repetitive visual. If wallpapering a whole room feels intimidating, we recommend using it for an accent wall or two.
Curated Art Collection
Many of our clients have spent years if not decades amassing a collection of artwork. Because these collections grow over time, the pieces are often added to an open wall or squeezed into a cabinet. For maximum visual impact, we recommend curating art that is connected by style or form into a specific area or space for display. When entertaining guests who might not know others (or even your family) very well, these collections create an immediate entrypoint for conversation and connection. Who knows? They may even have a unique collection of their own!
Want more design tips? Download our FREE Seasonal Guest-Ready Checklist below to get our curated tips and tricks to prep your home for guests this holiday season. Happy entertaining!
