furniture

5 Ways of Using Scandinavian Decor In Your Home

~ Naomi Pederson

There is something so refreshing about walking in a Scandinavian home. Their style is very unique, yet feels familiar and comfortable. Even if you don’t have Scandinavian roots, you can enjoy their style in your home by following these simple tips from Showhome Furnitures top designers. Remember, if you have any trouble at all about how to decorate your home, you can give us a call and book your free on-hour design consultation today!

One of the reasons we love Scandinavian interior design is that it manages to create a space that is at once modern, airy, tidy, and cozy at the same time. It is a space that welcomes good conversation and people while keeping their stuff to a minimum.

The most important thing you can do to create a Scandinavian feel in your home is to make sure that your rooms are full of natural light. The more you can free your windows up from dark curtains (or curtains altogether), and liberate the most amount of light into your room the better.

Keeping your walls a very light color is part of the Scandivavian look. That doesn’t mean you have to keep your walls white, though white is a popular color. You can paint them any warm, light color to reflect and take advantage of the light coming in from your window.

While your walls should be very light, your furniture and accessories should not. A Hallmark feature of Scandinavian design is high contrast. Dark furniture with clean lines will contrast with the light walls. Also, using modern furniture will often be the perfect contrast to more ornate architectural feature you might have in your home.

Layering your accessories with different textures is a fabulous way of creating intrigue in your decorating. Make good use of long wool rugs, and pillows. Thick chunky throws and natural cow rugs are perfect for the Scandinavian look.

Lastly, think cozy! Scandinavian’s love being cozy. This can be achieved by adding a few extra pillows to your simple lined couch, or an extra blanket to the end of your bed. Using the warmth of wood to decorate, or candles is also an excellent way of adding warmth to your room.

Scandinavian’s are experts in creating a spaces that are both spacious and cozy. If this is a feel you would like to create in your home, just follow our tips and in no time at all you will have a home that is tidy, carefully put together and cozy-Scandinavian style!

For some more personal, one-on-one advice, give our designers a call to book your free one-hour design consultation.

5 Simple Decorating Tips For Decorating Your Cabin

~ Naomi Pederson

Are you one of those lucky people who own their own cabin that they can use to just get away from the world?  If you are, you know that it can be a challenge to decorate it in a way that is easy to maintain, as well as beautiful.

At Showhome furniture we know that struggle well.  Each day we are rearranging furniture into small mini rooms to help inspire our clients.  We realize that decorating these small spaces take as much thought or more as decorating a larger home.

The first thing to realize when decorating your cabin is that because you won’t be living there on a daily basis, you won’t be needing as many things.  Being conscience of what you allow into your cabin is vital.  Your cabin needs to have the essentials and should not have too many extras. Extra’s create more clutter, are usually not used enough to make them cost effective and cause more work to clean up.  Keeping your things to a minimum will greatly improve the time you spend in your cabin.

Next be careful about your furniture choice.  Getting furniture that is well built and made with natural products will help them last longer.  At Showhome Furniture we offer a 5 year furniture protection plan.  This protection plan is something every cabin owner should consider, especially those who own a cabin by water.

When you are on a vacation rules tend to be bent, and nothing can wreck furniture more than wet sandy kids sitting down on new furniture.  Even well built furniture can benefit from the protection plan, helping make each dollar you spend on your cabin last long.

In a cabin you naturally chose smaller furniture because the rooms in cabins are usually smaller than a regular house.  While it is wise to choose smaller furniture, freeing up more space for moving around, do not worry if you find the perfect large chair or other piece of furniture.  A few larger pieces can help make a small room feel special and inviting.

When choosing what to decorate your cabin with think of the following questions:

1. Do I need this?

This question helps provide you a framework to help you make a better decision on what you should or should not bring into your cabin. As we identify what we need and don’t need, we are able to better choose things that will be useful and bring us joy, as well as say no to the things that will just clutter our cabin and vacation time.

There will definitely be things you will be tempted to decorate your cabin with that you don’t need.  When you find that you are dealing with something that fits this category it is the perfect time to ask yourself the second question, why do I have this?

2. Why do I have this?

With this second question, we are encouraged to analyze more deeply our relationship with our stuff and how they are a part of our lives.

Often you will be surprised at the answers you will come up with to the question of “Why do I own this?”

Many people have found that as they take time to thoughtfully decorate their cabins, that their cabins truly become the little bit of peace and quiet that help us get away from the stresses of life, and allow us to function at our best.

6 Steps To Bringing Your Room Together

~ Naomi Pederson

Bringing all your furniture together to make room work can be difficult to do at times.  At Showhome Furniture in Calgary we have to deal with this issue all the time.  We bring in furniture from all around the world and specialize in Canadian made product as well.  With all these different kinds of furniture to work with, we have a ton of experience in creating the perfect space for every room of your house.

Realizing that others might struggle with this concept, we have asked some of our designers what they thought was the easiest and most efficient way to bring a room together.  One of the top suggestions that they made was to find the perfect rug.  A rug can add warmth and coziness to any room, no matter how big the room is.  A rug also has the ability to help bring a room together in a way that is completely unique.

First you need to consider the size of rug you need.  There really are not rules as to what is the perfect size of rug for a room.  

Some people like to make sure that a rug is big enough for the front feet of the furniture to sit on it, and others like it to be a pretty island in the middle of a room or at the end of a bed.  You need to just try and experiment to see what works best for you.Next you need to consider what color would work best with the furniture you have.  If there is already a lot of color in your room, you may want to just pick one color to match the rug with, or go completely neutral so that your rug does not compete with the furniture.

If you you don’t have a lot of color in your room, you need to choose a rug that has colors and patterns that work with what items you already have.  

You may need to adjust a few items like curtains or pillows, but those are usually quite easy to do, and you will have a ton of options.  You need to make sure that your rug works with your wall color and flooring.

At Showhome, we are constantly switching up our pillows and rugs to help people see how different furniture can work well in many different rooms.

If you ever need any help or inspiration of your own, come down to Calgary’s Showhome Furniture and ask our designers what they would do.  They are experts in this area and are always happy to help you find the perfect way to tie all your furniture together in a beautiful way.

 

5 Amazing Statement Ceilings That Anyone Can Do

~ Naomi Pederson

If you have been prowling pinterest, or checking out the web, you will see a ton of posts and picture on “Statement Ceilings”!  In the past people used to do ‘statement walls’ but this year we are all setting our sights higher!!

At Showhome Furniture we totally understand the new excitement for creating a ceiling that people can not easily forget.  After all, once the ceiling is done, you don’t have to worry about washing it (at least not too often), having it get banged up or scratched.  Unfortunately some of those ceilings, as cool as they look, are not realistic for the majority of us to pull off.

 

After spending a ton of time researching, we came up with 5 amazing Statement Ceilings that anyone can do.

The first is painting your ceiling one color (besides white).  This is by far the simplest way of adding an extra “Wow” to your room.  It makes people look up and feel as if they are in a whole new world, instead of just a normal room with a white ceiling.

Painting the ceiling one color is great and fairly uncomplicated, but if you want to go a step further, consider painting the ceiling in more than one color.  You can do a simple pattern or more complex stenciling.  Remember that you are painting a ceiling so everything you do is going to be harder than if you were doing it on a wall.

If painting isn’t your thing, you can always wallpaper the ceiling!

If you choose to wallpaper you are lucky because there are so many different kinds of wallpaper that the possibilities are endless.

If you are not afraid of doing some simple cuts with wood, covering your ceiling with either weathered barn wood, or new pine is simple, and stunning.

The last idea to add more interest to your ceiling is stick-on ceiling tiles.  They can be pricey, but are so easy to use. 

All you need is an x-atco knife, a measuring tape and the tiles.  They are usually made out of light thin plastic that has a sticky back.  My sister did this in a small dining area she had and looked fabulous!