Category Archives: Decorating Inspiration

Innovative uses for ordinary household items

As a crafty homeowner, you'll pride yourself on your DIY skills. It's a good icebreaker for family and friends visiting your home, to be able to tell them about your interior design and show them your home projects, whether that be a beautifully painted mural wall or even just simplistic but stylish decorating.

Items used in a innovative manner can really get your guests admiring and shaking their heads – finding extremely creative uses for ordinary household items that give your home a rustic, homely but contemporary feel.

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How to make a small kitchen appear larger with Resene paints

A kitchen is a place of congregation for the family. It's where healthy, wholesome meals are made and if you have an open kitchen plan, it'll be where everyone gathers around at dinner time to bond and relax after their day. As a kitchen holds food, a basic human necessity, it symbolises a place of comfort and dependence.

However, a small kitchen can foster less than enthusiastic connotations, especially if it is situated in a separate room. Luckily, though, if you are clever with your Resene paint colour choices and design ideas, you can liven up your kitchen and make it appear more spacious than it is.

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How to incorporate Pantone’s 2016 Colours of the Year with Resene

For the first time ever, Pantone has chosen a duo-blend of two colours as the 2016 Colour of the Year. What's hot right now, is Rose Quartz, a soft blush of pink, and Serenity, a periwinkle pale blue.

Leatrice Eiseman, executive director of the Pantone Colour Institute, explains that it's an "inherent balance between a warmer embracing rose and the cooler tranquil blue".

While this may just look like a pastel hue of blue or pink, the colours were also chosen partly due to the blurring of gender associations of certain shades. These colours have also been very specifically selected, with Rose Quartz reflecting a slight tinge of peach tones while Serenity just edges on the border close to purple.

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Survey finds what people value most in a ‘perfect home’

We've heard Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz say, "there's no place like home", and many buzzy bee jokes end with the punchline "honey, I'm home!" – but now, we can actually get a sense of what makes a house perfect, at least in the minds of Australians.

A recent survey by the Real Estate Buyers Agents Association of Australia (REBAA) has found the top 10 housing features that would be on a wishlist for potential home buyers. Once you see what these are, it wouldn't be a stretch to say that many homeowners would likely want the same elements in a house, as many of these are modern and in-line with coastal living.

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Attract Christmas shoppers to your retail business with these decor tips

Deck the halls of your retail business with boughs of holly, because the Christmas shopping season is in full swing!

You'd be surprised just how much money is spent on gifts around the silly season. In Australia, for example, a whopping $45 billion was estimated to be spent on Xmas pressies in 2014, according to research by the Australian Retailers Association. What's even more impressive is that this amount was spent in just a few weeks, between November 15 until December 24. 

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Bring the magic of Monet to your space this spring

Springtime is the perfect opportunity to take a tired, stagnant interior and refresh it with some new inspiration in time for the new year. A staple of spring trends, while florals and pastels help to brighten up a wintry space, some may shy away from them due to their predictability. 

However, it is still possible to infuse a botanical essence into your home or professional space without being too stereotypical. Simply look to one of the great masters of Impressionism, Claude Monet. 

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Spotlight on nautical inspiration for Spring

Whether you're a home decorating enthusiast or a designer by trade, when Pantone releases its seasonal report every few months it can help to inject new inspiration into your plans, putting the spotlight on colours which may have previously slipped under your radar.

Pantone's Spring 2015 Fashion colours may have been designed to breathe fresh life into the runways, but that doesn't mean you can't take a little inspiration for your home decorating projects. Here we take a look at some refreshing ideas for spring that can vitalise your space. 

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Top 3 wallpaper worthy views to photograph on your travels

When you head off on that whirlwind holiday you've been dreaming of, you're bound to have some must-do attractions on the itinerary – from trying the local cuisine to visiting that incredible museum.

One of the best ways to make these memories last is to document your trip with photos of some of the incredible sights you encounter along the way. But instead of just flicking though them on your computer, or even printing them out, why not bring the magic of your adventures home by immortalising your favourite shot as a feature wall? 

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What’s the best colour scheme and design for a cafe business?

It's no secret that the cafe culture in Australia and New Zealand is building steam. Baristas seem to be popping up left, right and centre, and people can often catch the scent of delicious coffee beans wafting through the air along many side-streets and laneways. 

Some cities within these countries are especially renowned for their quality caffeine – Melbourne in Oz and Wellington in NZ in particular are hailed by coffee enthusiasts as meccas for mouthwatering brews and well-roasted beans. 

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3 fun DIY paint ideas for a breakfast in bed tray

There's no better way to enjoy a weekend than by staying in bed, enjoying a hot cup of coffee and a cooked breakfast without so much as getting out of the covers. A handy breakfast-in-bed tray goes a long way, and there are ways to revitalise the simple tray into a work of art using DIY paint methods.

Here are just three of the many ways you can create a fun tray for your next rise and shine moment. Best of all, each of these trays can also be used on your nightstand or bedside table as catchalls for keeping notebooks, reading glasses and a cup of water.

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