If you want your home to be as beautiful as it can be, then you need to learn and apply some of the most basic interior design and decorating principles. One of them is designing around a focal point, which is the centerpiece of every room and where all of your furniture and decorative elements are pointing to. Designing around a central piece can provide a sense of balance and symmetry to your room.
A focal point can be a decorative element or architectural. The following are some examples of a good focal point:
- Fireplace
- Screen
- Windows
- Piece of artwork
- Mirrors
- Outside views
- Vaulted ceilings
- Uniquely angled walls
With this, here are some pointers for decorating around a focal point.
Determine your focal point
The first thing you need to do is to identify your room’s focal point. As explained above, a focal point or centerpiece can be created, but it can also be built-in into the home that you have. If you want things to be less complex for you, you can choose just one focal point, but it’s also possible to have more than one, especially if one of them is architectural and the other is decorative.
For example, if you happen to have a home with a gorgeous built-in fireplace as well as a stunning view of a lake, you’ll want to keep both things in consideration when choosing your color palette and the orientation of your furniture. The first step to designing around your focal point is to first identify it. Remember that your focal point must highlight your room or home’s best features.
Find colors and pieces that complement your focal point
Now that you’ve identified your focal point, you need to ensure that your room’s colors and pieces can look good beside it. Make sure your interior’s colors are complementary to the focal point. Your color palette should follow the 60-30-10 rule so that there is a balance to the hues and shades you use in the room.
For example, if your fireplace is made of brick, you might want to consider furniture pieces and other decorative accessories that are warmer in tone, like rust-red, beige, and other earthy tones. You can also request the help of interior painting firms.
Lay your pieces around the focal point
There is a rhyme and reason for furniture placement. There is a method to the madness; you can’t just throw pieces around and hope that it looks good. How you arrange your pieces in a space will make or break the symmetry in your room. Your focal point can help ensure that everything remains balanced.
That’s the whole point of orienting your entire room around one centerpiece. When deciding on furniture placement, make sure that you are constantly directing attention to the focal point and not distracting from it. Strategically orient all your pieces towards your space’s focal point or focal points.
Use smaller decorative elements to direct the eye to the focal point
It’s not just your bigger pieces like the couch and coffee table that need to point towards the centerpiece; your smaller decorative pieces also need to direct the eye towards the focal point. The clearest example is built-in open shelves surrounding your focal point (like a screen, artwork piece, or fireplace).
When decorating the shelves, remember that the whole point of the built-in is to bring people’s eyes towards the centerpiece. It doesn’t have to mean you have to angle all your picture frames and books towards the focal point, but that they are placed so that they don’t take away from the show’s main star.
Maximize lighting and accents to bring attention to the focal point
Another way you can direct the eyes to the focal point is by using strategic lighting. You can invest in unique chandeliers to draw the eyes towards the centerpiece. Another example includes picture lights over any piece of art that you want to highlight.
Aside from lighting, you can also leverage decorative accents to frame the centerpiece, like drapes that can frame the floor-to-ceiling windows. The right curtains will help ensure that your windows pop more, and they can also add warmth to your room if they have the right color and pattern.
Decorating your own space and ensuring its symmetry is not as complicated as you think. Focus on your space’s best feature, make it the star by designing the whole space around it, and don’t be afraid to experiment and explore. No one knows your taste more than you, so let your home be an expression of that.
