Decorating Your Home With Your New Spouse? Remember These 7 Tips

Congratulations, newlywed! You've tied the knot, and now it’s time to decorate your marital home. As you'll soon discover, this process marks one of your first exercises in compromise with your partner.

From deciding on a color palette to combining your separate ideas, you’ll face many decisions. However, the process doesn’t have to be painful, even if one of you enjoys playing homemaker more than the other. Embrace these tips, and you’ll have a showcase-ready home in no time at all.

1. Start With Mutual Respect

Maybe you always thought your spouse’s taste in decor was a bit lacking. But before you run over their input like a single-minded bulldozer, stop to consider their feelings. Remember, you found admirable traits in your partner that spurred you to say, “I do.” Besides, just because your partner decorated their bachelor pad with all things NASCAR, that doesn’t mean they want to hang their autographed picture of Dale Earnhardt in the living room. Schedule a date night to sit down with some catalogs and identify decor you like. See if you can find themes you both love.

2. Choose a Color Scheme

If you want your home to resemble a model showcase, you need to select a palette that unifies your theme. No, you don’t have to paint every room the same beige hue, but nor do you want your home to appear chaotic and piecemeal. One way to unify your look is to think laterally by choosing hues in the same family as the others. For example, you might opt for blue tones to create a peaceful feeling. You can use teal accents in an otherwise neutral living room and light aquamarine paint on your bedroom walls.

3. Make a Materials List

Make a list of things you’re going to need. Maybe you waited forever to have a home with a foyer tall enough to hang your 80” x 25” M.C. Escher print. If you now have the perfect space, and you have a larger item, make sure you’re getting a cord that will support the weight. They make heavy duty cords with fiber that’s stronger than steel, so don’t go for the first standard cord you find. Decorating typically resigns itself to smaller projects, but you don’t have to ixnay more substantial remodels if you have the cash and know-how. For example, you might decide to screen in a deck or a balcony to make a Florida room or home office, or even a playroom for future or current kiddos.

4. Shop Together

Your spouse comes home with what they think is the perfect vase, but you wish you could donate it to Goodwill immediately. When making purchase decisions that cost more than $50 or $100, do the shopping together. After all, you both need to sit on the couch you end up selecting. Even if you typically keep your finances separate, you might want to open a joint checking account for things like home decor. These can double as savings vehicles for future vacations.

5. Think Less Is More

You might feel tempted to blow your entire bankroll making your house perfect — but remember, you intend to live there for many years to come. Your tastes will change, as well as fashion and decor trends. Strive to go as minimalist as possible with your design. This restraint leaves you room to add things, like that fantastic Tiki you get on a future trip to the South Pacific.

6. Add Personality Through Accents

You want to feel proud of showing off your home, but you also want it to reflect who you are as a couple. As such, feel free to express your personality through your accent piece choices. Are you a budding photographer? Why not have several of your favorite pics framed and matted to make a wall of original artwork? You can also layer rugs and add cozy throws, perhaps monogrammed with your initials, now that you’ve tied the knot.

7. Define Individual Spaces

Virginia Woolf once opined that, to write, a woman needs a room of her own. Even if you don’t harbor aspirations of writing the great American novel, everyone needs a unique space to call theirs. If you share a studio apartment, this area may consist of little more than a yoga retreat blocked off by a folding screen, but it signals to your partner, “I need alone time, please.” If you have more space, you can help preserve household harmony by letting your spouse decorate their area as they please. You can create the cozy sewing room of your dreams, and they can display their sports memorabilia proudly in their “cave.”

Make Decorating Your Home With Your New Spouse Easier With These Tips

Decorating your home with your new spouse can be one of life’s greatest pleasures. Create a welcoming design of your dreams with these tips.