1. Geometric patterns; Say goodbye to soft, gentle curves—funky geometric patterns will rule the roost in 2017. Embrace your memories of high school math with geometric throw pillows, wallpaper, and quirky planters. Large, mod geometric designs made an appearance in 2016 and will be a front-runner in 2017.

Scared this fun new style will feel out of place in your old-school home? Don’t be.

Don’t feel like your home needs to have all modern design to add geometric patterns. Geometrics even have a place in an industrial farmhouse–style home.

2. Jewel tones: Last year welcomed the bold return of art deco–inspired designs, and with them come luxurious jewel tones. Indulge your regal side with rich emerald chairs, bright sapphire walls, and amethyst accents.

These colors offer depth and a richness that will make space feel cozy, yet luxurious. Pair the designs with neutral, minimal wall colors for a toned-down take on the trend, or go wild and slather your entire living space in vivid color.

3.  Tropical influences: It’s the year of the “jungalow.” Your new, jewel-toned walls will look fabulous alongside lush tropical plants: spider plants, Dracaena, and beautiful ferns.

Cursed with the blackest of thumbs? You can still embrace the tropical trend, which mixes printed and embellished textiles ranging from novelty fruits to animal print to palm fronds. Add accents in bright yellows, deep greens, and earthy oranges and reds to bring this creative look home.

4.  Wood accents: We’re moving away from metal and back to an earthier feel. Wood accents will be everywhere in 2017.

No, we’re not talking about wood paneling (although that’s sneaking its way back, too). Look for modern wood clocks, sculptures, trays, and furniture that pair perfectly with today’s streamlined aesthetic. And yes, a lot of that wood will be reclaimed—so we can keep our wonderful forests.

5. Black stainless steel: Remodeling your kitchen in 2017? Now’s your chance to get ahead of a trend. Stainless-steel appliances have ruled the kitchen for years now. And why not? They’re sleek, easy to clean, and pretty. But it’s time for a change.

Black stainless steel is sleek, modern, and sophisticated. And even better: it’s not in all of your friends’ kitchens. Brushed stainless steel had its time, and now people are looking for a subtle change.

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As the new year commences, people are full of optimism, invigorated and determined to make 2017 a great year. Many people make resolutions about losing weight, getting fit, or improving their financial situation, but the new year also presents the perfect opportunity to transform your home.

Listed below are some interior design ideas that will hopefully inspire and give you the motivation to make some changes to your home. The beauty of interior design is that little tweaks can make a huge difference, so without further ado let’s look at some easy to implement ideas.

Three Inspirational Interior Design Ideas

Out with the old, and in with the new. As the new year begins, you have the perfect opportunity to declutter and free up some much-needed space. Over the course of the year, we all accumulate unnecessary items, which end up making your home look untidy and gathering dirt and dust. You will be surprised at how much difference it can bring to any room when you get rid of the excess baggage. Once you have completed this task, maintain the new look, by preventing further clutter and unwanted items from being brought into the home throughout the year.

Make Better Use Of Available Space – As our families continue to grow, and property costs show no sign of slowing down, it becomes even more necessary to make full use of any available space. If you live in a house, then the area under the stairs is often not utilized properly. With a little creative thinking, you can transform that space into an extra “closet” with shelves, and rods, to provide a brand new mini closet.

Add An Aquarium To Invite Nature Into Your Home – It is a well-known fact that watching fish swimming is both relaxing and therapeutic. In recent years, aquarium designs have been transformed from the old rectangular tanks; you might recall, to innovative and exciting pieces of furniture. Whether you decide on an aquarium shaped table or wash basin, these beautiful designs will easily fit into your home, look stunning and help you and your family to relax after a long hard day.

None of these ideas are particularly expensive to implement but can change any room or space quickly and easily. The new year is about to start, to embrace some of these ideas, and fall in love with your home all over again. 

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Four Simple and Cost Effective Interior Design Ideas

Books

In the modern era of smartphones and Kindles, people are buying fewer books, but books can add a certain decorum and focal point to any room. If you have an unused fireplace, or shelf wrap some of your old books in crisp, clean paper, and stack them creatively inside the fireplace, or on the shelf. Depending on the look you are aiming for, you could either go with white paper on everything or mix it up to create a colorful center-piece. If you already have the books at home, then the cost of this new center-piece will only be a few sheets of paper.

Music

Many couples have a special song that means a lot to both partners; perhaps it is your wedding song for instance. If you have a plain wall somewhere, an excellent idea would be to write the words of that song in either your personal handwriting or by using a unique calligraphic font. This will provide a perfect centerpiece, which will spark conversation amongst visitors while remaining deeply personal to your family.

Nature

Creating memories is a lot of fun, and paramount for a family. Why not arrange a fun nature trip for the household, to the beach of the forest, and give every member the task of finding something special on the journey to bring back with them. Once back at home, design a collage or display commemorating your trip. Seashells, Rocks and other pieces of nature can look beautiful if displayed correctly, and in turn, those pieces will help the memory of your fun family trip last much longer.

Declutter and Rearrange

One of the biggest myths about interior design is that you always have to add things to the room, to change the look and feel. If you take a step back and look at any room in your home with a critical eye, you will be surprised at how many excess items are taking up space and making the room feel cluttered. Invest some time and be decisive in your decisions, if there are things in the room that don’t add anything to the look, and are only taking up space then get rid of them. Once you have completed this task, which can be very therapeutic, evaluate the furniture, and consider changing the seating plan. You will be shocked at how different any room can look, once it has been decluttered, and rearranged. What’s more, the total cost of this interior renovation is precisely zero.

The above ideas are both simple and inexpensive to execute but can change the look and feel of your home. There are dozens of ways to achieve change, and they don’t have to cost a lot of money. With people becoming more environmentally friendly, these ideas are not only inexpensive but make use of items you already own. We hope that some of these ideas have struck a chord and will encourage you to make some quick, easy and hopefully personal changes in your home. If you need any help with executing some of these ideas, please click here to contact us.

The post Interior Design Doesn’t Have to Be Expensive – Get Creative appeared first on Refind Interiors.

When it comes to getting the biggest bang for your buck spending money on your kitchen is by far the best investment you can make in your home. According to Realtor.com “Regardless of where you live, the top home remodeling project that brings the most significant return on your investment is your kitchen.”

Think about when people view a potential new property; the one room everyone eagerly anticipates the kitchen. On any TV home improvement shows, the kitchen is regularly the focal point.

The kitchen is the place that makes everyone feel at home, just think about any family party that has taken place in someone’s house. Where does everyone gravitate to – the kitchen! The kitchen is no guarantee of success; it needs proper planning and an intelligent, creative designer.

Unlike other rooms, a kitchen cannot be designed with form over function; your kitchen needs to look great while performing a vital role.

Invest In A Professional Designer

When it comes to creating the kitchen of your dreams, it is imperative that you invest in a good designer that understands the complexities of kitchen design. After all, it’s not just the placement of the cabinets or appliances that need to be taken into consideration, there are electrical and plumbing factors, which need to be thought about and discussed during the planning process.

A new kitchen can transform the look and feel of the home because it is such a visual room. Although there will need to be many cabinets and appliances fitted, this merely provides more opportunity for innovation. Sit down and discuss your wants and needs with your designer. He or she should be able to come up with creative ways to utilize all of the space and provide that wow moment for your lifestyle or prospective buyers.

Lighting

Another advantage that can improve the desirability of a kitchen is a professionally designed lighting plan. A well-designed kitchen will sparkle day or night, and if you ask the majority of home buyers which room they remember most, it will nearly always be the kitchen, whether that is a positive or a negative thing.

The Cook Top and Oven

Invest in a nice looking and quality cook top and oven(s), as again this is something buyers will often pay attention to. Cook tops and ovens are the most important elements in the kitchen, but they come in many different shapes and sizes. Ensure your stove matches its surroundings and adds to the desirability of your property. When people are buying s home, they might be stretching their budget to the limit, so knowing that your property has a top quality kitchen and appliances could be just what is required to convince you or a potential buyer.

The Backsplash

The backsplash is often one of the most neglected design elements of kitchen design, and yet it doesn’t need to be expensive. In consultation with your designer come up with some complementary designs that are both creative and artistic. It is often the smaller things that leave the biggest impression, and ironically the backsplash could end up being one of the most cost-effective and striking components of your kitchen.

The kitchen is very often the busiest room in your home. It is where food is created and prepared, where many families spend the most time together. It is the place where the day begins, and quite often it is the place where memories are made.

Investing in your kitchen is indeed a shrewd and significant investment financially speaking, but it could also be argued that by spending money on your kitchen, you are also investing in your family. Take your time and enjoy the process, as a well designed and installed kitchen should last for many years, so you want to get it right first time.

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When it comes to designing your home, it stands to reason that every choice you make has an element of fashion involved in the selection. After all, you are hardly likely to buy a piece of furniture that doesn’t fit your aesthetic taste.

Lighting

The light in a room is perhaps one of the most important decisions you will ever make, regarding the design of your home. Each room will have different requirements, depending on its use, but just as importantly as the ambiance and style, you want to give for the place. In normal circumstances, you would expect the bathroom and the kitchen to require the brightest listing conditions, with the living room allowing a greater choice.

You could, for instance, go for a bright light which hangs from the ceiling, but if you wanted to change the style or ambiance of the room, you could maybe choose some freestanding up lights or install dimmers. Let’s face it every light is functional, but you can certainly make some fashion statements and style choices by carefully selecting your lighting options.

Shelving and Storage– There are a lot of different types and styles of a shelf and storage pieces, from freestanding to wall types. Shelves and storage pieces can make a fashion statement on their own, while apparently adding a significant amount of functionality in the process. Original and innovatively designed pieces can be fashionable and very functional.

Heating Choices – Perhaps the biggest choice you can make when it comes to fashion and function in your home is the heating systems. There are some simply stunning electrical fire places available on the market today. These can provide a beautiful romantic ambiance as well as generating heat for your living room. Even radiators offer you plenty of choices as there are many freestanding radiators in every design or shape you could want. By putting some thought into your decisions you and your designer can make some fashion statements even with something as functional as a heating system.

Color Choices – Color is always an essential ingredient of a fashion choice, but that doesn’t mean that it cannot have a bearing on function. Many people like to make their kitchen a bright yellow color to get them motivated and feeling great first thing in the morning. Soft greens and blues are comforting, and invite quiet time in a bedroom.

Red has been shown to have a large effect on people’s emotions, and so it would be a good idea to make use of it as an accent wall, instead of painting and entire room red.

The Kitchen – Perhaps the best way to demonstrate that function can be fashionable is in the kitchen. As fashion has changed and developed over the years, so have the designs of kitchens. They have incorporated lots of storage while adding innovation and design in the process. When a party takes place in a home, most people seem to congregate in or around the kitchen, and so the choices you make for your kitchen style will be seen by everyone. The right selection of a kitchen will demonstrate your personal style and taste while providing storage and efficiency within the kitchen.

As you can see, fashion can certainly be functional and vice versa. As with anything regarding fashion you need to decide on and plan your individual rooms and how they from one to the other. Provided you do things right you can have the best of both worlds, a fully functional home, at the height of fashion.

Need help with this? Contact Refind Interiors.

The post Function Can Be Fashionable – It Just Requires Some Thought appeared first on Refind Interiors.

How To Construct Your Budget

The first thing you need to decide on is your absolute top of the range budget and then subtract ten percent. This is important because however carefully you plan a project, there will always be unforeseen circumstances or issues that crop up. If you have fully pushed yourself to your financial limit, and then some problem arises, you leave yourself exposed, and potentially unable to complete the project.

By budgeting properly, and having a ten percent emergency fund, you ensure that barring disaster you can be totally confident in being able to finish the job you started. This may sound a little conservative, but the peace of mind this emergency budget brings is priceless.

Picking The Perfect Interior Designer Is Key

The real secret to getting the perfect result is to choose the right interior designer, but not necessarily for the reasons you might think. Obviously, you want someone with skills, talent and that artistic eye which will successfully transform your home into the vision you have for it. But a great interior designer will also respect your budget and stick to it rigidly. In the same way that you are committing your trust to them, a great designer will also work within your budget, and not try to push you to spend extra money that you don’t have. When choosing your interior designer, have an in-depth chat with them, and see if they are someone that you could form a relationship with. While you may end up as best friends for life, there needs to be an element of trust and friendship. Part of your designer’s job is to come in on or below budget, so in your initial interview, you need to draw a line in the sand and make it clear what the budget is. A good designer will not have any issue with this, as everyone likes to have a firm basis within which to work. This is where Jill shines. Refind Interiors truly cares about all of our clients and will never pressure anyone to do anything they simply cannot afford. Jill works one on one with all of our clients to make sure that anything presented fits within the budget that is placed prior to starting the project.

Use Your Carefully Prepared Budget To Your Advantage

If you have ever been in the situation where money is unusually short at the end of the month, you may have been forced to come up with innovative and intelligent ways to make the budget stretch. Because your budget is tight, you are obliged to make brave and challenging decisions, which in the long term can be beneficial to you. When it comes to interior design, the same methodology can apply. Once you have set your budget, it forces you to become more creative and inventive, and on many occasions that extra focus and attention to detail, can result in a far superior and attractive interior design project.

Interior design does not necessarily have to be exceedingly expensive, but without a firm eye on the budget, the cost has the potential to spiral out of control. By planning ahead properly, forcing yourself to have reasonable expectations and sticking to your limits, you will find the process easier and less stressful. Ironically setting a budget can be much more refreshing and empowering than burying your head in the sand. We hope you are delighted with the final result, but use a budget system properly and you might find you enjoy the entire process more than you ever thought possible.

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Encourage Natural Light To Become A Regular Visitor

For all of our technological advancements, there is nothing as beautiful as pure natural light. Any designer will always tell you that the more natural light that enters your home, the nicer the ambiance will be. Think about your curtains, ensure they cover as little of your windows as possible, don’t place furniture in front of windows to block out the light, and if privacy is an issue, consider the use of sheer or translucent window treatments, which will let in the majority of the light while providing the privacy you require.

Let In Fresh Air

I love to be wrapped up indoors and watch the rain falling, to embrace the smells of nature, and enjoy my sense of smell. Have you ever walked into a stuffy room, that hasn’t benefited from fresh air in a few days? Throw your windows open; the fresh air will be in most cases, smell beautiful and will brighten up your mood and leave you feeling fresh and energetic once again.

Embrace The Colors Of Nature In Your Decorating Choices

When most people hear this, they immediately think of earthy brown colors, but nature is so much more than that. A great blue can replicate the sky, a pleasant yellow in the kitchen can remind you of a warm sunny day, and of course, green is the color of recycling and rejuvenation. Paired with the right natural and ambient light, a crisp white room with appropriate naturally contrasting colors can produce great reactions from visitors.

Make Use Of Natural Materials

One of the best-kept secrets of interior design is that sometimes the little additions can make the biggest differences. With careful thought, a lot can be achieved with a small budget. A glass bottle filled with sand, for instance, is not high in cost, but can look beautiful, and a large seashell from the beach never goes out of fashion.

Use Natural Wood For Flooring Rather Than Man Made Alternatives

Perhaps this is an obvious suggestion, but one that can be overlooked for that very reason. Natural wood flooring looks, and feels fantastic, and if your aim is to bring the outdoors in, then this is the perfect solution.

As you can see, there are numerous ways to bring the outside in, varying in cost from free to however much you want to spend. With a little bit of thought and planning, it is relatively easy to bring the outdoors into your home. We offer a wide variety of service,s which can be seen here, that can help you achieve any look and design that you desire. Call (773) 348-7796 for a complementary consultation and find out how we can transform your living space.

The post Bringing The Outdoors In – How To Design Mother Nature Into Your Home appeared first on Refind Interiors.

If you need help setting up your apartment in Chicago, please Call us today at 773.348.7796.

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At first this task may seem too much to handle. But with the help of an interior designer, you can find your voice and get your home aligned with your personality. While your kids may play in every room of your home, it’s important to have rooms that feel adult too. Easier said than done! That’s a great reason why an outside, objective point of view can be helpful. A few simple steps such as decluttering and organizing can make a huge difference. Then think about how certain paint colors make you feel –  if a relaxed, slouchy couch fits your mood more than a sleek, modern one – or if a patterned rug distracts more than it adds.

Just remember, spring cleaning doesn’t have to mean just dishes and dust – it can also be about refreshing your house to feel like your home.

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