Whether you live in a home in Boston or an apartment in Portland, it’s clear that summer is quickly turning into fall: the temperatures are cooler, leaves are beginning to sport different colors and the days are growing significantly shorter. While we welcome this time of year for a number of obvious reasons, the changing of the seasons can also provide an opportunity to give the décor in your apartment a fresh, new face.
Read on to find tips for transitioning your apartment’s décor from summer to fall.
1. Keep it clean
Spring shouldn’t be the only time when your apartment gets a deep and thorough cleaning. So before you settle onto your couch for the remainder of the season, make sure to clear out the cobwebs so you have a fresh, clean space to hunker down into during winter.
A clean space is best accompanied by fall foliage. Katie Teel, principal designer of Tulsa-based Teel Spaces Interior Design and Renovations recommends “swapping out the stems of your favorite vase to dried hydrangea blooms, daylily branches, or store purchased leaf foliage.”
2. Focus on color
During the spring and summer, we tend to decorate with bright colors like turquoise, yellow and coral and use lightweight fabrics like linen and cotton, but this décor scheme doesn’t tend to fly in the cooler months. So update your apartment’s décor by swapping out these accents for darker, fall-appropriate earth tones.
Troye Williams with Prestige Home Decor suggests swapping “light, airy fabrics for warm, textured throws and cushions in rich autumn hues like burnt orange, deep reds, and browns.”
3. Souped up
It’s no secret that cool-season foods are some of the best reasons for the changing season. Soups, stews and pies bring us the requested smells of fall: warm, spicy and savory. So if you look forward to cooking during this time of year, make sure your pantry is stocked with ingredients so you can whip up your fall favorites in no time.
4. Scentsational
Alternatively, if your culinary skills aren’t quite up to par but you still enjoy the scents of fall, you can create your own home fragrance to fill up your apartment with a warm and cozy aroma. Bring a cup of apple cider and a cup of water to a simmer in a small saucepan on your stove. Toss in a tablespoon of ground cinnamon and a few cloves and before you know it, your home will be filled with a spicy, apple pie fragrance.
5. Lighten up
With the daylight hours getting shorter and shorter every day, you’ll want to keep things bright inside your apartment by turning up the lighting. Setting up mood lighting is one of the easiest ways to make your apartment feel warm and cozy, whether you’re having a dinner party with friends and neighbors or just settling in for a night of reading.
Owner and principal designer of Anna Gray Designs, Kristin Parr recommends switching to “warmer, softer light bulbs or adding candles to create a cozy ambiance.”
Additionally, Anne Miller of Miller House suggests using light fixtures such as “lamps and sconces” and to “make sure your light bulbs emit a warm light (2700k-3000k) instead of cooler, white lights.”
6. Introduce layers
Transitioning from summer to fall means welcoming layers. From sweaters to blankets, fall is truly a season to sink into a cozy aesthetic accompanied by pumpkin spice lattes and slow mellow songs.
Hannah French with interior design studio and home décor shop, The Highpoint House, states, “It’s time to break out the texture by using woven blankets, baskets, comfortable throw pillows, and seasonal décor pieces.”
7. Nature calls
If you don’t want to spend a lot of money on purchasing fall décor, simply turn to the outdoors for inspiration. Take a leisurely stroll around your neighborhood or in a local park and see what the season brings you.
What better way to immerse in the fall season than by tapping into your childhood adventures? With heat waves ending and leaves changing, Marilou Stones of Stones Design suggests embracing “the joy of running through a pile of leaves with a bit of chill in the air.”