When you have found that perfect new home and the movers have left, in many ways the real fun begins; converting this new house into your home. There are so many ways to do this, but décor certainly plays a big part, and changing, tweaking and adding to it can be a weekend hobby that keeps you busy for weeks, months and even years. This is the first in a new series of occasional posts to offer design and décor inspiration to new homeowners who are creating their home’s identity, as well as to ‘old’ homeowners looking for a change.
Bringing the Movie Magic Home As more people spend more time entertaining at home, or simply ‘hanging out’, the concept of creating a media centre, or home theatre, in the home has grown in popularity. Not everyone has the luxury of being able to convert a basement or spare room into a dedicated home theater. In fact, more often than not, when a family decides to invest in the right audio and visual components and tech to create a home theater type set up, it has to share space in a family room or a den.
And there is nothing wrong with that. A ‘fully loaded’ family room is a wonderful thing and it has the advantage that there is already plenty of furniture in place, so that’s an extra expense spared. But it probably doesn’t feel much like a like a theater, just a living room with a really nice A/V set up. Which is a serious disappointment for some.
What most of these rooms lack is the right ambiance. Interested in adding some? You can go as simple or as complicated as you want to produce the desired cinematic effect in your home and it may not be as expensive as you think. Here are just a five ideas to consider.
Repaint with More Theatrical Colours
Richer, warmer colors like burgundy or navy blue are classic cinema colours and can be less overpowering in a home setting than you might think, especially when combined with creams, which is exactly the decor scheme you’ll find in many real movie theaters. An added advantage of using darker colors in a room with a home theatre set up is that the light does not bounce off it in the way it does off paler colors, so the picture quality on your beautiful big screen will be even better.
Rethink Your Lighting
The pre-show lighting in most movie theaters comes from sconces on the wall. As they are in fact fairly inexpensive and relatively easy to install, adding a few to your ‘movie room’ to replace a glaring overhead light would not be hard at all. Stop by your local lighting store and you’ll find dozens of different design options too, so finding lighting to match the rest of your decor should not be difficult.
Install Dimmer Switches
Staying, for a moment, on the lighting in your room, we are all familiar with the way the lights dim in the movie theater and simply by installing dimmer switches in place of standard light switches you can, to a certain extent, replicate that theatre feeling. You can even buy dimmer switches now that can be controlled via a smartphone app, allowing you to dim the lights at the right moment without ever leaving your seat.
Add Architectural Details
If you are really into the idea of theatrical décor, modern crown molding, the kind made from MDF, which can basically be so easy to install it can be fixed on the walls with adhesives, has a lot to offer to help. You can add cinema style architectural details such as wall moldings, ceiling medallions and even columns and pillars quickly and easily and the effect can be truly Hollywood worthy.
Rearrange the Seating
While you probably do not want to swap your comfy couches and chairs for cinema seating in a family room that does have other purposes, you can rearrange it for the optimal viewing experience. In a real movie theatre all of the seating obviously directly faces the screen and so rearranging at least some of your seating to do the same will both add movie theater ambiance and improve your viewing experience.