Sometimes furniture stores can be intimidating. From beautiful chandeliers to rustic wooden dining tables, every piece you may lay eyes on may seem worth the buy; where by the end of it, you’ll find yourself way past your budget. It may not seem surprisingly, but these simple tricks make you stay within the price range that you wish to stay in. Don’t let the pretty lights and vintage desks fool you! Here’s a list of simple tips and unique techniques that helps you moderate yourself with your decor.
Customize Your Items
When it comes to ‘custom made items’, we tend to automatically think ‘pricey and lavish’. Custom made, can also be explained as ‘for you, made by you, appreciated by you’. For example cutting different pieces of fabric or even wallpaper, and sticking them onto boring/bland book covers can really illuminate your bookshelves. With multiple designs that catch your eye you can find affordable rolls of beautiful fabrics starting from 10AED onwards, with rolls and rolls of beautifully designed pieces that may seem never ending. You can find these products in Satwa, Dubai (where there are way more cool items that will leave you in shock). It gets better, you can feel free to splurge as much as you like! Go crazy! Every roll will provide you with more than enough fabric to brighten up your whole house, and will definitely last you a couple months, so there will be no need to keep going back.
Keep it Limited
It’s all about what meets the eye. All those shiny new pieces you see at the furniture stores look absolutely stunning, but remember you’ll be buying each individual piece yourself. By the end of it, you’re left with a bill longer than you would have imagined, without even realizing. Strolling without making a list of exactly what you need will literally be the exact reason why all the money goes on furniture. Keeping it limited initiates ‘shopping your home’/ going around your house and seeing exactly what bothers you. What piece do you need to buy to fill up this area? Is this the right mirror you need, or should you reconsider? Once a list has been made of every single individual piece you need, it tends to minimize the splurge, and keeps it at a good limit that will feel you leaving satisfied and achieved.
Not All That Clutter is Cold
It’s as simple as that. Remember that room where you’ve kept all your junk? Or that basement that has boxes piled up, and seems to just be getting bigger and bigger the more that time goes by? There’s your goldmine. Spend a good couple of hours purely devoted to being creative with this so called, ‘junk’. Not only will you prevent wasting these secret items, but you won’t need to spend a dime (unless of course, you want to put add-ons). From clothes, to old wooden pieces, literally anything will work if you make it. Buy some new paints and some gold leaf, and start getting to work! For example, broken frames can be a great way of applying a smooth angle on a bookshelf. Paint that with vibrant colours and add on some gold leaf, and you’ll have a decorative piece that would probably cost you a full furniture set in a shop. Old bottles can be used as candle holders by filling it to the rim with wax on the outside, leaving enough space on the inside to support the candle. Once you really put your mind to it, ideas will keep coming leaving you surprised.
Second Hand Shopping
We all know that this may not sound like the most luxurious ideas, but that can truly be arguable with shopping second hand. Number one rule- make sure you check the piece you’re interested in buying at least 5 times before you actually buy it. You can never be too sure whether it’ll last you long enough, but at least it will fill the space temporarily. In other cases (if you’re lucky), brand new pieces will be on display, simply because it was the previous owners wrong buy. For more than half the price you could find beautiful dining room sets, to garden attire, to a bunch of table lamps. For example, garage sales and various regional websites often display numerous amounts of beautifully maintained furniture pieces and decorative structures for prices that would shock you.
Take Your Time
Usually when we go furniture shopping, we tend to over-buy. Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither will your house. Buying a few pieces at a time may seem like there’s no fun in it, but as the years go by your house will become a home without you even realising. Taking your time with decorating is one of the key factors to a beautiful home. Prioritizing a room, and focusing only on that room for the time being will make furniture shopping a lot cheaper. The best way to know what you need is by living in it. Adapt to the room that you’re in, and feel the space around you.
Give it a go and try any or all of these tricks and let us know in the comments section which of these tricks did you like the most; or whether you have a couple of tricks of your own that you would like to share with us.
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