Interior Design Ideas: Bengal by Design

While some states boast of majestic palaces, West Bengal boasts of centuries old colonial bungalows with central courtyards. Along with this style of architecture, Bengal is also known to be one of the few places in India to find authentic classical rosewood furniture. Here are a few other interior design tips from Bengal.

Colours

From the red and white sarees to the big red bindi on a Bengali woman’s forehead, no colour speaks of Bengal like a bright red. Red is a bold colour so it isn’t very well suited to being a dominant colour except in kitchen designs. Consider an accent wall in red or red accents to introduce this colour to your living room designs.

Rosewood furniture

As mentioned at the start of this article, West Bengal or more specifically, Kolkata, is one of the few places in India where you can still find authentic carved rosewood furniture. The beauty of carved rosewood furniture is that often just a singular piece is all you need to make a statement. Consider a beautiful four poster bed as part of your bedroom design or an easy chair with a side table that will sit well in any room.

Books

Bengalis are known for their love of literature and poetry. When working on the interior design of your home translate this love for literature to using books in your décor. Coffee table books are ideal ways to dress up a coffee table and simultaneously show off your passions. Frame a calligraphic print of your favourite poem or a passage from a treasured story as art for your bedroom décor.

Fabrics

When speaking of fabrics in India, Bengal is best known for its crisp cottons. This beautifully woven fabric can ideally be used as home linen and curtains to protect your privacy without making the room décor feel heavy. Kantha is a traditional Bengali style of embroidery. While you could use kantha embellished bedspreads to complete your bedroom design, it can also be used in the form of cushion covers and table linen in the living room.

Dhokra

Dhokra is the art of creating brass artifacts using a lost wax casting technique. Dhokra is named after the Dhokra Damar tribes of West Bengal who specialize in it. Stand dhokra figurines on their own as curios or frame slimmer figurines on a silk background to create art for your walls.

Alpana

What is known as rangoli throughout the rest of India is called Alpana in Bengal. Alpana is generally white though sometimes green and red motifs are also included in the design. If you’re looking at a different type of rangoli to decorate your home this Diwali, consider an Alpana at your entrance. 

How to Design a Bedroom That Grows With Children

Children outgrow their room décor almost as fast as they outgrow their clothes. This gives themed children’s bedrooms a very short life. Some things are unavoidable like changing a baby crib for a bigger bed. However, making a few smart choices right at the beginning can save you from emptying your pockets and having to change the entire room’s décor as your child grows.

Neutral Base

Though your six year old daughter might love her pink walls right now, she might not feel the same way in a few years. To save yourself from having to repaint the bedroom every few years stick to a neutral colour palette for the walls. To balance this practicality with your child’s wants, consider highlighting an accent wall in his or her choice of colour.

Timeless Furniture

Furniture for children can be extremely cute to look at but very expensive to buy especially when you know that in a year or two your child might not fit into it or like it a lot. When choosing furniture for children’s rooms pick pieces that are timeless in terms of style. Two must have pieces are a sturdy bed – that can withstand kids bouncing on it and a comfortable armchair- for you to sit in and read to your child.

Storage  

When things don’t have a place of their own, a kid’s room is bound to get chaotic. Even as a toddler, there are a number of things your child will need. Invest in storage from the very beginning while designing a bedroom for your child. Along with built in storage like cabinets, storage is also something to consider while buying furniture.

Accessorize

Accessories are the ideal way toad character to a child’s room. To brighten up a kids room think bright and playful curtains, bed linen, cushions, rugs etc. These are easy to change as your child grows older and won’t hurt your budget.

Think Short Term

Though the bedroom design for your child might begin with a neutral base, it does not have to be boring. Decals are great temporary solutions to letting your child have his or her favourite TV characters as part of their room décor. Temporary fabric wallpaper is also a décor solution that allows a child’s room to change as he or she grows older.

Think beyond the princess or superhero theme for your little one’s bedroom design. Incorporate their thoughts and preferences when designing their room. Channel their demands to a bedroom design that will grow with them.

18 Nursery Design Ideas for Girls

There’s more to designing a girl’s bedroom than pink walls and princess themes. Her bedroom design should be cheerful and fun to interact with, while at the same time echo her tastes and personality.  Here are a few design ideas to inspire you.

Add Colour… Lots of it

Children love colour. That said, this tip applies to decor accents and not the room’s colour scheme. Colourful accents liven up a space and add energy to the room. 

Create Hideaways

Kids love little nooks and hideaways. The easiest way to create a cozy corner as a part of your daughter’s bedroom design is by curtaining off an area. A cute mini tent gives the additional feeling of camping indoors. 

Stick it on

Washi tape, decals or simple card paper cut outs with blue tack: the best part about them is that they’re temporary. Use them to decorate doors, switchboards or even create an accent wall. If you’ve hesitated about fulfilling your little girl’s decor demands, this might be the perfect solution for you. 

Monograms

“Mine” becomes an important word in every little girl’s vocabulary. To give her a feeling of ownership with her room consider a monogram to ornament the door to her room. Creating one is easy and there are a million ways to make a unique monogram. Try these out for your next weekend DIY project. 

Dress Up The Bed

The obvious focal point of a bedroom is the bed. There are a number of custom designs available to suit a little girl’s preferences but they don’t come cheap. The alternative is the dress up a regular bed to fit in with your little one’s current favourite theme. From DIY headboards to bed skirts and canopies, whatever you choose is sure to please both you and her. 

Be Whimsical

You get to be a kid only once in a lifetime. Leave all the seriousness outside the door when it comes to a girl’s bedroom design. Get playful with hooks and hangers and reinvent toys to fit in with the decor. 

Top 7 Interior Design Ideas in Lush Green

The colour green symbolizes life, balance and sustainability. From leaf green to emerald green, every interior designer in India has a shade they favour for home interiors. In an interior design colour scheme, green can be beautifully used as a primary, secondary or even accent colour. Green pairs well with most colours and here are our top seven colours to use with green in a residential interior colour scheme.

Green and Blue 

Green and blue is a colour combination that works in bedrooms as well as living and dining rooms. Pairing green with pastel or aqua blue can give the room a fresh appeal while pairing green with a darker shade of blue makes the room look rich and sophisticated. 

Green and Brown

To give your home decor a natural look, there’s no better colour scheme than green and brown. Both colours are iconic of natural flora. When decorating with green and brown vary shades and textures to add depth to the room. 

Green and Pink

Pink is often looked at as a feminine colour and suited only to a little girl’s bedroom design. Green and pink however, is a fun, flirty colour scheme that is well suited to children’s bedrooms as a well as guest rooms and foyers. 

Green and Red

Green and red are festive colours ideal for the December festive season coming up. The colours are cheerful and make a room feel cosy and lively. Accent it with a neutral colour to give it a classic appeal or metallic tones to make it look more contemporary. 

Green and Yellow

Greens and yellows are the colours of happiness and sunshine. A room decorated in this colour scheme not only looks bright but also looks bigger and more spacious. 

Green and Black

Green and black is a classic colour scheme that is suited to both public and private spaces in a home. A green and black room looks elegant and luxurious. Along with metallic tones, pops of yellow, orange and peach also work well as highlighter colours. 

Green and White

Green and White is another classic colour combinations for home interiors. This interior colour scheme is fresh, bright and young. From large rooms to small rooms, a green and white colour scheme works well with all rooms. 

7 Ways to Have Fun While Designing Your Home

No matter what your design style may be, designing home interiors should always be fun! The best interior design plan for a home is one where you feel most comfortable. There are two parts to every interior design plan; the practical and the personal. For a change look past the practical, be whimsical and indulge in a little childhood fantasy living to keep you young at heart.

Be Bold

When it comes to designing children’s rooms, we’re not afraid of colour so why then by vary of it when designing the rest of the house. Painting each wall a different colour might be a little extreme but a bold accent wall, a bright wall mural and fresh and colourful cushions can infuse life into a room. To go a step further, place a bold piece of furniture as a statement piece.

Swing by

Swings are most favoured section of every playground but they don’t always need to be only outdoors. Be playful with your décor by incorporating a swing as part of your seating plan. Apart from a cosy swing in the bedroom, you could choose to have a swing as seating for your dining table, a hammock for the study or even side tables hung like swings.

Play Hide and Seek

What do The Chronicles of Narnia, Harry Potter and The Secret Garden have in common? Apart from being on almost every child’s list of favourite books, they all talk about secret doors and hidden spaces. Even as adults we’re intrigued by hidden spaces so why not include it as part of your interior design. Use the space under your staircase to create a tiny yet cosy room or camouflage a door as a bookcase or a display case to hide the room it opens out to.

Think Quirky

Sofas and armchairs are what every house has but what do you have that makes your home different? Take a look at your furniture and think about how you can make it pop. It could be a single DIY painted chair at the head of the table, a patchwork upholstered sofa or if you wanted something designer-made, a faceted sideboard.

Put Up a Sign

The sound of laughter is the easiest way to make a house feel warm. From framed “house rules” to funny “beware of dog” and bathroom signs, there are a number of ways to add humor to your home’s interior design.  As part of your kitchen design or bathroom design consider a whiteboard or chalkboard as a stage for the “family joke of the day”.

Be FunKtional

Every sofa needs a side table and every chest of drawers needs drawer handles but do you really have to choose from only the run of the mill selection? Think out of the box. Can a stack of books become a sidetable? Can the leftovers of your grandmother’s cutlery set or rocks you brought back from your last holiday become drawer pulls that tell a story?  

Show off Your Collections

For a child, one of the most important rules of designing a bedroom is that there must be plenty of space for him or her to show off a prized collection of butterflies, stamps, rocks and dolls. As adults, we still collect things. While some people collect matchboxes and pub coasters, others collect tea sets and sea shells. Whatever be your collection, don’t hide it away in a box. Design a way to include it as part of your home décor and watch it become a conversation starter.

So have fun decorating your home. Break the rules and best of all know that Interior Design has no unbreakable rules. 

How to Design a Guest Bedroom

If you aren’t planning to visit someone this holiday season, chances are high that your home is going to be playing host to family and friends. To design a warm guest bedroom it is essential to balance hotel style presentation with home styled comfort. Often a guest room starts out as an unused extra room in the house. Placing a bed and a few knick knacks in an empty room isn’t enough to create a warm guest room. Here are a few design tips to make your overnight guests feel comfortable in your home.

Pleasing to the eye: Pleasing to the Heart

Like every other room the first step to designing a guest bedroom is to choose a colour palette. Pick gender neutral colours that are warm and cheerful. Yellow & grey and blue & white are two of the most popular colour schemes for guest bedrooms. Avoid loud colours and keep patterns to a maximum of two or three in the room.

Love Overflows When Everything Else Doesn’t

Expecting guests to live out of a suitcase is fine only if they’re literally staying overnight. For guests staying longer, plan plenty of storage in the room. A wardrobe, dresser and bed side tables are essentials. To go a step further, place a tray in the bathroom dedicated to toiletries.

There’s More to Guestroom Furniture Than a Bed

Your guest may want to do more in the room than lie in bed. When space permits, plans a desk and chair in the room. For smaller rooms, place an easy chair with a peg table in a corner. Also plan a bench or trunk at the foot of the bed for your guest to place extra bedding at night. Lastly, when choosing a size for the bed, don’t forget about the bedside tables.

Spread Light and Laughter

Planning an efficient light scheme is very important in a guest room. Along with ambient lights, wall mounted or table mounted bedside lights are essential for guest bedrooms. If possible incorporate dimmers to your lights so that your guest can adjust the lighting to their preference. Along with designing a light scheme also design a way to control the natural light coming in from windows etc. The easiest design solution if to layer sheers against blackout curtains.

The Pleasure of Staying Entertained

Even your closest friends will want a little time for themselves while they’re your guests. When designing a guest room, consider entertainment as one of the elements of the room. Apart from a television, you could include a bookcase with current bestsellers, a magazine rack and a jigsaw puzzle or two if your guests have children.

Plug In for Happiness

Today, a phone isn’t the only gadget that needs charging. When designing the electrical layout for a guest room, plan multiple plug points that are preferably near the bed. If you’re using an extension cord, run all wires along the wall to eliminate the chances of having your guest trip over the wires.

Lastly, to complete the room, mount a framed art piece above the bed. You don’t want your guests to be constantly reminded of your presence so avoid photographs in the room unless your guest in included in the frame.