Princeton Happenings

Interior Decorating Tips for Couples:

Recently, my husband and I sat down to discuss making over our bedroom from floor to ceiling. Like every woman, the wheels start turning on what colors, fabrics, and shiny new things we can get. I can already see the room coming together when he wakes me from my daydream and starts telling me his ideas. OH NO! I am slowly envisioning this man cave with sports memorabilia and other manly things throughout the room. This can’t happen! It will be horrible! I won’t be able to sleep! What will I do?!

I started to think about the simple things that we could most likely agree on easily and asked for his input. “So, what color were you thinking for the walls?” His quick reply was like music to my ears: “Oh, something neutral. What do you think would be a good color?” I mentioned gray and he seemed to be intrigued, so we looked at a few gray samples, one of which we both agreed would work- so on the walls it went.

Now for accent colors, which I originally dreamt would be teal, yellow, or both. So again I asked what he thought about those colors. I did get a little resistance, so I waited and then slowly introduced a few teal accents to the room. He didn’t like them, so I took them back to the store and purchased something yellow. I couldn’t wait for him to decide on a color he would prefer, so I figured I would give him some visuals of my idea. That worked like a charm, so now we have gray walls with yellow accents… and a little teal!

The bigger challenge was going to be incorporating his taste in bedroom furniture with mine. So off to the furniture stores we went – and those trips were painful! What he liked, I didn’t, and what I liked was too expensive. I started to do a little searching on line and, as I found things, I would print them out. I tried to print things that were a hint of what he liked and more affordable so he could see I was paying attention to his ideas and concerns. Once we were able to bring those photos of furniture into the room, it made it a bit easier to decide on the style and color that would be best.

I pretty much ended up with exactly what I envisioned for the room, without him ever feeling like I pushed it on him and he had no say.

So here are some tools I used to do it:

1. Have a specific budget
2. Ask for input and ideas
3. Be open to the suggestions
4. Have specific/clear ideas to share
5. Find or ask for alternatives to ideas you aren’t keen on
6. Introduce items of your choice into the room to offer a visual
7. Figure out which design elements you can easily allow the other to make decisions on.