As illustrated in our interior design trend report, styling your home in a flashback theme is definitely in. Decorating your home using old pieces is not only good for the environment, it’s good for your home too. Mixing the old and the new brings an element of class to your home and adds a sense of maturity that’ll be tough for others to replicate. Here are vintage décor ideas that’ll ensure you have a home that shows off your personality to the fullest.
Décor ideas to refresh your interior
•What’s trending right now is turning old lights or standing cameras into lamp shades for your living room.
•Stack up old suitcase trunks to be used as a centerpiece in a hallway, a living room coffee table or old brief cases for a bedroom nightstand.
•Take vintage tin signs and decorate your walls with them.
•Use chipped china teacups as book holders on a bookshelf or as door stoppers.
•Make statements with antique tiles, by incorporating them as splash backs in your kitchen or use them as an accent in a living room wall to give it the unfinished look.
•Use apothecary bottles and jars to store sweets or cookies in the kitchen or your toothbrushes in the bathroom.
•Add accents around your home, by placing vintage items like old funnels that can be used to hold candles and place them on coffee tables or book shelves, or use old pitchers as vases to place flowers inside.
How to pull off your vintage décor ideas
Now to get down to the shopping. Analyze the room you want to incorporate vintage stylings into, in terms of the space you have available. Always, and I mean always take measurements with you when buying furniture and don’t forget to think about the space you have to work with. You don’t want to be stuck with a piece of furniture that’ll make you feel claustrophobic.
If you want to make this a full on project and you’re good with your hands, head on down to a second hand shop and buy beautiful pieces that may need your special touch, ask your hubby for help if need be. Remember, you\’re trying to style your home to look like no one else’s.
Be vigilant when buying old furniture
Always be on the lookout for imperfections in furniture. Yes, you are buying an item that has seen a lot of mileage, but that doesn’t mean you should take on something that could fray in no time. Look out for woodworm, small holes in the wood is a clear sign there’s something making the furniture its home.
How to tie all your vintage décor ideas together
When tying it all together, keep an open mind, you don’t want your house to look like a museum. Achieving an authentic vintage look is about harmonizing and creating cohesion in the room. A great tip is to leave spots open for you to breathe and your eye not to be overwhelmed.
Painting the vintage piece in the room the same colour as the walls is another great way to tie the room together, or choose one vintage piece to act as the focal point and keep everything else minimal. Also remember that you may have your eye on a specific piece, but when it comes to vintage, some things are hard to come by, adapt to what you have available and remember collecting takes time.
Visit these shops and markets to get your hands on your next prized antique collection:
•Milnerton Flea Market (Cape Town)
•Rosebank Sunday Market (Johannesburg)
•Bellbottoms (Pretoria)
•Vamp Furniture (Cape Town)
•Antiek Fabriek (Centurion)
•The Irene Village Market (Centurion)
•Hey Jude’s Antiques Barn (Durban)
•Amatuli Artefacts (Johannesburg)
•Vintage Ideas Market (Cape Town)
(Search for more at the antiques directory)
Thanks to the versatility of our window film designs, we can accommodate your vintage decorating flair.
Choose from our designs or bring your own, we’d love to see what vintage window film designs you can come up with.
