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7 Ideas to Make Your Spare Bedroom & Guest Room Beautiful
Galvanise that guest room glow up
By | 2 years ago
The spare bedroom needn’t be the sideshow. With tips and tricks from Antique expert and creative polymath Benedict Foley, we’ll get your spare bedroom looking beautiful once more.
7 Decoration Ideas to Make Your Spare Bedroom Beautiful
Image courtesy of The Lacquer Company
Benedict Foley’s Ideas for Spare Bedrooms
‘Crank up your guest rooms. I know in reality they may be the place where boxes go to live before being recycled or more usually decorated with drying laundry, but no one needs to know that! You want your guests to have a good time, so amuse and entertain them with quirky finds from the auction. It makes a much better conversation starter than who’s doing the washing up! I love things like portrait miniatures – a good looking or amusing face never goes amiss. A couple of small tables by the bed, a chair or two for people to lay their clothes out, a couple of prints in antique frames on the walls – you can buy inexpensive and charming things, but if you’ve considered the basics your guests will feel much more considered by turn!’
Benedict Fowley, a-prin.com, @a.prin.art
Here are 7 Hot Hacks to Galvanise That Guest Room
Accent Chairs For the Win
If you’re needing to cocoon a spare room: look no further than adding an accent chair. Lifting up the drabbest of dark corners, the accent chair adds a warm mood, and an opportunity for your guest to sit and read (why not also add a side table or magazine rack for good measure?).
Campbell-Rey, The Fabrizia Cocktail Chair, The Invisible Collection, theinvisiblecollection.com
Side Tables Are No Sideshow
Side tables are the difference between a nice guest room, and a gorgeous guest room. Not to be underestimated: the side table is the perfect place to support an accent chair, tray and space for books, magazines, and you can flank the bed either side, for a nice bit of symmetry styling.
Original Pair of 1970s Meret Oppenheim Traccia Tables, Gavina, Italy, 1st Dibs, 1stdibs.com
Two Single Spare Beds? Think Symmetrical
There’s nothing more satisfying than a bit of mirroring in a spare bedroom. And since it’s rarely used day in day out, you can afford to be more playful with it all. A matching set of patterned covers, from Alice Palmer, is never a bad idea.
Image: Instagram/ @alicepalmerco
Display with a Tray
Trays make both the perfect accent to a side table and beautifully frame a Roberts Radio. They also happen to be helpful if your guest would rather like breakfast in bed, mind you.
10 of the Most Beautifully British Trays
Medium Belles Rives Tray, The Lacquer Company. Image courtesy of The Lacquer Company
Hang Prints in Pairs, or Threes
A few prints hanging side by side always shows a bit of care, and will elevate any wall to please the eye. Check out the best places to buy affordable art, and our online antiques round up for the best places to buy.
Boxwood Interiors, Houston, Brunschwig & Fils wallpaper and ‘garden folly’ art pieces, marymaguireart.com
Image: Mary Maguire, Instagram: @marymaguire
Get Bookish
Leaving a few books strewn about the spare room is always nice for guests to pick up.
Image: Instagram/@sean_antony_pritchard
Always Amuse
Moments that pique curiosity, that stir a bit of humour, never go amiss. We’re taking our cue from this S&P cushion for starters.
Salt & Pepper Cushion, Harriet Says Hi, £195, Glassette, glassette.com
Get Experimental with Wallpaper
The guest room is your canvas for creativity, because you’ll never spend day in, day out there, and you’re guests will never realistically be there for more than a couple of nights, so why not take the opportunity to be bold with some maximalist Morris & Co Blackthorn Wallpaper?
Blackthorn Wallpaper, £119, Morris & Co, morrisandcosandersondesigngroup.com
