Spring home decorating ideas from our 2023 Trends

Spring is the perfect time to freshen up your home in so many ways, from decluttering to setting intentions as to what you want from your home this year. In this ultimate guide to refreshing your home décor in spring, we come at it from two angles: colour and materials.

We’re also tying all this goodness into our Trends for 2023/2024: making the best bits of what’s shining in the arts and culture accessible for everyone.

Contents:

• Setting intentions for your home
• Pastel rooms for a sweet like sugar vibe
• Green reigns supreme
• Colour blocking for bedrooms
• Materials and finishes for romantic homes
• Vintage furniture mix and match

Setting intentions for what you want your home to be this year

There’s no need to completely remodel your home: we explore big impact changes alongside small tweaks that even people renting a property can implement to haul some fresh optimism into their interiors.

The first step in deciding what decorative accessories you want and what colour choices you love or hate… is to get clear on what you need from your home in the first place. Not only will this pause make you feel inspired, but it can also give you an opportunity to add some luxury to your home and make it a more relaxing place to be in.

To get intentional about your interior decor, ask yourself these 5 questions:

1. What do I value most in my life?
2. How will the things I buy, keep and display reflect those values?
3. What kind of activities happen in my house? For example – anything from cooking daily dinners to having friends over to hang out, from quiet reading to boisterous playing with the kids. Don’t forget to include working from home, if you’re doing that, and any hobbies too!
4. What kind of colours, textures and patterns move me emotionally?
5. If a friend were coming over for coffee or tea right now, what would they find if they walked into my living room or bedroom?

Read more about intentional home decoration.

We recommend using Pinterest for ideas on how certain rooms might look with different styles or colours so that when it comes time for actual shopping/decorating you have an idea of what you like. Plus, if you’re finding a full décor overhaul overwhelming, why not just focus on one piece of furniture or even just one sofa’s cushions?

Update your interiors with soft colours for a dreamy, gently welcoming home

You can make your interiors a bubble of softness through clever use of colour, materials, and light. You can relax the tone of a room by exploring colours, lighting, decorative accessories, kitchen appliances and soft furnishings, no matter what your budget.

The focus must lie on colour if you’re set out to achieve that light, fresh spring morning feeling. Think about giving your wooden furniture a soothing coat of seafoam blue, paint a bookcase coral, or refit your door panels in pale yellow.

We’re seeing swathes of blush pink and dreamy pastel sheers everywhere we go, but with a definite pivot towards sophistication, with touches of grey here and there, almost like a limestone finish. It’s as if pastels have grown up: they’re not so basic. We’re seeing an evolving pastel colour family, where the earthy tones of parma and terra combined with a teal green or cloud blue evokes the atmosphere of an elegant Italian Palacio.

And this evolution of colour leads us to our top colour suggestion: go green.

Top tip: go green in your rooms with the Oublié trend

While to some people ‘soft mood’ interiors bring up images of pastels only, springtime interiors aren’t just all pink-on-pink. Sage green, pistachio green and uplifting mint green are all showing no signs of going away, nor should they (they’re fabulous!).

In the last few years, we’ve noticed that green is hugely popular globally, and according to 1stDibs's insiders, this green trend is expected to continue in 2023. According to their annual Interior Design Trends survey, emerald green is their most popular colour yet again.

Emerald snagged the most recent survey’s highest colour spot with 23%, followed closely by earthy sage (22%), burnt orange (20%), mustard yellow (20%), and cobalt blue (18%).

“This is the third year in a row that the number one colour is emerald. When a trend shows signs of great resilience, we think it ceases to be a trend and crosses into the realm of design classic or icon.” - Anthony Barzilai Freund, 1stDibs’s editorial director, in Architectural Digest.

Joa Studholme, the renowned colour expert from Farrow & Ball, also pointed out the growing popularity of their deep, moody greens, such as Green Smoke. It’s an exciting time to be colour obsessed. We see these deep colours everywhere in one of our leading trend themes for 2023/2024: Oublié.

Quick Trends peek: even though all of our trend themes flow into each other, Oublié reflects our turn inward to a contemplative, almost mystic place. In a hybrid aesthetic language between past and present, it's defined by grandiose, dark styling and deep, jewel tone colours like emerald, green, peacock blue and garnet red. Here is a world of gilded designs, metallic accents, stained glass, and the lustre of candles.

Colour blocking for zesty bedroom interiors

With such a range of colour at our fingertips, let’s talk colour blocking! It’s a technique that was born in the world of fashion, and it’s burst onto the interior design scene in a big way.

It’s by far our favourite springtime update, and it’s stunning. So how does it work? Let’s look at 3 ideas for working with colour blocking techniques in your bedroom style:

1. Paint an accent wall in a bright colour and use blocks of a darker colour for the bed frame and side tables
2. Use a single colour on the walls and then use blocks of other colours and textures for the furniture and accessories
3. Use blocks of colour on the ceiling to create a dynamic and interesting look

The great thing about using furniture rather than paint to create a colour-blocked look is that it doesn’t feel as permanent. If you tire of the colour, it’s likely to feel easier to swap out a sofa than to redecorate your entire living room. Read more: Colour Blocking: how to make this bold trend work in your home.

Creating soothing interiors in spring with materials and finishes

With the right combination of materials and finishes, you can create an open, romantic interior design concept that reflects your personal style. To create an accessible, romantic interior design concept, pay attention to the materials and finishes you’re working with.

Bringing in natural elements to a room, such as potted plants, woven baskets, and natural wood furniture can provide a calming and soothing atmosphere.

What other materials are rising stars right now?

• Natural materials and finishes, like driftwood and shell
• Handformed materials with deep tradition in craftsmanship, like terracotta and lacquer, are rooted in Durability, one of our key trend themes for 2023/2024
• Did we just say natural wood furniture? Handworked wood in all beautiful, natural shades from caramel to camel.
• Flowers, flowers everywhere. Introducing ferns, orchids, and bromeliads, can help to bring a sense of peace and serenity.

Durability is one of our Trends themes of 2023/2024. You feel in your hands, following the creation of an artisan object from the rough irregularities of raw wood down to the smoothed out, finished feel in an exquisitely crafted piece.

Regarding texture, adding comfortable seating options, such as sofas and armchairs, in soft, cuddly textures, helps create a soothing space too. Because sofa fabrics are available in lots of different colours and patterns as well as textures, they’re an easy pathway into updating your entire space.

3 more tips for exploring soft textures in your interior

• Choose to add small touches of colour to your living room with just this one change.
• Try mixing and matching different fabrics on your sofa cushions too as well as colour combinations—you might be surprised at how much they complement each other.
• Updating decorative accessories like cushions or throws can feed into your colour blocking ideas too!

Our final spring décor idea: go vintage

Our last tip this springtime is to mix vintage furniture with modern pieces for an eclectic, personal space. Creating a new mood like this in your home is something that Pinterest calls the “hipstoric home trend,” and they’ve noticed that Boomers and Gen Z are searching for new ways to honour vintage and inherited pieces in their homes.

Incorporate vintage furniture into the room with a few select pieces that add warmth and charm, such as an antique armchair, a mid-century side table, or a vintage rug.

Mixing your existing modern furniture with vintage pieces can add a layer of visual interest and depth to a room that it didn’t have before. To further emphasise the vintage look, you could use muted colours such as green and blue, or incorporate vintage floral patterns.

“Comfort is a key quality here—reassurance, familiarity, a feel-good aspect like bringing up a smile seeing it or touching it,” says Gemma Riberti, head of interiors at international trend forecasting agency WGSN – Elle Decor

Our 2 top suggestions for decorating with vintage furniture

1. If you’re lucky enough to be in the position: do a sweep in the attic or garage for any inherited pieces you have lying around. Your granddad’s cut crystal retirement clock, for example, or your great aunt’s sewing machine table. It's not just about personalising your style though; having unique pieces makes your home feel more interesting too!
2. No inherited pieces? No problem! Vintage furniture and decorative objects are often sold at auctions so keep an eye out for them there if you're lucky enough to live somewhere where these happen regularly. Or pop into your local second-hand shops or flea markets: people will often sell off their old stuff when they're moving house and trying to make room. You never know what you might find!

The future of home design could be based on old-fashioned craftsmanship. This idea of looking backwards at craftsmanship and heritage is huge for us in our 2023/2024 trends.

Quick Trends peek: Tradition is the trend that combines traditional objects and aesthetics into a frothy, exciting cocktail of fashion and interior. Here we explore worlds of rounded shapes and chic, modern, milky colours, contrasted with artisan products such as terracotta and lacquer, which are bound through craftmanship and tradition. This theme is distinctive through its celebration of different kinds of wood in all beautiful, natural shades from ivory to amber.

At the Fuorisalone event (aka Milan Design Week) in 2022, there were many pieces of art made by people from around the world that showed off traditional techniques. Explore more: 5 juicy colour and texture trends from Milan Design Week that are still with us now.

Spring décor updates never looked so easy

The most important thing is to take your time and assess what you have in front of you. Even small changes can make your home a more inviting space, and that’s certainly worth doing. By taking inspiration from the latest interior trends, you can completely change the look and feel of your home whatever the season or occasion. What’s more, spring is a great time to do it before the warmer months hit full swing.

You don’t have to do all these techniques at once, of course, but you’re totally allowed to if you want to just go for it. If you’re still wondering what you can do to brighten up your space without a huge financial commitment, start by making some adjustments to colour and materials.

Explore the trend themes mentioned here in our full Trends website.