Tag: rented

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Art Renting

Hanging art in a rental & how to start your collection

As a young person on a limited budget, you could be forgiven for thinking art is something you need to wait years until you can afford (or are even allowed to hang due to owning your own home). But young art lover Alex Hocking is here to share how you can start an art collection on a budget and how you can display it, even if you’re renting.

Artwork is easily one of the cheapest, simplest and somewhat most overlooked ways of giving your space life and turning your house into a home… especially when it comes to renting. I’m here to give you some simple tips that I guarantee will have your home looking brighter and better than ever before!

Welcome to my place. You will notice that I love artwork, as one should. When I first moved into my house, it took me a good six months of staring at bare stark white walls before I finally had enough and decided to do something about it. Art is good for the soul but it’s also great for your home. As most decorators will tell you, art is always something you should invest not just your money, but also your time in. It will drastically change your home, and it could change your life.

Let’s clear up one of the biggest misconceptions right off the bat as I tell you art can be affordable. Sure, there are some incredible pieces of art that cost an unfathomable amount of money. There is also generic mass produced art from your local cheap chain department stores. And there is everything in between.

To start to dress your home with art, you first need to find what kind of art it is that you like. Are you a classic and traditional painting enthusiast, a contemporary pop art junkie (like me!), or possibly an appreciator of a wide variety of art in all of its wonderful forms?

I would first encourage you to look online, look in books, or even visit a local art gallery to find what kind of art tugs at your heartstrings and hits you in all of the right places. Good art will evoke a certain reaction or feeling when you see it. Perhaps it fills you with calmness or tranquility. Perhaps it fills you with passion and fire. Or perhaps it motivates and inspires you to go further and be better. Once you’ve found your preferred style – it’s time to get yourself some art!

Art is worth investing in, but I understand that everyone has a different budget, so I’m going to share some of my more thrifty tips for acquiring art that has personally helped me decorate my own rented home. Firstly, I would highly recommend trying to find and support local artists in your area. Local art will generally be more affordable, as well as being unique to your location and will give your home a beautiful cultivated look. I would encourage you to firstly head down to your local markets or search for art to your taste within your own community.

Secondly, it’s time to expand your outreach to look to bigger and broader artists. But remember, just because you might love a top artist’s most famous work, it doesn’t mean it has to cost a fortune. Unless you’re trying to acquire the original piece, you will simply be looking for a reproduction of that work, known as a print. There are many websites set up such as allposters.com that offer millions of quality posters and prints for sale at an extremely affordable price, with the option to purchase them with or without the frame. If you opt to go without the frame, a trip to IKEA will be on the cards to source some cheaper frames to finish them yourself. Now this sourcing method is all well and good for some pieces, however, I am a big fan of personal customisation when it comes to my own art collection.

A third great way to acquire personally customised art is to make some of your artwork yourself. There are various methods to doing this. You can opt to go get a giant blank canvas from your local art store and go to town on it with a brush (something I’ve definitely done before), or you can be a little more subtle and include things such as personal photographs or images that arouse a memory or feeling specific to you. Within my own home, I enjoy an equal mix of all three.

Now that you have your artwork sorted, it’s time to get it up! As a young renter myself, I know there are certain rules that one must follow for ensuring care is taken to ensure no damage comes to a rental property, as is your duty as a tenant. However all too often I see renters using this as an excuse to simply not invest in any art at all, leaving their home with big empty white walls just dying for some personality and love. But (providing you seek prior approval from your rental agent/landlord) there is a way around this and it comes in the form of Command 3M hooks and strips. These magical things, in my humble opinion, are far superior to alternatives of the hook variety, and are far more appropriate for putting up larger heavier artwork. I’ve used them for years in all my rentals and never encountered a single issue when it comes time to remove them.

However, even if your agent or landlord isn’t too keen on you hanging art on the walls, there is still another, rather on trend way of displaying your amazing artwork, and that is simply by leaning it against your walls. Larger prints can sit on the floor in hallways or grouped in with furniture, while smaller pieces can sit on top of cabinets or grouped in with shelves. I personally love the effortlessly chic look of this method and have used it frequently around my own home.

And that’s all there is to it. No longer will your home, or your soul, be deprived of being surrounded by the beautiful art it so deserves. Remember that art is exciting, engaging and endearing. Art will bring any room it enters to life and instantly give it an undeniable burst of personality – your personality! Now that you know where to start, it’s time to get out there and get yourself some art!

—Alex Hocking is a former interior decorator and visual merchandiser with a continued passion in interior design, based in Melbourne.

Categories
Expert Tips Styling

How to personalise a rental home: 5 ideas

By Jessica Bellef

Are you a tenant who despairs of having a home that truly reflects your style and personality? When we rent a house, we are borrowing the space. These houses weren’t built for us, and they weren’t built for the people who will move in after us, but they temporarily become our own when we arrange our things in them, go through our daily routines and create memorable moments in them. The walls aren’t always going to be the colour we want them to be, the floors may not give us the starting base we were hoping for and often the detail of the building structure looks tired (if any architectural detail exists at all).

Renting a home is a rite of passage, the first stop after careening from the family nest. It may be the first time we have had to share common rooms with people outside our circle of kin, and it’s often the first time we have had to think about what furniture as well as bits and pieces go into rooms that aren’t the bedroom. Budgets are usually restricted when we rent in our youth, as we are juggling study, entry-level jobs and the pull of a vibrant, glittery social life. Hungover Saturdays are spent constructing flat-packed furniture and dragging home beat-up items found on the side of the road.

Current social trends in Australia’s major cities have us renting well beyond the heady student years, as the cost of living keeps rising. We tend to hold back on setting ourselves up completely in a rental, waiting for that magical day when we can drop boxes of our things onto the floor of our perfect forever home, taking in the generous floor plan, the mass of natural light and the spot-on finishes. What we need to realise, though, is that unfortunately the perfect forever home can take a while to come around, and even then you are very lucky if you manage to nab a property that ticks all your boxes. Stamping your personality on the home and making it your own is important for your wellbeing and sense of connectedness, whether you are renting or you have moved into your not-quite-perfect forever home and renovations are a costly pipe dream.

Ideas to help make a rental yours

Mix up the layout to work for you
Rooms are defined by the furniture that goes in them—a bed belongs in the bedroom, while a dining table fits in the dining room. The real estate agent may tell you that the room at the front of the house is a lounge room, but that doesn’t mean you have to keep it that way. Take note of where you are drawn to at different times of the day and the conditions you need for certain activities. In Adam and Nick’s home, the bedroom was in a dark cave of a room, so the sun-loving couple converted the bright sunroom into their bedroom; the old bedroom then became a workroom and storage space. They love rising with the sun and starting their weekends with coffee and the papers in bed, soaking up the light.

Use rugs to downplay unattractive flooring
Laying down a rug is the quickest way to hide floors that are looking a little worse for wear or may be finished in a way you don’t like. I am a believer in rugs laid on top of carpet—as long as the pile of each isn’t too thick. Make sure you get the size right using the Goldilocks approach—a rug that is too small will look dinky, while a rug that is too big will suffocate the space. You need to find one that is just right.

Display art without hacking into the walls
Landlords aren’t very fond of holes in the walls, which makes it hard for renters to display their loved art and framed works. Sticky hooks can be useful for hanging things that are lightweight, but they aren’t so reliable for heavier pieces—and cheaper brands will pull paint off the walls, anyway. Large-scale art can look great casually leaning against a wall, whether it sits atop a sideboard or is placed on the ground. Shadow box frames can nestle onto shelves among your books and hold favourite items. For unframed prints on paper, washi tape and coloured painter’s tape will temporarily affix the art to the wall. Work slowly and carefully when you need to remove the tape, though, so that the paint remains intact.

Change up the lighting
My least favourite thing when it comes to homes is cold, harsh fluorescent lighting. If you are stuck with a temperature of overhead lighting that you don’t love, fill your rooms with lamplight for a cosy and comfortable ambience. If you don’t mind the temperature of the light but aren’t a fan of the fittings, get up close to see if you can swap out the shades without the need for complicated rewiring.

The other option is to talk to your landlord. If you would like to paint or make other minor alterations, there is a good chance that they will give you permission to do so. Especially if you mention that the changes may add value to the property!

–Images and text from Individual by Jessica Bellef, photography by Sue Stubbs, Murdoch Books RRP $49.99.  Out now. Buy online.  

Renovate a rental property on a budget: a case study | 10 DIY updates for your rental kitchen | How to: restyle your home with what you already own

Categories
Designers Expert Tips Renting Styling

10 tips for personalising your rental home from The Living Room’s James Treble

By James Treble

It’s a common dilemma for many people: how can you add your personal touch to a rental home? You may not be able to re-paint the walls, change the carpet or update the kitchen, but there are some simple ways to make a space truly your own that won’t break the budget.

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Here are my top 10 tips:

1. Flooring: whether it’s tired looking carpet or timber floorboards in the wrong colour, adding rugs and runners is an easy way to add colour and texture to any space. A great look right now is overlapping rugs of different sizes, but in the same colourwash and style. This layered effect is warm and inviting and very practical for the renter as you can adapt the pattern and shape to each room or home as required instead of spending big money for a space you may not be in forever.

2. Walls: We all know there are never enough hooks in a rental property, but thankfully there’s a huge range of stick-on hanging strips to let us fill the walls, without making a single hole. Hanging your favourite paintings adds your mark and makes a space feel your own. Consider using many small/medium frames to fill a large wall; they are lighter to hang than one large piece, plus you can swap them around when the mood suits.

3. Doors: Never underestimate what you can do with a door. By hanging a Moroccan tassel, coloured ribbon or an ornament from the door handle, you can make a subtle but stylish statement. It’s also a great way for kids to identify their rooms without causing any damage.

4. Plants: I am passionate about indoor plants and have them everywhere. Tropical plants and succulents add ambience and freshen the air. Lush green leaves are soothing for the soul and you can have year-round colour by using decorative or colourful pots.

5. Art: Artworks don’t just have to be on the wall. Placing frames on mantle pieces or window frames is a great look, and don’t forget sculptures. Personal objects add dimensional interest to any room and say something about you.

James Treble

6. Storage: It’s always a problem for any home, especially a rental property, but instead of jamming everything into small built-ins, consider using decorative storage boxes and baskets which can be displayed and become an accessory. To make an inexpensive statement, why not wrap a cheap box and lid in wallpaper; you can fill it with your personal things and create a masterpiece at the same time?

7. Mirrors: They can make a small space feel large, a narrow space feel wide, and they are also perfect to bounce light around even the darkest of rooms. Add a brightly coloured or ornate frame and they also become an artwork.

8. Lighting: You may not be able to change that ugly light fitting, but you can change the globe to a softer light. Another trick is to add a feature floor lamp, brightening up an empty corner, and table lamps with decorative bases that always help set the mood.

9. Furniture: When renting, you should consider smaller or modular furniture pieces which can easily adapt to any room configuration. Another tip is if you can’t add the colour you like to the walls, why not repaint your furniture? That secondhand side table may just become your favourite new piece.

10. Kitchen: When it comes to decorating, the kitchen is often overlooked. Consider the simple effect of bright new tea towels, a bold fruit bowl and a funky coloured kettle. You’ll be able to make the dullest of rental kitchens reflect who you are, and it will be fit for Nigella.

–James Treble , the resident interior designer on Channel 10’s The Living Room, is the new interior styling ambassador for online homewares shopping destination, Zanui. Last year, he was chairman of the Colour Society of Australia’s NSW division.

Categories
House Tours Renting

Rent my style: Perth beach shack turned well loved family home

Here at Interiors Addict, we just don’t buy into the idea that rental homes have to look bland or lacking in style and personality. Rent My Style is dedicated to showcasing the best of our readers’ rental home decorating efforts. They’re not show homes, they’re real homes!

As a freelance photographic stylist and the owner of an interior decorating and styling business, it’s perhaps no surprise that Jo-Anne Pabst‘s home is absolutely gorgeous. Jam-packed full of character, this unique old house is a two-minute walk from one of Perth’s finest beaches and is referred to, rather fondly by Jo’s family, as the Beach Shack. But it takes a certain eye to disguise leaning walls and peeling paint this well, in a home which is most likely destined to be knocked down.

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“I think we appreciate the Beach Shack more than a lot of other people might,” explains Jo. “There aren’t any modern features (no dishwasher or second toilet here). It is not very big and all the rooms lead off each other, but we love what it offers us as a family.”

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Home to Jo, her husband and their two young boys, they have lived here for the last two years. Having moved from London, they decided to rent so they could keep their property in the UK; a decision that hasn’t compromised the homeliness of the property. “It was all very neutral when we moved in. Great floorboards and plain walls,” says Jo. “ There’s a feature fireplace and mantle which I change regularly and all of our furniture just seemed to work with a tweak.”

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As an avid collector, Jo has furniture and homewares from all over the world. Loving everything antique or vintage, she has found these character pieces to be the key ingredients for creating changes that aren’t permanent and giving the place a great feel. “I love having all of our furniture and art from our time in London. It all has a story of where it was bought or found,” explains Kate. “For that reason, I really love the lounge room. It has an open fire, which we are enjoying in the very short winter in Perth and it also has all of our favorite furniture, art and things we have collected from our travels. It is amazing how these can take me back to times gone by in an instant.”

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Unfortunately for Jo and her family, the Beach Shack will most likely be knocked down, but that does mean the landlords don’t mind what they do to the property… within reason. “Most of the things we have done are in the outside area,” says Jo. “Vegetable and herb gardens, sand pits and chicken houses. I think we fancy ourselves as suburban farmers! The boys have lots of room for adventure, trees to climb and swing from, a cubby house (from Gumtree) and even a pirates’ lair up in the back corner.”

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While the outside has got a lot of love and care, the inside of the property has not remained untouched either, with some quick DIY fixes, fresh coats of paint and the addition of IKEA cupboards. The interiors also presented Jo with her biggest rental decorating challenge: “The two rooms on the side of the house have a definite lean to them,” she explains. “One room is my office and then the kids’ playroom. We definitely have to position our furniture to lean the right way! I have also covered the walls in these rooms with my moodboards, photos and kids’ artwork; much cheerier than the peeling paint!”

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While it may be tired in places, Jo sees this as a benefit: “ I don’t have to be precious about the sandy feet or the hand prints!” Loved by her family and all those that come to visit, Jo is very glad to call the Beach Shack home. “We have a bit of fun with it, lots of barbecues and themed kids parties. Most people say it has a really good vibe, which is what I am most proud of.”

Categories
House Tours Renting

Rent my style: Bonnie’s personality-filled home on a shoestring

Here at Interiors Addict, we just don’t buy into the idea that rental homes have to look bland or lacking in style and personality. Rent My Style is dedicated to showcasing the best of our readers’ rental home decorating efforts. They’re not show homes, they’re real homes!

With an artist mother, Bonnie Muir grew up in homes bursting with colour, pattern and paintings. “To me, the little touches and objects wherever you look that show the personality of the people that live in the space, are what make a house a home,”she says.

The 22 year old lives here with her boyfriend Samuel, and it’s their first home since leaving their parents’ nests! They’re both students, so can’t splash the cash on furniture and homewares, but they’ve certainly put their stamp on the place in just five months! “I have always loved interiors,”said Bonnie, who’d like to work in the industry one day. “It was really important to me to create a space I love to be in. The thing I worried about with renting, was that I would not be able to create a homely feeling, and that our house would end up stark and bare. I definitely think I had nothing to worry about!”

Bonnie had a decent art collection thanks to her mum’s efforts which helped fill the walls. “She paints on incredibly lightweight canvases, so they hang on removable 3M Command Hooks, which makes life incredibly easy! The majority of the pictures hanging in the bedroom are bargains that I picked up in secondhand shops. I have always loved dogs and flowers, and so I have been building up a collection over the past few years whenever I see something I like.”

Gallery wall in the bedroom
Gallery wall in the bedroom

The map collection in her study was one big bargain. “The large ones are wrapping paper prints and were only $8.95 each. The small ones all come from an old mini desk calendar that I pulled apart and put into op-shop frames, all painted white. Again, Command Hooks are the saviour here! I did a similar thing with pages from an old diary in the kitchen. The diary featured images of ads from the 20th century, and I just picked a few favourites and put them in some IKEA frames.”

The couple, who live in South Australia, are lucky to have friendly landlords (they even said yes to a kitten!). “There have been two things that I have actually had to put nails into the walls for (the pegboard for my jewellery, and the large map in the bedroom), but I checked with them first, and they gave me the all-clear, so long as I patch them up when it comes time to leave.”

In the living room, Bonnie swapped the existing curtains (putting them away safely to return when she moves out) for a cheap fresh white pair from Spotlight. “It has really made the space a lot lighter and brighter!” When it came to furniture, the students bought their TV unit, dining table and couch from good old IKEA. “We managed to get the couch as an ex-demo for only $500 because of a tiny scratch on the arm. Our dining chair are just fold-up chairs we got from Officeworks for $12 each, but the colours match perfectly and they’re all we need.”

There are pre-loved Gumtree finds in the mix too. Bonnie’s bedside table is an old meat safe with the legs cut off. “It did take some patience: I was compulsively checking the listings every hour for about two weeks each time, but it definitely paid off!”

Her main tip for renters is that it doesn’t have to be expensive to put your personality into your home. “Be inventive! Use bits of interesting wrapping paper in a cheap frame to create some artwork, go trawling through junk stores to find things you can update, or even just do something as simple as getting bedding that makes you happy and gives an injection of colour into the room!

“Customise anything you can to get the feeling you want your house to have. The lamp on my bedside table was only about $50 from a lighting shop, and it came with a boring, basic white shade. I had met a woman at a market who made lampshades and pillowcases, and so I got her to make something funky for me. Bargain shops and secondhand shops will become your best friends if you let them.”

Bonnie’s been surprised at how easy it’s been to make her places hers (even though, technically, it isn’t). “I honestly thought it would look a lot barer than it does, and that it would also take me a lot longer to get it looking how I wanted it to. The only real challenge I have had was trying to convince Samuel that it would all actually look good together! Because I have quite eclectic and colourful taste, in the moving van it all looked like a hot mess! He has really let me take the reins on decorating here (which I am very thankful for), but I think I’ve managed to create a space that we can both share and enjoy. I’m very proud of the home I have created.”

We think you should be, Bonnie! Thanks for showing us around and sharing your tips!

Categories
House Tours RENO ADDICT Renting

Rent My Style: Laura Koomen’s balcony makeover

Here at Interiors Addict, we just don’t buy into the idea that rental homes have to look bland or lacking in style and personality. Rent My Style is dedicated to showcasing the best of our readers’ rental home decorating efforts.

Today, we’re sharing Laura Koomen’s cute balcony makeover in Melbourne. Her one-bedroom apartment has been home for three years. “One of the best things I did was put a floating wooden base covered in AstroTurf down on my balcony,” she explained. “The floating base was important as it is one of those old concrete tub style balconies that fill with puddles when it rains! Also, I had a wooden bar built that sits atop the balcony edge.

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“It’s been transformed from concrete box to my little oasis! The rest of my apartment is lovely too and I think the key for me has been about getting the right size furniture for the right space, not overcrowding and keeping a consistency to every room.”

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We love how Laura’s inexpensive additions have made all the difference, and everything can be easily removed when she moves out (although we think her landlord should pay her to keep them!).

Categories
Expert Tips Renting

5 ways to make your (temporary) mark on a rented home

Decorate your home without the need of a hammer or drill and without damaging your walls with 3M Command Picture Hanging Strips, which hold up to 7kg. Visit go.3m.com/loveyourwalls/ for decorating inspiration and the chance to win some great prizes.

If there’s one thing that annoys me more than the painfully slow scoring process on The Block, it’s people saying you can’t or, worse still, there’s no point, in making an effort with your interiors if you rent your home. AAAGGGHHHH. Nonsense!

Of course there’s a point. One of the main things I hope to get across in this blog, is how much joy and fun you can get from making your home a nest, filling it with things that make you smile or perhaps feel calm and secure, or remind you of a great holiday. It can be as simple as the lovely feeling of your home being very “you” or feeling so super cosy that there’s nowhere you’d rather unwind after a busy day at the office. And it doesn’t have to be hard, expensive or permanent.

Here are my top 5 ways to add some personality and you-ness to your rented home. Because we all deserve to love our home and get the feel-good vibes that go along with that, whether we own or not. And let’s face it, it’s increasingly bloody hard to get on the housing ladder, especially in Sydney!

1. The last time I looked, rugs, furniture and accessories were all removable and therefore able to be moved from room to room or home to home, or even packed away and saved for a future home if they don’t work in the next place. There is no reason why you can’t invest in these items because they can move with you. Be smart and buy key, larger pieces in neutral colours.

My last rented apartment in Home Beautiful
My last rented apartment in Home Beautiful

2. Put up art and framed photos using 3M Command Picture Hanging Strips. These aren’t just for small frames.  You can use them to hang frames weighing up to a whopping 7kg. No limits! Creating a gallery wall of photos or hanging a favourite art print above your bed are now options without leaving so much as a mark on your landlord’s walls. Winning.

3. Change curtains and blinds. I have never EVER lived with the supplied curtains or blinds in a rental. I remove them, put them away safely somewhere and replace them with whatever I like. I simply put back the originals when I come to move out. You can also change the shower curtain if you have one.

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Urban Outfitters sell great shower curtains online

4. Try removable wallpaper. There’s the vinyl self-adhesive kind (try Wallcreations or The Wallsticker Company) or the real paper kind (read about my experience with Publisher Textiles, tried and tested!) and you can damn well have that feature wall if you want it!

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My wallpaper being removed at the end of my last tenancy

5. Ok, so this one isn’t temporary but bear with me. Depending on how long you’re likely to live in your rental and how important your interiors are to you, weigh up whether you might be prepared to spend a little money on things you won’t be able to take with you when you leave. This isn’t for everyone, but I’ve done this myself. In one apartment I HATED the kitchen floor so much I offered to pay half for a new one and the landlord said yes. In another apartment, when I moved in, I realised quite how badly the place needed a lick of paint (but it certainly wasn’t bad enough that you could argue it HAD to be done). I offered to pay half to have the small place painted and the job was done within a week. Happy days! I can’t tell you what a difference it made and I didn’t regret a dollar. Yes, you won’t get that money back but if you, like me, are really fussy about what your home looks like, you might consider it’s money well spent.

Having both rented and owned, I don’t think there’s been much difference in how much love has gone into my homes’ interiors. How about you?

 Love to hear your tips for making your mark on you rental! Please share in the comments.

This post is part of a Nuffnang native advertising series.

Decorate your home without the need of a hammer or drill and without damaging your walls with 3M Command Picture Hanging Strips, which hold up to 7kg. Visit go.3m.com/loveyourwalls for decorating inspiration and the chance to win some great prizes.