How To Decorate Your Home For Winter

Home For Winter decorations are the next best thing to hibernating. When the mercury drops and the wind begins to whistle, leaving the comforts of your home is far from easy. So when you do, rest safe knowing that you have a plush, cocooning space to which you can return, shutting out the cold behind you.

Where to begin though when it comes to bracing your home for the winter chill? Our winter-style survival guide is filled with suggestions to bring into your interior, transforming it into the ultimate escape from the chilly outdoors.

Style your home with winter decor

There are plenty of winter decorating ideas that can be blended into your existing scheme, giving it a seasonal update.

Winter home decor can be as elaborate or as simple as you wish. Some choose to change the wall colour in a key room to reflect the cold snap, opting for velvety shades of deep navy, sultry charcoal or even warming rust or ochre tones.

But if you’re looking for less onerous ideas, consider smaller touches such as adding more lamps to rooms without light and even passing places. Soft glows are even more appealing at this time of year and encourage a mellower light—if the light outside is grey and dim, you don’t want to come inside to see dazzling lights. Choose something different in intensity to outside, just several degrees warmer.

Or, simpler still, introducing a few decorative items with winter-themed motifs and colours on them is a subtle nod to the seasonal mood. Nothing too cliché of course, but shades with a warm base like creams, taupe or peat and cable-knit weaves. Cushions are an almost effortless way to achieve this.

Warm up your room with cosy textiles

Speaking of cushions, these plush accents are high on the list of winter home essentials, along with blankets, throws and rugs. Offering texture and much-appreciated additional warmth, sumptuous throws, in particular, are vital for a winter-ready space. Whether draped over your bed or your seating arrangements, they bring a layered look to interiors and can double up as a cosy wrap. Even a throw over the back of a dining chair is reassuring, telling you that, should you feel a draught, warmth is always within arm’s reach.

Cushions will also help you swiftly build comforting layers in your sitting room, snug, and bedrooms. Mix and match different styles to create a plump, cosy display. Champion the softest materials—they’ll make your space even more welcoming and enjoyable to lean back into. Velvet and silken designs look inviting and incredible, while hints of pattern will brighten up your interior on even the darkest of evenings in winter.

Snuggle up with a good book or film under the comfort of mohair, cashmere and alpaca designs, reclining into plump, velvety cushions, and with a deep-pile rug underfoot to set the perfect conditions for a wintry evening in the comfort of your own home.

Decorate your mantel

Your mantel is likely to keep the same look and feel for most of the year. Most only update it when Christmas calls or perhaps to prop up the occasional scattering of birthday cards.

Your mantelpiece, however, offers the perfect spot to reflect on the season and calls out for a handful of winter home accessories. Save the garlands of greenery and berries for the festivities, and instead consider a twiggy garland that will bring further texture to the room and correspond to the bare branches outdoors. In front of this, add layers of candlelight at varying heights and in abundance.

This is the time of year when there is no such thing as too many candles. Try having some on candlesticks, some scented varieties in coloured vessels and a hurricane lantern or two with a pillar candle inside. The occasional decorative ornament a metallic glint, be it gold or bronze, will pick up on the flickering flames and radiate them around your room.

Use winter-themed table decorations

The dining table is another part of the home that doesn’t always get involved until dinner parties and special occasions come knocking. If you’re using it every day how seasonally relevant your home feels?

Make napkins part of everyday meals to bring textiles into as many activities as possible. Just the addition of a smooth linen napkin makes a difference. Adding a napkin ring is one more step, but such an easy one to take. Choose one in a gleaming metallic that feels well-suited to winter and then pick up that same tone and material in other winter table decorations, like gold-hued coasters or placemats with a shimmery thread running through.

Choose a winter centrepiece

As part of your winter decorations, seek out a special something that can act as a centrepiece in the room. This is especially effective in downstairs spaces like living rooms, dining rooms, kitchens and hallways. An oversized vase that’s coloured in the same metallic tone as your winter table decorations is a stylish way to achieve continuity. Choose gold in either a brushed, matte or glossy and high-shine finish, because this sort of finish in a large size is something really does only work in wintertime.

At any other time of the year, it might appear too much. Fill it with a white floral in a large bouquet to pare things down and suggest snowfall. Or a bunch of pussywillow twigs whose height makes them instantly centrepiece-worthy and whose fuzzy catkins are an unusual way to bring in another soft texture.

Florals aren’t the only option here. A majestic sculpture that will mesmerise and command attention, or a statuesque candelabra in the same gleaming tones, such as this gold duo by L’Objet or a blend of snowy white and antiqued gold in Arteriors’ candle holder is ideal. The idea is to add height and a variation in scale to draw the eye.

Bring colour into your home with winter florals

Your centrepiece vase isn’t the only floral addition to your winter interior scheme. Choose several smaller vases of seasonal blooms to dot around your home so that the beautiful side of winter’s character is spread from room to room.

This is where faux flowers come into their own because they don’t ask for any attention or struggle with the reduced light levels and effect of central heating. If you can, try to choose varieties that would be naturally flowering outdoors so that your scheme is as true to nature as possible. Hellebores in deep burgundy and delicate snowdrops are ideal. Otherwise, faux colours of crimson and white feel particularly wintery.

Add finishing winter touches

Candlelight is not solely for the mantel. Candles are a beautiful way to give your home that winter glow, perfect for creating a restful atmosphere. Place multiples around your interior for maximum impact, scattering a few thoughtfully chosen candles across bookcases, mantelpieces, windowsills and tabletops. Don’t forget to try room diffusers, too. Designs with festive-inspired scents (think orange, cedar wood and spicy ginger notes) make a fitting choice.