Open plan living is the go-to for many contemporary interiors, allowing free-flowing movement and ease of access to all areas of the home. When it comes to choosing your decor, an open plan space may feel daunting and cavernous at first. To create a design that flows smoothly, the right furnishings will need to feel harmonious and well-balanced. Here are some tips for decorating an open-plan interior.

To create an easy, free-flowing design, it’s important to choose a color scheme and stick to it throughout the space. Whether you stick to neutral tones or choose bolder colors, echoing the same scheme in every layer of your design will help create a sense of harmony and balance.

Open-plan designs avoid breaking up the space with walls, but this can make storage an issue. Open storage units and shelves are a great way to keep things tidy. Without blocking too much light, these handy shelves also act as partial screens to direct movement and delineate zones within the space.

Create harmony and make your open plan home sing with harmonious materials that reverberate throughout your design. Whether you choose wood, stone, bamboo, fur, or velvet – pick a material that will really shine and incorporate it into various different accents throughout the home.

Creative paintwork can be a really clever way to define a space without using any walls or dividers. Use contrasting colors to define an archway or create a niche around a certain area, tricking the eye and clearly defining different zones within the home for different purposes.

Bring the eye through your space and make it pop with colorful accents that appear in varying types of objects and textures. A vibrant color can make its way into one area of your open-plan home in a framed print, showing up in another zone through a cushion or rug. This helps enhance the sense of balance and continuity throughout the space.

You can also help define space within an open-plan home through your flooring choices. Contrast your kitchen tiles with a hardwood floor in your living space, or use large area rugs to delineate a section for your dining table.