Decorating Your Kitchen in 5 Easy Steps

Sunshine Drapery sliding glass doors window treatment

As you sit slumped over the kitchen table holding a cup of hot coffee, you look around at your bare kitchen walls. We’ve always wondered why no one seems to think the kitchen should look as magazine-cover-perfect as the rest of the house. You obviously think like we do, because your family meets in the kitchen at least twice a day, your friends chat over coffee in the kitchen in addition to the kids’ homework and your home business being completed at the kitchen table. We know five ways of decorating kitchens and other areas that will jazz up the atmosphere.

Shelves

It seems even modern chrome kitchens need space for cookbooks, herb pots and other decorations. Shelves can be painted to match a country kitchen, a traditional one or even brick walls and wood floor kitchens. Decorative platters and bowls, teapots, glassware, stoneware and apothecary jars can be displayed on them.

Beams

Nothing beats boring like a beamed ceiling. The wood is often in contrast to the colors in the room and other wood such as hardwood floors. It makes an elegant statement. Put in a kitchen, a beamed ceiling takes people back to a simpler time. You almost expect to see a fireplace with a cooking pot hanging from a hook. Alone, a beamed ceiling makes a kitchen attractive, but hanging things from the beams makes it a wow! moment. admin-ajax (7)

Hanging Racks

Every cook would dearly love to have copper pots hung from a rack overhead. Hanging from a beamed ceiling, copper pots, ceramic pots or any pots make cooks look like professional chefs. Another idea would be to hang your collection of cast iron skillets and cooking pots from the rack. The rack could be painted to match the kitchen colors, or it could be left in its natural wood state to contrast with the beamed ceiling. Either way, it would free up storage space under the oven and the cabinets.

Lighting

Every cook knows the frustration of cutting themselves while chopping vegetables due to faulty lighting. This isn’t necessary, though, due to the ease of choosing pendant lighting. Task lighting is necessary for cooks who chop and prep their foods. Pendant lighting can be hung from those beams we were just discussing, over the kitchen table to light up the kids’ homework or over the kitchen island to illuminate work done there. Decorative lighting goes a long way to perking up a tired or boring kitchen.

Decorative Accents

What do country-patterned china plates, decorative platters, baskets and apothecary jars have in common? They can be placed around a kitchen to give it some character, color and elegance. Mount on the walls decorative platters, pretty china, odd-shaped baskets or decorative wrought-iron trivets. Fill your apothecary jars or other decorative jars with oranges and apples, peppercorns, sea salt, fresh herbs or anything colorful and useful. Other decorative accents include antique toasters and mixers, cutting board and cheese knives and old-fashioned milk bottles. Since family and friends spend much of their time in the kitchen, it only makes sense to make the room as comfortable and attractive as possible. Using a little imagination, yours will look magazine-cover-ready in no time!