You’re probably wasting a lot of time right now looking through Instagram and Pinterest, saving inspiration for your living room, bedroom, and kitchen to their various boards. After all, giving your home a small facelift is a fun undertaking to undertake. But how do you take your vision board from inspiration to reality without having to leave your house?
Here’s some good news: There are a few guides 4 homeowners design-focused firms that will provide you with free on-demand decorating guidance. Yes, you read that correctly—free professional counsel! What’s the best part? There’s no need to visit a design store or hire an interior designer—all of these materials are available online right now. Here are the greatest internet resources for getting free, expert decorating advice that will help you make your home a little bit happier right now.
Design Bar by Decorist
Do you require assistance in locating a specific sort of decorative accessory, paint color, or work of art? Decorist’s free Design Bar is available to assist you with all of your decorating problems. Simply choose one of the five prompts offered, write up your question, and attach an image of your place to provide context. Then, from a list of possibilities, select the one that best describes your aesthetic and budget, and submit your query. Once you’ve found a designer who you like, they’ll evaluate your project and provide you with their recommendations. It doesn’t get much simpler than that.
The Design Support of Revival Rugs
Purchasing a rug is a difficult task in and of itself, let alone doing so online. What looks fantastic in a photo may feel very different once you have it in your home. Enter Revival Rugs’ new Design Consultation service, which has a team of experts ready to help you with any of your rug-buying concerns. Begin by filling out a simple questionnaire that includes the measurements of the area in question, your style preferences, inspiration boards (if applicable), actual images of your space, and the type of piece you’re trying to buy. The team will respond with three to five rug recommendations, as well as mock-ups and sketches to help you picture them in your space. It takes roughly two business days to receive a response.
Clare is a master of color.
It’s difficult to beat picking the right paint color for a room without having to leave the house. Clare, a designer-curated paint brand, accomplishes this with its “Color Genius” tool, which provides tonal choices based on a short questionnaire that considers the size of a space, the colors of its furnishings, and the quantity and direction of natural light it receives. The platform immediately assesses your preferences, as well as your willingness to be experimental, and offers up to three color options. You can then order a swatch or a complete gallon of paint to try out in person.
The West Elm Design Team
The retailer that resurrected mid-century modern style now offers a free design consultation service that you may use digitally or over the phone. Choose the type of space you want to renovate, your preferred aesthetic, and the type of assistance you need—organization, mirror or art installation, sourcing entirely new furniture, and more. Once you’ve been matched with a designer, they’ll be able to provide you personalized assistance on even the most difficult or basic problems.
Serena & Lily, Pottery Barn, and Crate & Barrel, among others, provide similar one-on-one design services and consultations at no cost. Consider starting your search there if your aesthetic is highly skewed toward one brand or the other.
Introductory Consultation at One Kings Lane
This e-retailer offers a free 30-minute consultation service with a designer to assist you get started if you have a design project on the horizon but aren’t sure where to start. Begin by deciding on the types of areas or rooms you want to renovate, as well as the design styles that inspire you, and then set a date and time for your digital meet-up. Following your virtual talk, One Kings Lane’s designers will even give you with a curated shopping list.
