5 Ways to Make Your First Home Beautiful

5 Ways to Make Your First Home Beautiful

Interior designer Kyle Schuneman’s adventures as a Hollywood production designer finally led him into the world of interior design — the perfect career for a guy who drew floor plans and turned through style magazines as a small boy growing up in Chicago. After building his industry contacts and working together with high-end clients, Schuneman noticed that a good deal of his twenty- and thirtysomething friends were still feeling fulfilled by the design procedure — a realization that planted the seeds for a style book.

“I wanted to put together a guide filled with design information that is useful, fresh, interesting — and also the antithesis of a style manifesto regarding how you need to decorate to fit into a mould,” says Schuneman, 28. He collected his adventures in solving his clients’ real-life style challenges in his very first book, The Initial Apartment Book: Cool Design for Small Spaces (2012).

Here are just five of the hints for anybody setting up a first apartment or house.

Kyle Schuneman | Live Well Designs

1. Take good care of something beautiful, something alive. One of the initial things Schuneman suggests to his clients would be to go out and purchase a plant or fresh flowers. He utilized a collection of glass bubbles from CB2 to house magenta dahlias in this street-level San Francisco apartment.

“When you have something residing in your area, you need to take care of it. You turn into a larger part of your area when you are nurturing something in it,” says Schuneman.

He adores the architectural look and feel of this magenta dahlias and how out the flowers’ placement frees up valuable table space.

Kyle Schuneman | Live Well Designs

2. Your distance ought to have roots. Schuneman designed this bedroom for a young man living in an historic Los Angeles building. “I actually wanted to pay homage to the masculine lines, warm woods and layered textures of this building,” he says. “You just can not deny the larger context of this distance.”

The designer gave a collection of vintage tennis racquets brand new life by turning each slice into a mirror; the collection creates a graphic pattern onto the wall area over the bed. “The racquets are the focal point of this space. They soften the tough, angular edges of the bed frame”

He cautions against damaging your flat or house like it’s a “floating cloud” You can live in the city and elect for a cottage-coastal vibe, however let where you live somehow organically influence your choices.

Kyle Schuneman | Live Well Designs

3. Take design cues from the places you love. The top-shelf mirror design of the retro kitchen repeats the layout of Schuneman’s client’s favorite neighborhood watering hole.

“She just loved the way her beloved pub reflected the hard-to-reach, top-shelf bottles. For her kitchen we moved for the same effect. But rather than spirits bottles, the mirror reflects an assortment of coasters from her travels,” he says.

Kyle Schuneman | Live Well Designs

4. Tell a story with your surroundings and have a definitive perspective. When the designer came to assist this Nashville couple with their first flat together, drum sets and guitar cases overwhelmed the place before the picture window, wasting their opinion of the Cumberland River.

Schuneman freed the guitars from their cases and integrated all the instruments through the loft. “The instruments give the distance an advantage,” he says. They immediately demonstrate the clients’ musical origins, “giving the distance a rock-and-roll vibe”

The designer chose low club-like furniture to make an intimate lounging area within the open expanse of the loft. A set of wicker coconut chairs soften the hard stone appeal of this living space and help bring out the warm wood tones of the flooring planks.

Kyle Schuneman | Live Well Designs

5. Bring home treasures and conversation starters. Without any intention of purchasing an extra armchair for her living space, Schuneman’s customer spotted this midcentury modern seat while strolling through her neighborhood and fell in love with its own layout and $150 cost.

“it is a great lesson on fixing yourself to items when the right moment — and right piece — appears. She’ll always have that love-at-first-sight story to look back on,” says Schuneman.

The designer found the hanging metal piece at a nearby thrift shop. “It’s hard for folks to devote to art, but these vintage metal bits feel sculptural and unique, therefore I think that is why people are gravitating into them,” he says.

Kyle Schuneman | Live Well Designs

Schuneman acknowledges that good design — no matter how big this room — boils down to one’s personal taste.

“We don’t operate in a wrong-or-right industry. Take for example this man cave I did for a Hollywood writer; many folks reacted to the inclusion of a urinal within the area — and I loved it. I think it’s great that people either loved or hated the urinal, because at least I understand that the customer and I took a stand. At the end of the day, what matters is the way we feel about the distance.”

More:
Create a Chic First Apartment to a Dorm Room Budget
Grow With Intention: 10 Strategies to Maximize a Small Space

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