Make Your Home Look Expensive with Simple Interior Design and Home Decor Tips

Genuinely feel like your home has a huge impact on your mental well-being and you shouldn't always be eager to leave your house or only feel great when you go to a nice hotel or resort. If you went into a hotel room, a five-star hotel, and you saw that, you would be less than impressed and you'd probably call management to come and do something about it. So in your home, you are the management and you need to do something about it. Hey guys, welcome back to my YouTube channel, Love Marbee, where we talk about all things home, heart, and hosting. I'm Michelle Marbee Davies, and if you're new here, just imagine if Oprah and Martha Stewart had a baby, I'd basically be the end result because I love rich, deep conversations like Oprah and a good Bob, like Oprah back in the day. But I also love hosting dinner parties, cooking, and elevating my home. And that's essentially what I share about across all my platforms. Now one of the videos I shared here on YouTube that you guys seem to absolutely love is about easy ways to elevate your home. And I really do believe the way your home looks and feels has a huge impact on your mental health and wellbeing. And I shared some tips on how to elevate your home, give it that luxurious feel and make it feel slightly more elevated. I said before, part of the reason why sometimes you feel great when you go to a really nice hotel or resort or even a nice store is because they've been really intentional about the design of that space. They've curated a beautiful space that will in turn help you feel amazing. So let's get into it. Here are 10 ways you can elevate your home, make it feel more expensive and slightly more elevated. Now you probably wouldn't guess the first tip if I gave you a chance to, but it is clean walls or fresh paint. Honestly, I think it's so easy to overlook your walls, but they make such a huge difference. And I guess maybe because you live in the space constantly, it's easy for you to overlook it. But especially if you have gray walls, white walls, beige walls, anything where it's easy to see dirt and stains, you really do need to take the time to give that a good refresh. Now, if you have white walls, beige walls, you can go in with a magic eraser, especially around your light switches, your sockets, those places where you touch the most. I can't explain to you how much of an impact it makes because the dirt really does build up around those spots. And for someone who comes into your house, you know, with fresh eyes and is seeing everything for the first time, it makes such a huge impact. So for me, I have white walls, so I really like to make sure I always have a magic eraser on hand. You can grab them from Amazon or just your grocery stores. Typically they have them in there. And I just make sure you lightly, lightly wet it. You don't want it to be too wet and you don't want to scrub too hard. You just kind of want to buff in, you know, circular motions, but with very light pressure because if you buff too hard, depending on the type of paint you have, you can actually end up kind of going a bit too far and you see the layer beneath the paint. But if there's no redemption by simply wiping or using a magic eraser, then go ahead and paint it if you can. And I think this also makes a huge difference when it comes to bathrooms. If there's not enough ventilation and if air isn't coming in, which is why I'm such a huge advocate for opening your windows. If you can, you can get a lot of condensation in there that builds up and it causes discoloration on the ceiling. So look around in your bathrooms, look around your walls, look around your light sockets. Honestly, if you want your home to feel elevated, so much of it has to do with making sure it's as clean as possible. Because if you went into a hotel room, a five star hotel, and you saw that, you would be less than impressed and you'd probably call management to come and do something about it. So in your home, you are the management and you need to do something about it. Now, the second tip, especially if you want to avoid the kerfuffle of having to constantly wipe the walls and make sure there isn't makeup transfer around the sockets and the light switches is to go for darker paint. Honestly, this makes such a huge difference for a luxurious and elevated feel. I absolutely love it. I know there's the trend of color drenching where you drench the whole room in a particular color. So the ceilings, the walls, the doors, the skirting boards, everything. And I love the way it looks. I did this with my room in America in my aunt's house, and I just adore the way it looks. We kept the skirting boards white, but it's this rich forest, deep green color that I think just is amazing. Especially if your room, I can't remember which way it needs to be facing, north, south. I don't know how it works. But if there's enough sunlight coming into the room to handle it, it can make such a huge difference. But even if it isn't an overly bright room, going for a dark, dark gray with undertones of brown and green, I feel like when you go for paint colors that have undertones that are warm, it doesn't feel like a room that would then be suffocating. So grays that have kind of like a brown undertone, maybe a green that is just warm and expensive. It's just so gorgeous, and I know it feels like a huge leak to try and do that. I think this works really well in offices and studies where you kind of do want that calmer vibe. I think it works amazingly well in bedrooms, just to allow you to kind of switch off and calm down. And just because you go for a darker paint color doesn't mean you can't accent it with brighter colors. So you can go in with soft furnishings that are slightly lighter. You can go in with paint, artwork, there's different ways that you can kind of balance things out. But I think if you want that kind of elevated look, and pay attention to hotel lobbies or even sometimes the accent walls that they have in bedrooms, sometimes you will notice that there are deeper, darker colors going on. And it makes such a huge impact in terms of making the room feel grounded. Now if you can't go in and change the paint color completely, another way to achieve this is by adding some darker furniture. So furniture that also feels grounding, like dark browns, mahogany, deep, deep, deep grays, charcoal, whatever it is, these just help to make your room feel slightly more grounded. Because I feel like somewhere in the 2010s, we kind of went in towards the grays and the whites and the beiges for the walls. And then there's kind of no character. It doesn't feel elevated. It doesn't feel expensive, because everything feels kind of just flat. So you need to work to add in balance by the time you're designing. So if you can't use paint, try to opt for furnishings. This could be bookcases, cabinets, whatever it is, but you just want to ground the space as much as you possibly can. The third tip is about the bedroom, which is honestly one of my favorite spaces, because I do love to sleep, and it's to make sure you get a great bed or a great headboard. And if you can do both, then why not? But honestly, this makes such a huge impact when it comes to elevating your bedroom, which is a special space for you that you should get to enjoy. And sometimes we can spend so much energy and funds investing in the spaces that everybody else gets to see, and we don't make sure the place we spend a lot of time in when it comes to relaxing, recharging, and probably investing in self-care, we don't make sure that we elevate that space. So I would say a great bed, something that feels luxurious, something that feels elevated, and something that works well functionally makes a huge difference. I love an ottoman bed, I love being able to have storage, I love when it works well when it comes to style and function. So having storage underneath the bed to make sure there isn't clutter, too much visible clutter in my space, I think goes a long way when it comes to elevating my bedroom. But a great dramatic headboard, now I see the girlies DIYing this, if you can, and if that is your ministry, then go right ahead. But for me, we don't do too well with DIY. If I maybe got someone else to come in and build it, maybe sure, cool, but I know as for me and my house, I can't do that, I just, mm-mm. But if you are blessed to be able to do that, then go right ahead. But honestly, getting a great headboard, and you can get these online, there are great websites where it's slightly more affordable. If you have outlets near you, go online and check to see what they have in stock, or maybe just have a trip to the outlet on the weekend. I think sometimes people underestimate the great deals they can get from furniture outlet stores, the outlet stores of some of your favorite furniture stores. You can get great steals, okay? So you can try eBay, you can try your outlet stores, you can try Ikea, sometimes they have this section where it's discounted furniture, too good to go, or something like that. And you can just get great bargains. But having a great headboard makes a huge difference. I love a dramatic headboard. And if you can't have a great headboard, just get a good base, and then just focus on maybe creating a gallery wall behind your bed, something, again, that will elevate the space. You don't even always have to do a gallery wall, you can maybe just hang some art. I know sometimes there's art that you can hang behind the bed that isn't just pictures, but honestly, I feel like a great bed and a great headboard will go a long way in elevating your space when it comes to the bedroom. Tip number five is making sure you have an extra large duvet on the bed. I'm telling you, this hack works every single time. When you go into a nice hotel and you see the bedding is able to drape down the sides, it's probably because they've sized up. So when I first heard this tip, I tried it immediately. I was like, ooh. I think Melissa's Wardrobe shared it as well as some other designers that I follow. And they mentioned just sizing up when it comes to your bedding, your bedspread, your duvet, I don't know what it's called in America, I can't remember, but your duvet, essentially. And if you have a queen-size bed, for example, you get a king-size duvet. If you have a double bed, you get a queen-size duvet, and you get the gist, right? But it just makes sure there's the ability to have overhang on the sides, and then you get that luxurious, elevated feeling when you're making your bed. Now, another bonus tip within this category is to make sure, if possible, you double-stuff your duvet. Now, I love this because, number one, it looks great. The duvet looks fuller. The same with your cushions. If you can, double-stuff them because you get that fuller look, but the same applies for your duvet. But the reason why I also love this is because, in the winter, I don't need to keep my heat in on that much because I'm so warm in the bed. For someone who maybe you just have a warmer body temperature, like your baseline is super warm, maybe don't do this because sometimes when my friends come over, they're like, oh my God, it's so hot under the duvet, but I love it because I'm always cold. Typically, primarily, I'm usually cold. So having two duvets and just having that extra warmth, it feels like a weighted blanket and I absolutely love it and I think it makes such a huge difference in the way my bedding looks overall. There's some great tips you can find online when it comes to styling your bed and ways to make it look elevated. Sometimes less is more, so making sure you don't have too many cushions on the bed and just really being intentional about how you style it because there's something that feels so good about coming into a bed where it just looks elevated before you're about to go to bed. Again, I know I keep talking about hotels and resorts, but I really do love them. It's the same feeling when you go in and that bed has been made with extra care and attention to detail. Try it at home and tell me you don't love it. So good. The next tip is to start creating vignettes. If you haven't heard of this before, let me read the definition quickly. So it says online that a vignette is a small curated arrangement or display of objects that tell a story, evoke a mood, or showcase a particular theme or style. Honestly, I feel like with certain things, it's just about having the energy and the boldness to take a leap at it. But when you see sometimes you go into a store, a hotel, a really nice apartment, and it has groupings of things together, I think it's easy to just think, oh, that wouldn't work in my home. But it would make such a huge difference because it adds a visual interest, right? So you start to group things together, maybe on your island, maybe on bookshelves, maybe next to your TV stand or on your TV stand, on your console table. Usually I like to work in odd numbers, so groups of threes and fives and sevenths. You get the gist. But just making sure I create little vignettes in different spaces. You can do this, for example, in a kitchen, let's say on the backsplash or on the wall behind your work surfaces in the kitchen. You group little things together, and they can be things that are functional as well as things that are stylish. And a great way to do this is picking things that you know maybe you can use for storage. So for example, on a coffee table, you could create a vignette, and you could do this by having storage boxes for remote controls or maybe books and something else like a candle or even a candle, a tray, and maybe a candle snuffer. These are things that are functional that you would use, but you're also using them for styling. And I feel like just getting into your interior design bag and starting to create vignettes in your home. Be bold with it. Know that you can change it. You can move things from your living room to your hallway. I love to shop my home, if you've ever heard me talk about that before. Where something is today doesn't mean it has to stay there for the rest of your life. You can move things around in your home and just create little curated spaces, little curated assortments of things that, one, make you feel happy, evoke joy for you, and tell a story about your style. Or it could be mainly functional, but primarily you just want to style a particular area. This works wonders when it comes to elevating a space because you add visual interest. You go beyond just having things that are solely functional in a space. Tip number seven is to make sure you include visual interest in your home by not having everything on the same level. So a great way to do this is through using plimps. You can get concrete plimps. You can get plimps that are made from MDF. You can get plimps that are cardboard, I believe. But this really helps to make sure everything isn't solely on the same level and there's visual interest when you're looking around. So even when it comes to a tablescape, when I'm styling a table, I like to make sure there's varying heights because it keeps things interesting when you look at them and when guests come over and they look at them too. You can also do this through having book stacks. So if you're going to put a tray on the table, for example, if you have some books, some coffee table books or some styling books, you don't only need to just keep the tray down flat on the table. If you put it on the books, it's slightly elevated and it adds visual interest. This is really great when it comes to coffee tables, for example, because it's so easy to just lay things down and it's flat. But if you start to add stacks, it makes such a huge difference when it comes to what the eye sees. And also what I like to do, even when I have a vignette based on what we spoke about in the previous point, is make sure there's visual interest there too. So not only am I grouping things together, I'm making sure that everything on that tray, for example, in that grouping isn't on the same level and it doesn't fall flat. I make sure that, you know, if I have a vase, maybe I have something slightly shorter and I just work to play with the eye a little bit. I spoke about this in the video where I spoke about styling your home for fall and for autumn. I just like to make sure on my console table, for example, I have things that are varying heights and I kind of play with a rule of if I start with a tall lamp, I'm going to go down lower and maybe go back up. And that's a group of three. And then I do the same thing on the other side, or maybe I make that a group of five. But you get the gist. You need to add visual interest. And there's some great ways you can do this. You can get side tables and put things on top of side tables. I have side tables where I have plants sat on top of them because it looks more interesting visually, especially at eye level than having it just sat on the floor. So where it makes sense, try to incorporate this as much as possible. The next tip is to switch out your hardware, and this is such an easy fix. You can grab hardware from places like TK Maxx, HomeGoods, HomeSense. You can go to Lowe's. You can go to Home Depot. And you really just want to add some visual interest to your space by switching out the hardware. Sometimes you can make a piece of furniture, a cabinet, a bookcase look completely different by simply switching out the hardware. And I think this is such an easy thing to overlook sometimes, but it makes a huge difference. I got my island from eBay, as I've mentioned before. But what I did immediately I got it was just make sure I switch out the hardware to something that felt more interesting to me. And I absolutely love it. Another thing I would say, if your accent color in your home is gold, for example, maybe you do hardware around your kitchen cabinets that's brass. So you add some visual interest. It doesn't feel like everything is white and gold or black and gold. And especially if it's brushed brass, for example, like that kind of brushed effect. And even if you're going to get silver or stainless steel, if you go for something with a brushed effect, again, it adds some depth, it adds some character, and I feel like it just elevates the space so easily. Next tip is to go bigger in everything, artwork, mirrors, cabinets, bookcases. Honestly, it's so easy to want to play it safe and go smaller. So even when you're getting gallery walls, for example, people will get the smallest frames from Ikea. And it's like, if you just go for the big frames that they have, it would fill up the wall so much more beautifully. And I think this comes down to making sure the proportions make sense. When it comes to hanging art, it's great to make sure it fills up the right amount of the wall. There's some great guides that you can find online for this. The same goes for your TV stand, your console tables, your mirrors. I think it makes a huge impact when you have a larger than life mirror, whether it's hanging on the wall or even leaning. Honestly, don't try to play it safe. Go bigger. It will make the space feel more elevated. Again, back to the hotels and the resorts. When you walk in, you typically see a large piece of art, large chandeliers, something that feels... You don't want to go to the point of it being gaudy, but it feels elevated when it takes up the right amount of space, when the proportions work. And I think a great way to do this is making sure you have, again, visual interest when it comes to eye level and above. Because sometimes we stop at eye level. So we've spoken about making sure it's interesting at eye level. But when you walk into a space, typically your eyes do go up and come down. And it's great to make sure you've made as much use of the space as possible. Go big or go home. But you are home. So just go big. Go bigger than you think you should. And if you're unsure, there's great guides online that speak about how to make sure the proportions make sense. It ends up looking cheaper, sadly, when you have frames, mirrors, artwork that are just not proportionate to the space that you have. Go big. And there's some great hacks. Go big. Okay? Final tip is to go higher with your curtains and your curtain poles. I'm sure if you've been online on interior design TikTok or Instagram, you've probably seen this tip, but it makes a huge difference. You want to make sure that as much as possible, your curtain poles are closer to the ceiling than they are to exactly where the window starts. And it makes a huge difference when you have the curtains kind of going from as high as possible to the ground. And you want to make sure your curtains aren't swinging like ankle swingers. You want to make sure you have the appropriate length when it comes to drapery in your home because it will make your space feel more elevated, more luxurious. And you can grab great pieces from places like Amazon. It doesn't have to cost you an arm and a leg when it comes to your curtains and linen in your home. But honestly, going slightly higher than you think, again, makes a huge difference. You want to add things that will bring the eyes up. And I think you can do this when it comes to bookcases and cabinets that you have. So, for example, in another video, I mentioned when it came to my IKEA cabinets, I did not stop where the normal height was. I added extenders to them to let them go as close to the wall as possible. And if you can, you can even get someone in to come in and add some trim work around it to make it look like a built in. But you get that luxurious feel, once again, an elevated feel when it feels slightly more interesting visually, when it goes up slightly higher than you would normally go. Because sometimes when there's that naked space, you feel like, oh, what am I going to do with that space? And then if you're not careful, you start to have clutter build up in those spaces. So just go further up as much as you possibly can with your curtains, your cabinets. And even if maybe you can't do anything about the cabinets, go big when it comes to vases and things that you use to style the top of those cabinets. So it goes all the way to the ceiling as much as possible. Our bonus tip, no matter when you are watching this video, is to make sure you refresh your home seasonally. So for summer, for spring, for autumn, fall, winter, whatever it's called where you are, just make sure you are refreshing your home with the seasons. And again, it doesn't have to be super expensive. It can be as easy as adding some greenery into the space, some plants. It could be as easy as changing out your cushions, your throws, even for my bedroom. I love doing this and it makes such a huge impact when you are intentional with designing your space with each season. Because for me, again, my home has a huge impact on the way I feel mentally. And I want to be proud of my home, not just for the sake of showing it to other people, but because that's the space where I probably spend most of my time, especially for many people who work remotely, right? You spend so much of your time in your home, it makes sense to invest in elevating it. And it doesn't need to cost an arm and a leg. It could be as simple as just changing out your cushions, washing them, washing your curtains every so often. These little things will make a difference. Trust me. That's it, you guys. Thank you so much for watching. I'm so grateful for every single person who is here and who has subscribed already. If you haven't subscribed, make sure you click the subscribe button so you can see more videos. There are currently, I think, 11.5K of us here. And that makes me so happy and I'm so grateful for all the love and support. And I can't wait to continue sharing more and more with you. I'm so excited about some of the content that I have in store, especially coming up to Christmas. So, OK, guys, stay tuned. Bye.