words Alexa Wang
Have you ever heard of “biophilia”? In 1984, American biologist Edward Osborne Wilson popularised what is known as the biophilia hypothesis, which indicates that humans have an inward desire to connect with nature.
Edward was spot-on. Who doesn’t love nature? Nature has a calming, refreshing, and soothing effect on our minds and bodies. That’s why many people take holidays each year to visit all kinds of places, from the beaches in Cancun to touring the Grand Canyon. The good news is that you can bring nature right into your living room. Here are five tips to turn your indoor space into a breathtaking natural attraction.
Add Houseplants
The most obvious way to add nature to your living room is to bring in houseplants. Nothing adds beauty, luxury, and enlivens a living area like lush flowers and foliage. Aside from their aesthetic benefits, indoor plants have several advantages.
Several studies have shown that indoor plants can improve your mood and reduce stress, fatigue, and anxiety. Additionally, houseplants purify the air by absorbing toxic substances. Houseplants are also a productivity booster: they can sharpen your focus and increase your creativity. Here’s a roundup of some creative ways to add houseplants to your space.
A Large Plant by the Sofa
A large indoor plant such as Areca Palm, Dracena, and Umbrella Papyrus, can add a vibrant touch to your living room. While you can place such plants in the corner, it will look terrific beside a sofa.
Use a Cart or Bench
Create a long cart or a long bench and place many small flowers on it. Stylishly arrange these flowers to add a special touch to your living room. A bench can work well as a complement to your TV set or close to your windows.
Shelves and Racks
The great thing about shelves and racks is that they can be positioned anywhere in your room. These shelves can contain different pots of plants containing various plants.
Macrame Hanging Pots
It’s not only your chandelier that can hang from your roof and give your living room an extra glow. A macrame hanging pot can give your living room an exciting new look.
Quirky DIY Pots
There is a wide range of beautiful templates for DIY pots you can find online. These pots come in all shapes and sizes, and you can paint them however you like. Put your favorite plants in these homemade pots and place them in different areas of your living room. It could be your coffee table, beside your television set, or even between chairs.
Create a Living Wall
Instead of having paintings hanging on your living room walls, you can create a living wall. This kind of wall is a vertical garden where you can grow a wide range of plants. This artistic garden adds a unique feel to your living space.
Once you decide on what plants to use for your living space, find a company that supplies lovely flowers and does plant delivery – Bouqs is an excellent example.
Make Your House Smell Like Nature
One of the reasons we love the outdoors is because of the sweet scents and smells that nature offers. The good news is that you can bring these aromas right into your living room. First of all, open your windows and doors sometimes to let in some fresh air. Fresh air not only displaces stale air, but it brings a fresh smell to your room as well.
Second, you can use a diffuser to help maintain a pleasant fragrance in your living area. Electric diffusers deliver just the right amount of scent, and add moisture to the atmosphere as well. The electric fan in the diffuser blows air at the pad or water, dispersing the electric diffuser’s essential oils.
Alternatively, you can use a reed diffuser to get the job done. These diffusers have narrow-neck bottles with long sticks inserted. The long stick or rattan helps spread the bottle’s fragrance by absorbing and allowing the perfume to travel up the stalk into the atmosphere. You could also click for home scent machines that spray your selected scent using a fan or heat. These devices spread the scent all over your living room, creating a refreshing atmosphere.
There are also many DIY ways to make your home smell good. There are DIY hacks online for nature-scented living rooms, including orange peels, smudge sticks, vinegar bowls and homemade air fresheners.
Use Natural Materials
Another way to bring nature into your living room is by using natural materials to build your home, and in this case, your living room.
Besides adding a natural feel to your living space, using natural materials reduces our reliance on man-made materials. In the long run, this green building technique is beneficial for the environment. Let’s look at some of the common natural materials for building:
Wood: From pine, to cedars to redwoods, there are many types of wood available for building. There are many aspects of your living room that wood can beautify. For instance, your ceiling and flooring can be made entirely of wood. In addition, choose to have wooden chairs or sofas instead of metallic ones.
Bamboo: Bamboo is a special kind of wood that adds style and class to your living room. It can be used for various purposes, including blinds, room dividers, window treatments, flooring, and ceilings. You can even use bamboo as walls for your entire living room. When you add lights, it creates a beautiful ambiance in your living room.
Brick and Stones: Bricks and stones are an exciting and beautiful way to make your living room come alive. Whether it’s adobe materials or other materials made of earth, bricks and stones bring a beautiful accent to your living room. You can also add rocks to your living room as decor.
Create a Wall Mural
A wall mural is meant to be a showstopper, making a big statement with stunning designs. Since the 19th century, murals have been a common feature in the design of meeting places and spaces.
In particular, churches have been known to have many wall murals showing their beliefs and practices over the years. These days, you can create murals for your living space with ease. Whether it’s wallpaper or a painting, these murals for living room walls or in any wall add life to your living area. People will be impressed by the unique and custom look this creates. Not only that, art is beneficial for your mental health.
A mural can also be a source of inspiration for painting the rest of your room. You can choose your living room color and theme from the mural. The great thing about these murals is that you can choose from a wide range of designs: from forests, rivers, mountains and skies to animals and flowers, there are so many nature-themed mural ideas to choose from. To make your life simpler, you can use a site like Wallbeard to create your custom wallpaper.
Increase Natural Light in Your Room
One enduring characteristic of nature is light. Whether it’s the dizzying glare of the sun or the beautiful glow of the moon, nature has ambient light all around. To bring nature into your living room, good lighting is a must. There are many benefits to lighting up your room properly. First of all, an illuminated room looks and feels more spacious and lively. Also, great lighting helps to lighten or set the mood in a living space, and improves our overall health as well.
To increase the lighting in your room, reduce your use of blinds and curtains to allow a lot more natural light into your living room. Mirrors have a unique way of spreading the natural light that seeps into your room, so consider strategically placing mirrors in your hallways to brighten them up.
Paint your living room with bright colors. White usually lightens a room, while giving you a neutral background to highlight different accent colors in your decor. Also, you choose sofas and curtains with lighter colors. Don’t hesitate to use lights – including pendant lights, lamps and skylights – to give your living room the glow it deserves.
Nature Is the Way to Go
If you are constantly thinking about how to incorporate nature into your home, you deserve a pat on the back. Thinking green does not only help conserve nature, but it ensures that we live healthy. Your living room, where you spend most of your time, should have a nature theme to it. Explore these five tips and customize them with your own style, until your living room looks like an extension of nature.
