DECORATING A FOYER THE EASY WAY

Decorating a foyer is so important because it gives anyone who walks through our front door a first glimpse of a warm and welcoming home We all want our foyers to be a happy and beautiful place to step into. Here are easy things you can do to create a great first home impression in your foyer.

I think foyers are the hardest room in the house to decorate!!!

A foyer has a big job! It’s the welcoming committee of your home and sets the mood for the rest of our home.

It needs to be functional and pretty too. Let’s look at simple and pretty and functional ways you can make your foyer the best place to welcome friends and family!

My foyer has gone through a big change recently! It used to have a very different vibe!

I’m finally striking a new tone with my home. We have lived at our Tanglewood House for two years now and I’m adding more Transitional furnishings with a Traditional feel.

And, in the foyer, I’m adding a bit of color!

WHAT CAMP DO YOU FALL IN?

We all have a foyer. Some are at the threshold of the room we walk right into from outside and some are more of a room than an entryway. No matter how small or how palatial most of us fall into one of two camps when it comes to foyers.

The first camp is the functional camp. Our foyers are just a landing spot for someone coming into our homes. We might have a doormat to wipe feet and a place to hang a coat. It’s a foyer all about the business of function.

The other camp is more fabulous. Having a pretty introduction to our home is most important. If you are in this camp having an attractive space to define your look is most important.

Which camp are you a member of?

Well, the sweet spot for decorating a foyer is to have one foot firmly planted in each camp. Let’s think about function and fabulous when it comes to decorating your foyer!

START DECORATING A FOYER AT YOUR FRONT DOOR

I think a foyer really begins at the outside of your front door. Your front door ties the outside and inside of your home together. So why don’t you make your front door welcoming!

Our home right now is decorated for fall and so are our outdoor spaces. So anyone coming to our front door will get a big autumnal hello!

Make sure your front door is clean and painted to reflect your style and hang a big seasonal wreath on it!

Doing these easy things will set the stage for what visitors and family will see when they enter your home.

You can see how to make the wreath on my front door HERE. It’s super easy!

CREATE A DISTINCTIVE WELCOMING SPACE INSIDE YOUR FRONT DOOR

No matter the size, a foyer needs to be a specific space designated to greet people who come into your home.

Unlike the back door or garage entrance or other entry points in your home, a foyer is a “formal” spot to welcome people who come in your front door.

Our foyer is very long and a bit wide too. Quite an unusual shape.

I’ve seen a huge sweep in decor styles lately. And pretty is back in a big and more modern way! I just love it. So our foyer is beginning to reflect that style change.

I love trends but don’t follow most of them. But I am totally embracing the change to a more attractive, transitional look!

The new look of the foyer really plays up the accent color I love right now! And is a preview of what will be found in the rest of our home.

This brings me to my next point…

CREATE A FOYER THAT LOOKS LIKE THE REST OF YOUR HOME

Your foyer should be a little preview of what the rest of your home looks like. It should be part of a cohesive look for your whole house.

The change in our foyer started with the white console table. Just adding that one piece started the change in the foyer. And it created a look that worked with the rest of our home.

From there I added a new lamp and rug.

There are more changes to come but like anything change is often slow!

Make your foyer cohesive with the rest of your home.

WHAT EVERY FOYER SHOULD HAVE… IN A PERFECT WORLD

Every foyer should have these things…

• an indoor mat or rug right inside your door to wipe your feet
• some type of lighting
• a place to sit
• a place to hang a coat or drop a handbag
• a place to hold keys or sunglasses like a table or buffet or bookcase
• a mirror
• art
• something personal
• flowers

Notice this list is both functional and fabulous. There’s a little of both.

Yes, wouldn’t that be great! But many of us, if not most of us, do not have a foyer that large to addommodate all or most of the things on the list.

So here’s my best advice…

If you have room for these things to comfortably fit in a foyer go for it. If you don’t, pick what is most important for the comfort of your guests and the cohesiveness of your home. And then add some things that make your foyer extra pretty if you have room.

Do not crowd so much in a foyer or entryway that you and the people who come through your front door are uncomfortable.

WHAT I HAVE IN MY FOYER

Let’s start with the rug because it fills this space with color!

Our foyer is too wide for a runner so I added a 5×8 very traditional rug to our foyer with big color! This introduces the accent color I’ve added to our home.

I do not have a mat at the door because this rug can handle any dirt or mess. It’s easy to clean up.

If you are adding a rug to your foyer make sure it is easy to clean because our foyers get a lot of foot traffic!

Above the console I opted for beautiful scripture verse that blesses all who visit our home.

And to the left of the verse is a vertical coat rack. Although we have a coat closet further down the hall this is such a nice thing to have. When I know we are having company I it empty so our company can hang things on it.

When we are not expecting company I decorate it with seasonal items. Right now I have a market basket filled with green stems with rust berries.

I also added a chair from the basement because I like the idea of having a place to sit in the foyer but I’m not sure it will stay. I’ll live with it for awhile but I bet it will go back to the basement.

MIX FUNCTIONAL AND FABULOUS

Like I said earlier, find the sweet spot for decorating a foyer is a mix of functional things you need in your foyer and things that make the foyer pretty and welcoming.

Just remember function always trumps fabulous. But often function can be pretty!

The new lamp adds soft ambiance to the foyer as does the candles on the other side of the console. They are both pretty and functional!

KEEPING THE FOYER SPARKING CLEAN

I think the foyer should be the cleanest area of a home. It makes the first impression and when your front door and the windows around the front door and the foyer is so so clean and tidy what a great welcoming impression it makes!

Just in case you get a call from, let’s say, your dear Aunt Audrey and she is stopping by and your home is a mess I have a really practical post about how to fake clean your home in 20 minutes. You can probably fake clean your foyer in about 5!

In this post you can see our StoneGable foyer and how I decorated it with functional and fabulous things too.

See HOW TO FAKE CLEAN YOUR HOME IN 20 MINUTES here.

LESS IS BEST IN A FOYER

The longer I decorate I see the great beauty in simple decorating and design.

Keep small collections and easily tripped over area rugs out of the foyer. Choose pieces that fit the space and accents that don’t get lost in the rest in the decor.

One of my favorite decorating mantras is worth keeping in mind when decorating a foyer…

BIGGER IS BETTER AND LESS IS BEST

You can see a post about LESS IS BEST DECORATING here.

CHANGE YOUR FOYER SEASONALLY

One of the things I love to do is to change out my foyer decor seasonally. I like to put something in the foyer that reflects the season at hand! In the fall I might add a basket of white pumpkins to the console. At Christmas, I might hang a wreath and some Christmas ornaments on the vertical coat rack. You get the idea.

I think this gives us a chance to really look at our foyer. I often talk about being decor blind in decorating posts. Sometimes we really don’t see how the decor in our homes looks because we see the same decor day after day! And after a while, we get so used to it and we actually don’t focus in on the details!

Don’t become decor blind. Change up the decor in your foyer to keep it fresh!

I hope you find this post helpful for decorating your foyer to be both functional and fabulous!

SOURCES FOR MY FOYER