Do You Need Decorating Inspiration? Try a Teacup

Sometimes, don’t you just need some decorating inspiration? I know I do. And I have a little trick that always seems to get my creativity sparking!

When You’re Stuck

We all get stuck sometimes. You know – where you want to do whatever it is, but you don’t have any real motivation or ideas.

I’ve had projects that I’ve dinked around with for years. The wall color for the downstairs bathroom. Modern or Traditional for the bedroom. What the heck to do with my office-slash-weaving studio-slash-guest room.

It’s times like these that we need some decorating inspiration.

Inspiration and Motivation

Inspiration is like magic. Once you catch it, things that used to be hard become easy. Exciting! You’re full of energy and enthusiasm. You just can’t wait to get going on that project and make it beautiful!

In theory, you can get decorating inspiration from a lot of places. Books, magazines, Instagram. Songs, stories, works of art. A walk in the woods, a long bubble bath. A bolt from the blue.

But what if it’s just not descending?

A Focal Point

There’s a common decorating practice that we’re probably all aware of – choosing a focal point for your room. Famous designers do it, and we do it ourselves all the time.

Maybe you have a coffee table, a special work of art, or – let’s say – a rug. You think to yourself, “That would be a perfect rug to have in this room.” So you plop it on the floor and fill the room with things that complement it.

My decorating inspiration-sparking trick is a combination of this concept, and a similar one I got at a writer’s seminar. (I wasn’t there because I was a writer! I was just with someone who was a writer.) The instructor told us to pick an object we had with us, and just free-form on it. Write whatever came to our minds with the object as the focus. The focal point.

Teacups as Decorating Inspiration

I’m sure you can see where this is going. My trick uses teacups as the focal point for decorating inspiration! Really it could be anything, just like at the writer’s seminar. But if it’s something you love (like I love teacups,) that’s a great place to start.

For some reason, every time I see a teacup, decorating inspiration hits. I immediately want to design a little vignette around it. What style is the cup? How could I bring out the colors? What lighting, textures, shapes, what flowers would complement it?

It’s an intermediate step that lets you free-form without pressure. Like a brainstorming session. If when you’re done, it’s not exactly what you want for your room, you just make another. All you’re doing is creating something pretty around your teacup. A slightly different kind of mood board, if you will.

Just pick out a teacup – or other item – that has the vibe you’re going for. And if you don’t know what vibe you’re going for, just keep picking things up anyway. Even if it you don’t think it hits the nail right on the head, give it a try. You might come up with something that surprises you.

Translating Inspiration into Decoration

Then I take the colors, shapes, and textures and see how they could translate to a room. Furniture, textiles, art, flooring, wall color – everything!

For instance, the little vignette in the photo above gives me design inspiration to decorate my master bathroom, of all things! I’d use the colors of the vignette – my favorites – cream, ivory, white, gold, and rose. The walls and fixtures would be white. Maybe the walls would have some subtle stripe-y action, reminiscent of the book pages. The hardware would be gold. And there’d be big, luxurious, fluffy cream colored towels and rugs with texture, texture, texture! Maybe some art with a gold filigree motif. Then to top it all off, I’d add some lovely salmon pink details! Ahhh…

In the meantime, here are some more teacup vignettes for decorating inspiration!

An art gallery.

A library.

A garden room.

A wine cellar.

An outdoor living room.

A little girl’s secret hideaway.

See how much variety there can be? And this is just one vignette per teacup. You could break through the block even further by doing several different vignettes with each cup!

So next time you need some decorating inspiration, try this little trick. It’s a great way to open things up and spark some new ideas. Plus it’s really fun!

Leave a comment below and share what you do for inspiration – we can never have too much! Thanks for being here!

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• Metamorphosis Monday #682 – Hosted by Between Naps on the Porch