By Lauren
I received hardware from D. Lawless Hardware in return for writing this post. However, any opinions expressed are still my own and I promise I would only recommend products that I love and use myself!
We lived in our house almost a year before even touching the upstairs hallway. Since we didn’t have kiddos and the only people in that hallway were the occasional Airbnb guest, we just weren’t all that worried about it. But once we started working on our little boy’s nursery , we got inspired to update this space!
Like most of our house, it was painted a yellowy-tan with orange-toned wood trim (we had already painted the trim in this picture, but you can see what it looks like in the before pictures of our son’s nursery). There’s one big window opposite the hallway, but otherwise it gets almost no natural light and felt very dark and closed off.
A couple hours of work, some coats of paint, and a few pretty frames later, it looks so much better! If you’re looking to update your hallway, I recommend you try these five things that we did. They made all the difference and our hallway is now a space I love walking through!
1) Paint the walls a light, neutral color.
It seems like when a lot of people try to brighten a space without much light, they lean towards bright, cheerful colors. These colors can actually absorb the light to make it seem darker, and they also can throw off the flow of the house if you have different colors in all the rooms connecting to the hallway. One of our favorite ways to make spaces feel connected is to use paint colors off the same paint chip (that little card you get at the store). We chose a cool, white-gray that is the lightest shade on the paint chip where the other paint colors in our upstairs come from. This helps the whole space flow and it reflects beautifully the little natural light that we do have!
2) Bring in as much cool white as you can.
Orangey, wood trim darkens and ages a space so quickly. One of our first steps was to paint all the trim in the hallway white. It was a ton of work (and we had some much-needed help from my brother-in-law to paint all those doors) but it made a HUGE difference right away. We also installed new baseboard trim from Home Depot, something we’ve gradually been doing in our entire house. It brought out the cool, airy feeling of the walls and made the rooms seem bright instead of like dark spots along the hallway.
3) Update to hardware with silver undertones.
Our whole house had bright, shiny gold and brass doorknobs and hinges (see pictures below). They looked so out of place with all the cool white and gray tones in our house, so updating them was high on the to-do list!
I loved these satin stainless knobs from D. Lawless Hardware. They look so much more modern but still feel simple and classic. Updating hardware is a great way to update the whole hallway if you don’t have the money to replace old doors (which we didn’t), and a place like D. Lawless Hardware is the perfect place to find affordable, stylish hardware!
4) Use simple, crisp wall decor.
I’m all about gallery walls and bold statement pieces on walls, but a hallway without much natural light is maybe not the best place for these. We used a few simple white frames from Ikea ($9 each, baby!) and some pictures I printed at Target to fill the walls and they add a little style and color without being overwhelming. Hallways are transitional spaces, so choose pieces that will catch your eye without having to linger too long. Since this is a space where mostly just family will be, it’s also a fun space to display favorite photos. I chose 5-6 photos that tell our love story, starting with a picture of us holding letters, an engagement pic, a wedding pic, our pregnancy announcement, and then a maternity picture. I’m excited to put more pictures with our little one on the opposite wall when he arrives!
5) Spray paint old vents or light covers.
Our house had all sorts of yellowed light and other switch covers. I brought them out into the garage, sprayed on a coat or two of spray paint, and voila: they look so much better! Spray paint is magical, y’all. When in doubt, use it.
Do you have the same problem with dark hallways as we do? What have you done to update them or brighten them up?
