When you’re preparing your home for sale, you’re always looking for the perfect place to add a little glitz and glam. Because you are also looking to make your home attractive to many kinds of buyers, you may think that you are very limited. Your home stager will urge you to use neutral colours for broader appeal and there is a solid, scientific and artistic reasoning behind that advice. There is a place in your home, however, where glitz, glam, and artistry can carry the day and also give you the advantage styling. Interestingly, it’s probably the smallest room in your entire home.
Your powder room, because it’s small and often without windows, is a place many people would never use bold colour. It also happens to be a place where artificial light, reflective surfaces and custom-look fixtures can help transform this tiny space to make a dramatic statement that will captivate potential buyers.
Before you undertake this, or any other potentially expensive upgrades to your home, be sure to discuss it with your home staging professional. When you’ve committed yourself to the stager’s plan for presentation of your home, you don’t want to go rogue. Your stager truly knows best. Professionals in this industry go to great lengths to gather information about the market and potential buyers – information that’s worth its weight in gold. Ignoring that advice makes no sense. However, if you are willing to go a step beyond what must be done to bring your house to its very best, your stager will be delighted to help you put a bit of sizzle and shine to sometimes forgotten areas such as the powder room.
Colour it Bold
Even though it’s typically tiny that doesn’t mean that big, bold colours are verboten in the powder room. With great lighting and a little help from other reflective elements such as mirrors, your powder room can pull off a dark and dramatic colour. As with all paint choices, you should first test the paint in the room itself. (In a perfect world, you would already have installed any new lighting fixtures since its best to evaluate colour choices in all lighting situations.)
Have your paint professional provide you with sample pots of several of your colour choices. These sample pots are usually just a few dollars and the small expense will be well-spent.
If you have windows in your powder room, test paint colours on a wall that gets outdoor light and one that does not. This way you can evaluate the colour in both circumstances. Light has a way of changing the colour’s value and can completely change the choice.
Remember that the little paint chips you might have taken home previously are not large enough for you to truly judge the colour. Additionally, using anything other than the actual wall for this test doesn’t give you the full effect.
Paint good-sized patches – at least 30cm square – of each of your favourites directly on to the bathroom wall next to each other to get the full effect. If you are painting over a deep colour or want to try a more intense colour, paint the test area with a good primer first so that you won’t have any ghosting.
Apply a second coat and allow the paint to dry thoroughly, and then live with the colours for a few days or even a week, checking the colours in all lighting situations. When you’ve made the choice, run it by your stager just to be sure.
Once the colour is in place, forge ahead with your powder room transformation. Remember to take full advantage of the light you have available – add artificial light if the room seems dim – consider a small chandelier or some ‘over the top’ sconces to show off this room. Because the powder room is small, it can be your ticket to big-time design. The smaller spaces and limited surfaces allow you to consider other, more expensive materials and fixtures that pack a big punch in terms of that WOW factor you’re seeking.
As always, we’ll share other suggestions in future blogs that can help you achieve the best advantage styling outcome for your investment.
