Decorating and Design - Hallway

I need some help please! :wall: We have just started decorating our hallway stairs and landing, there are no windows so its quite dark. We want to wallpaper not paint, all the woodwork is white, including the doors, and we have just had a new pine spindle staircase fitted. Any ideas on a colour scheme that is bright, airey and makes the hall look bigger? Any recommendations on wallpaper as all the wallpaper I have looked at hasn't done 'anything' for me! We have silver light fittings and lights and we want something hard wearing on the floor but not wood, but a shade near the pine stair case would be good. I have some pictures to put on the walls and thought I might change the dark wood frames for silver ones?

Any advice would be much appreciated :)

what's going on in the rest of the house?? what is the subject matter of this artwork? the wallpaper you choose needs to compliment these things. the pattern shouldn't be so large that it fights with the artwork, or too hard to work with that all the rooms that come off of it will clash with it. i'd keep it more of a neutral, and let the other rooms be of bolder colors. keep the pattern small, i'd probably avoid stripes unless it's more of a tone-on-tone stripe. i wouldn't choose a wallpaper with a white background (unless the pattern is so small - like an allover pattern - that the solid white trim would stand out against it), but rather choose any other color, so that your pretty white woodwork stands out. i think the silver frames sound fine, but be careful combining the gray silver tones with the tan wood tones. maybe blend them together with a berber carpet that's speckled with both tans & grays on an offwhite background (that's not too yellowy-creamy).

Thanks for that Annette. I was thinking of a pale lemon colour, I have a white dado rail, is it darker at the bottom of the rail or top to make a room larger? The lounge is a pale blue and white with a pale blue carpet and white leather suite which you can see from the hallway, the kitchen leads off the hallway and is dark blue at the dining end and light oak wood at the kitchen end. My husband wants a pale green but I'm afraid it will clash with the lounge??

sorry, the artwork is photographs of places in London that are dear to us. We also have a really large space underneath the staircase which seems a waste but I don't know what to put there, any ideas on that? Not keen on bars, or book cases etc.

either the pale yellow or the mint green would work with your blues. the green might actually be better with the silver tones, but let the artwork dictate which is better. and then depending on which you go with, add some touches of that color to the other rooms to tie them together.

to open up spaces, use the same color both above & below the chair rail. but if you want to use 2 different shades, put the darker shade under the chair rail and the lighter shade above.

as for the alcove below the staircase, assuming it's the entry, is there room for a little desk? it could be a pretty spot with a small lamp & some nice accessories - a place to drop the mail & car keys. ......or.....how about a pedestal table with a round glass top displaying a really fabulous floral arrangement? or a coat rack? hall tree? bench? kinda depends on the style of your house & if it's the entry or some other area....???

Thanks a bunch. Yes I think the mint green, I am trying to get as plain as possible wallpaper as hubby dosn't want to paint but I don't really want much pattern. The table with flowers etc sounds nice, maybe I should get pine to match the stairs? or silver with a glass top to match the lighting oh my gosh! sorry these questions are never ending arent they!! :D The alcove under the stairs is right next to the lounge entrance. What colour carpet would go with the mint green do you think, I was thinking of a tough grass type flooring?

since it's wallpaper, you should be able to find a mint background paper with a small blue diamond or swirl or something in it - maybe even a faux marble pattern. i know looking through wallpaper books can be the most boring thing to do, but you will find it. most wallpaper books are sort of categorized, so look for book names like Mini Prints or Faux Textures, etc. or try going online & searching that way. you can search by patterns or colors. or, if you have a local decorating shop, the people working there should be able to find it for you in a matter of minutes (when i worked at a wallpaper/decorating store, we all had most of the wallpaper books memorized). but you really need to tie the blue & mint together somehow, or this hallway is going to seem out of place with all the other primarily blue rooms. get some mint throw pillows for the sofa and something mint for the kitchen - maybe a mint & blue fabric to use somewhere (curtain, placemats, etc).

hunting for the right entry table will be fun. think ahead to the vase or container the floral arrangement will be in when you're picking out the table so you can coordinate the two. maybe save the silver for the vase & go with a wooden pedestal to echo the wooden staircase.

as for the carpet - what do you mean by "tough grass type"? sisal? berber? i'm a huge fan of berber, so that's what i'd recommend. i love it because it won't crush or matte down like a plush since it's already as low as it can go, and it comes in so many multi-color combinations. the solid color ones look more formal, and have lots of different patterns to them, whereas the flecked ones look more casual & can help to pull several colors together. some of the darker ones really hide dirt & traffic areas well.

any beige/taupe neutral color will work with the mint color.

Thanks Annette, thats got the old brain working :) I'm off to bed now its getting on for 11 so I will leave you in peace now, thanks very much for all your help you've been brilliant, I will look out for the berber that you mentioned too.

Night.

Karen
X

you're welcome...........11pm??? it's 5pm here - where are YOU?

In the south east of England near the M25 about 20 minutes from London. You?

London England! cool!! i'm just here smack in the middle of the US (Missouri).