8 Ways to Refresh Your Home for the New Year

The start of a new year means some­thing for every­one, regard­less of where you stand on the New Year’s res­o­lu­tion debate. For some, a new year sim­ply means a con­tin­u­a­tion of days. For oth­ers, there’s a cleans­ing feel­ing that comes with the change of a year. The oppor­tu­ni­ty for a clean slate, and to refresh parts of your life that have become stale. Con­sid­er­ing the amount of time we’re spend­ing at home late­ly, an impor­tant area in your life to revi­tal­ize every now and then is your home. Clut­ter builds up over time, liv­ing with the same fur­ni­ture becomes monot­o­nous, and items in the home can become stale with neglect. 

There are emo­tion­al and men­tal ben­e­fits to fresh­en­ing up your space, too. You might find your cre­ativ­i­ty gets a boost, your mood is ele­vat­ed or you have bet­ter men­tal clar­i­ty. Luck­i­ly, you don’t need to uproot your home every year to refresh it. These sug­ges­tions are easy to do and cost very lit­tle. Let’s kick 2022 off with a small pos­i­tive change in our lives, and bring that ener­gy into the rest of the year. Read on for 8 ways to refresh your home for the new year.

1. Switch up small decor items

Take stock of small­er pieces of decor in your home, and decide whether they still align with your style and life. After a year or so, you stop notic­ing decor items as they become part of the back­ground. If that’s your case, then mix it up! Try sell­ing items that no longer fit your vibe, and using the mon­ey to buy new, pre-owned pieces. Apt­De­co has thou­sands of decor items avail­able. Fil­ter by free or 50% off deliv­ery to get a great deal. 

If you don’t find any­thing you’re itch­ing to replace, try shak­ing up the place­ment of your decor. Switch out art pieces, re-orga­nize your book­shelf, or move your can­dle­stick col­lec­tion to a dif­fer­ent area. Anoth­er option—swap decor with your friends! You know the say­ing, one man’s bor­ing art is anoth­er man’s decor revitalization.

While you’re mix­ing things up, try out some oth­er eco-friend­ly decor tips that won’t break the bank or the environment.

2. Organize and declutter

You didn’t need to read this arti­cle to know that declut­ter­ing your space is a home refresh essen­tial. But did you know that clut­ter caus­es stress, even on a sub­con­scious lev­el? You may not real­ize it, but that pile of reject­ed clothes on your chair is cloud­ing up your mind, mak­ing it hard­er to be pro­duc­tive. You don’t need to go full throt­tle and attack your home; orga­niz­ing even one room or clos­et can make a huge difference. 

Our favorite meth­ods for decluttering: 

• The Kon­Mari method advis­es to only keep items that bring you joy. It might feel sil­ly decid­ing if a spat­u­la makes you hap­py or not, but after doing this exer­cise you’ll feel lighter and happier.
• Ask your­self: have I used or worn this item in 6 months? If it’s a sea­son­al item, give your­self a year. If the answer is no, it’s got to go! 
• The guilt method. This one hits hard. Did you just buy that shirt, but secret­ly hate it? Did an in-law give you a vase you’re only keep­ing out of guilt? Get rid of any items you’re hold­ing onto because you feel bad let­ting them go.

3. Sell items you’re not keeping

Just because you’re get­ting rid of some­thing doesn’t mean it needs to go direct­ly in the trash. There’s always some­one out there who will enjoy the items you no longer need! Try sell­ing or donat­ing them, or ask­ing friends/neighbors if they have use for those items. 

If you’re say­ing good­bye to fur­ni­ture or decor, try sell­ing it on Apt­De­co. We han­dle pick­up and deliv­ery, so you only need to wor­ry about list­ing the item. Our pric­ing tool is also extreme­ly help­ful when decid­ing the best price point.

For clothes and acces­sories, try Posh­mark, ThredUp, The Real­Re­al or Grailed. 

For appli­ances and odds and ends, Offer­Up and Face­book Mar­ket­place are your go-tos.

4. Add a fresh coat of paint (or wallpaper!)

Fresh paint just screams ‘refresh.’ Paint is nat­u­ral­ly asso­ci­at­ed with new begin­nings, and a new year should be no excep­tion. Try on that Gen Z col­or you secret­ly love, or give your space a mood­i­er feel­ing with sen­so­ry col­ors.

Wall­pa­per is anoth­er no brain­er when it comes to a refresh. Start small with the bath­room, or go big with a ful­ly wall­pa­pered room. If you live in a rental, peel and stick wall­pa­per will let you add and remove with­out back­lash from management.

5. Give your home a sensory refresh

Our noses get so used to our home’s scent that we nev­er real­ly know what it smells like. Bring in a new scent to your home to give your­self a sen­so­ry refresh. A new can­dle or incense will do the trick, or you can try a longer last­ing option like a diffuser. 

6. Add some plants

Ahh, there’s noth­ing like a new plant. Watch­ing it grow, fig­ur­ing out the right water­ing sched­ule, whis­per­ing sweet noth­ings to it. They say plants are the new pets. Plants also add fresh oxy­gen, and some help puri­fy the air. 
Plus, they’re gen­er­al­ly inex­pen­sive! New to the plant game? Try a snake plant or a ZZ plant to start. But don’t take our word for it, lis­ten to the experts.

7. Wash overlooked fabrics

Appar­ent­ly, you’re sup­posed to wash throw blan­kets every two weeks. Do we do that? Admit­ted­ly, not a chance. Items like throw pil­lows and blan­kets, cur­tains, duvet inserts and out­er­wear should be washed a lot more fre­quent­ly than (we assume) most of us wash them. Why not use the new year as a rea­son to go forth and cleanse? And if you’re into stay­ing on top of your pil­low clean­li­ness, you can turn your near year’s fab­ric refresh into a new habit. 

Try this slight­ly less intense time­line of how often to wash your fab­rics. 

8. Take on a new project

Take advan­tage of snowy week­ends indoors and take up a new project. Save some mon­ey by build­ing your own dec­o­ra­tive shelves, or cre­ate a gallery wall in an area that needs some extra love. 
Archi­tec­tur­al Digest com­piled a great list of week­end projects for renters.

How else do you refresh your home in the new year? Let us know in the comments.