Creating a Focal Point – Guest Post by Two Story Cottage

As we say goodbye to February, I have one final guest blogger for you. It is with great pleasure that I introduce you to Erin from Two Story Cottage.

If you haven’t been in Erin’s Two Story Cottage, she gives her readers a warm open invitation to view her beautiful home.

Reading her blog is like leafing through the pages of a home design magazine! And she shares her decorating secrets with you! Her home can be described in one word, GORGEOUS! Be sure to accept her invitation to view her home today.

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Please welcome Erin from Two Story Cottage.

Dear Friends of Pretty Handy Girl,

Hi! I’m Erin @ Two Story Cottage. I’m a catalogaholic who enjoys art and all things cheerful in decor. As a Mom of two little ones I’m working to achieve balance between my creative side and my responsibilities at home. I’m a DIY newbie so I’m a total work in progress!

Today is the last day of “Falling in Love with your Home” so I’m hoping that by now you are smitten. If not maybe creating a focal point will tip you over the edge. The goal of a focal point from a design perspective is to draw the viewer’s eye to a central point. Do you have a room in your home that needs some “umph”? Or maybe you are looking to focus attention away from something else? Creating a focal point may be your answer.

There are many great ways to accomplish this! I’ll show you some ways I have created focal points in my home.

A Focal Point Using Color
We have a TV over the fireplace in our family room which I like to draw attention away from. To do that I hung a large, bold painting on the perpendicular wall.  It draws your eye away from the TV wall for sure!

A Focal Point to Ground the Room
We have a living room/ dining room combination that felt like a bowling alley. To help define the living room I created a large focal point by adding a fireplace ( an ambitious project for a DIY beginner like me). The addition of the fireplace served two purposes. It took attention away from the looong space but also served as a central point to arrange furniture around.  I painted it white and used glaze to antique it for contrast so that it would stand out a little more while staying within my neutral palette.
A Focal point to distract from the obvious

My desk in the breakfast room is large and seemed to stick out like a sore thumb in our very open home. An unintended focal point! However, I did NOT want to get rid of my workspace so I decided to take attention away from its’ purpose. I took away all of my obvious office supplies and utilized the shelves to decorate it as if it were a buffet. I also mounted the hutch to the wall and added Ikea cabinets
underneath to store all my clutter.

A Focal Point to Create Interest
My dining room is very neutral and I love it but it needed something to jazz it up a little. Enter my accent wall. A few stripes and decoupaged plates took it from barely noticeable to “wow”.

Thanks for letting me guest post, Brittany.  You have definitely empowered me to find my inner DIY skills!

Thank you Erin! I hope you enjoyed her post on Focal Points. I realize I have some work to do in a few of my rooms now. How about you?

This concludes the “Falling in Love with Your Home” series at Pretty Handy Girl.

This is also your last chance to enter my 1,000 follower giveaway. Be sure to enter HERE,
because I will be choosing a winner on March 1st!