While size isn’t everything in the world of home design, it often feels like a significant factor. Whether you’re living in a ranch-style house or a cozy bungalow, making your home appear and feel more spacious offers numerous benefits. It enhances your home’s aesthetic appeal, adds value to your property, and even makes your daily living more enjoyable. This is why homeowners and designers alike seek out clever hacks that create the illusion of more space without adding any actual square footage. HGTV’s Christina Haack is a trusted voice in the design world for transforming compact homes into bright, open spaces. Two of her top tips? Paint your home’s exterior white and use the same flooring throughout your home.
One of her standout tips involves the house’s exterior. To enhance your property’s curb appeal, she suggests painting your home’s exterior a stark white. In an episode of HGTV’s “Flip Off,” Haack described this as “a little trick to make the house appear larger than it is.” White is known for reflecting light, which makes surfaces look more open, airy, and bigger overall. It also imparts a modern vibe that is crisp and clean, standing out beautifully against surrounding trees and grass. White exteriors are timeless, offer a fresh aesthetic, and attract the attention of buyers and passersby alike.
Making your home’s interior look bigger
Maximizing space inside your home is a top priority for many homeowners. One of Christina Haack’s interior design tips for creating the illusion of space in a compact room involves flooring. She advises using the same flooring in most areas of the home, including the main living room, kitchen, bedrooms, and hallways. “I like sticking with the same flooring throughout bedrooms, throughout the whole house, besides bathrooms, laundry room, stuff like that, and then I like just putting down a rug because those are affordable and easy to switch out,” she explained to Parade Home & Garden. “I like consistency. I feel like it makes houses look bigger.”
Matching the color and material of your floors introduces cohesiveness and consistency throughout your home. This eliminates visual barriers that break up space and make each room feel individually smaller. Instead, the eye is drawn to the home as a whole, making the interior appear larger and more expansive. If you’re remodeling a smaller or cramped-feeling home, implementing Haack’s two hacks will create a lovely illusion of space and openness.
