Preparing your home for the arrival of a new family member can be a stressful experience. You might end up accumulating lots of new things or throwing away some of your most prized possessions. Looking at the home interior that you have so lovingly crafted over the years it is easy to see dangers everywhere.
You might think that childproofing your house involves sacrificing your beloved home interior in favor of ugly safety features. This is absolutely not the case. Here are some of the best ways you can prepare your abode for a new baby without sacrificing style.
Prepare for Mess
Children are messy. There is no way around this. In fact, making mess is an essential part of a child’s early development. Experimenting with materials helps a person understand the world around them. With this in mind, you should prepare your interior so that it looks great even when it isn’t completely spick and span.
Making sure that you have a forgiving floor is important here. Choose short fibered, dark colored rugs that are small enough to go in the washing machine. There will be crumbs, and there might be the occasional patch of vomit. Don’t shy away from buying stylish rugs. You can always wash them! According to Architectural Digest, a Persian rug truly suits a home with a new child, as they are often dark and sport very dominant patterns.
Avoid glass furniture and white pillows. These quickly start to look worn when they are messy.
Consult an Expert
The best way to incorporate child safety into your stylish interior is to work on a bespoke plan that includes safety as a constituent part from the ground up. If you have the money, it would be wise to consult an interior designer if you plan on going down this route.
An interior designer will be able to guide you through room plans, pick child friendly furniture and ensure that your house stays beautiful by making choices that will age well and wear gracefully. Consulting an interior designer is the easy part. Go to an interior design website such as https://nativainteriors.com/ and make an enquiry. Consultations are usually easy to get. At the very least, talking to the experts will help you to formulate your own plan.
Style on the Stairs
One of the most important areas you will need to baby-proof is the staircase. The danger posed to young children by staircases is obvious, but that doesn’t mean you have to go for an obvious safety solution.
Many people will settle for an ugly plastic or metal stair-gate to baby-proof their stairs. While this is a perfectly practical option, they do tend to ruin any atmosphere you may have deliberately created in your hallways.
There are alternatives on offer. Interior designer Charles Des Lisle has created bold wicker stair-gate designs.
Although Lisle’s work is rather expensive, it works as a proof of concept. More and more alternative stair safety designs are being popularized that diverge from the hospitalesque plastic and metal paradigm.