Interior Design And Furnishing Ideas For Your Extension

It’s difficult to contain your excitement at the prospect of a new extension being added to your property as it provides you with an additional room to inject your personality and celebrate home living.  

The two most popular forms of home extension are conservatories and orangeries and each offers unbelievable spaciousness. Their roominess needs to be exploited and by that we mean that you should thoroughly furnish them and turn a conservatory / orangery interior into something that captivates the whole family.

But, where do you start? It can feel quite daunting staring at a large, blank interior when you don’t know how best to add flair to it.

Here are a few ideas to get your creative juices flowing…

Furniture

When buying any furniture for your extension bear in mind its interior will regularly be exposed to sunlight, so you’re probably wise to avoid installing any leather furniture as there is a risk the material will gradually fade. Upholstered, wooden and rattan furniture work better for conservatories and orangeries as they can cope with exposure to sunlight and aren’t like to split or swell.

Flooring

A fully carpeted floor is asking for trouble if you have an integrated door in your conservatory or orangery design that provides an opening into the garden. Can you imagine how distraught you would be if someone were to walk all over it with dirty feet brought in from the garden? Engineered wood flooring or tiled flooring is a more sensible choice as you can easily wipe them clean and cover parts of it with attractive floor coverings.

Colour

Keep things light would be our advice as when the sun comes into contact with lighter colours it generates an airy feel inside these kinds of extensions. That’s doesn’t necessarily mean being too plain though. To contrast against a light colour scheme you could always add a statement piece in a vibrant finish – perhaps an armchair, something that stands out from everything else. For an on-trend colour look no further than ‘Spiced Honey’, Dulux’ Colour of the Year for 2019.

Lighting

When the sun goes in you will still want to be able to use your conservatory or orangery and in order to do that, you need the right sort of lighting. The plastered perimeter ceiling within an orangery can accommodate recessed downlights that will give the extension a real atmospheric feel at night. Mounted wall lights can also be mounted onto any solid wall within either of these extensions or conservatory owners can kill two birds with one stone by commissioning the fitting of a central fanlight as it will both keep them cool and help them see what they’re doing.

You can get further interior design and furnishing ideas on our Inspirations page where there’s an online showcase of some of our finest conservatory and orangery installations.