Transform your Home into a Sanctuary (7 Tips Included)
Who wouldn’t want to have a home that is so incredibly tailored to their needs, so intentionally designed and styled in such a way that when you step foot in it, an immediate sigh of contentment escapes your lips? That’s what happens when you transform your home into your own personal sanctuary.
After all, most of us spend a lot of time within the walls of our home. We don’t want things to feel thrown together or disorganized. We don’t want it to feel too cookie-cutter, either. And we certainly don’t want our home to cause us anxiety. Rather our home should be instilling a sense of peace and calm within the very fiber of our being. And that is exactly what we at Kasia Karska Design do! Believe it or not, there are just a few simple steps you can take in order to transform your home into your own personal sanctuary.
Our owner and lead designer, Kasia Karska, is brimming with excellent advice and brilliant design solutions. Not to mention that transforming homes into sanctuaries is a speciality of hers and one of her greatest passions.
Below are the top seven tips Kasia would recommend. They will help transform your home into a sanctuary that is specific to your life and your needs. You can apply these tips to a home you may already live in. Or they can be incorporated into a home that you are dreaming of designing. Or maybe even a home that you are in the process of designing and building.
Tip #1: Name your home
Naming your home adds a personalized touch. You share more of a connection with the space and it becomes more than just walls. We’ve had clients name their homes after beloved pets, a beautiful view their home captures, or even in another language that speaks to their souls. It forges a deeper connection, a connection where it’s not just a house, it’s your home.
Tip #2: Inviting Spaces
Each area of your home should be inviting. Kasia learned early in her career to not just make the most used area of a home inviting. This inevitably takes the focus away from the remainder of the home. Rather, each area of a home should be equally inviting. She recommends not focusing on just one central space. Rather, look around your home and think of different areas within it where you tend to stop and pause during your daily routines. Each of those spaces should have equal consideration. Create attractive spaces in every area of home that are pleasing to the eye and inviting. You are then drawn into them to pause, sit down, look around, and enjoy the entirety of your home—instead of just one single room.
Tip #3: Cultivate a Quiet Space
After you finish our second suggestion, this is the next step. If you have a busy home with multiple family members, or if you are a person that leads a busy life, selecting a place within your home that is “your quiet space” is essential when working to transform your home into a sanctuary. Fill that spot with things that you love, things that will bring you joy, and things designed to calm you.
Kasia mentions that within Indian design tradition, puja rooms are a MUST. Kasia’s adaptation on a puja room is a room where one reads, meditates, practices yoga, etc. The room is ideally placed within the northeast corner of the home. Every quadrant within a home is responsible for different energies and has a different use. The northeast corner is the spiritual quadrant/planetary corner of the home. This makes it an ideal quiet space for you to take some time for yourself throughout the day.
Tip #4: Keep Nature Close
Even when being within the confines of your home, Kasia recommends always trying to stay close to nature whenever possible. Creating seamless transitions between indoor and outdoor space is a great place to start. You can have large doors that open onto a patio where it then feels natural to flit in between your indoor space and your outdoor patio.
Incorporating as much natural light into your home as possible is another great option. One way to do this is to drop the windows all the way to the floor. Natural light can then flow into your space and generate a sense of connection to the outside world, even in something like a high-rise scenario. The above are great tips if you are in the process of designing a home. But even swapping out some windows or adding a new window or perhaps extending your patio space can achieve similar results for a home that already exists.
Tip #5: Create an Ambiance of Tranquility
Kasia is a firm believer in filling your home with soft music, fragrant flowers, diffusers, candles, etc. All of this creates an ambiance of tranquility. Integrate things you love, that personally mean something to you, into the spaces, as well. Some examples are textures you love (like soft blankets and throws), beautifully designed decorative pillows, inviting scents that personally appeal to you, and treasured possessions that bring you joy. We had an avid fly fisherman client and fishing made him incredibly happy and brought such joy to his life. Kasia added a vintage fly rod to the wall in his home office. Even when he couldn’t be out on the water, he could simply glance over at the rod on the wall and feel that same sense of incredible joy that fly fishing brings. This is yet another tool to transform your home into a sanctuary.
Tip #6: Pick Your Colors with Purpose
Color selection for your home can sometimes seem like a no brainer. But strategic color selection can make all the difference. Depending on the room and what mood you are going for will determine what colors you choose—both on the wall, but also when it comes to furniture and accessories. Kasia gives two specific suggestions when it comes to color selection:
1) Make your powder room interesting. Do something that makes you smile, like funky wallpaper. And, don’t be afraid of dark colors in small spaces, like a powder room. That is a misconception that people often fall into.
2) For bedroom color selection, choose soothing, soft colors for the walls and muted tones overall. For example, lavender would be okay, but Kasia recommends no bright colors: reds, bright purples, oranges, etc. Bright colors are a mistake because they can disturb your sleep. Muted colors create a more tranquil and relaxing environment, inviting sleep to come easily and deeply.
Tip #7: More than a Bathroom
Kasia urges being intentional when it comes to designing and accessorizing your master bathroom. She likes to say that your bathroom should become a room in which you bathe. It should be a spa-like room that is deliberately thought out, just like any other room of your home. These are some elements you can incorporate in order to achieve a spa-like space: a rain showerhead, seamless glass doors on the shower stall, and elements of nature such as natural rock or flowers. By definition a bathroom is a room where you bathe, a room where you take your time, and a room that you spend a lot of time in. So design it in that manner. Include a comfortable chair (if you have the space) or stool to sit on and take a deep breath. Even small bathrooms can look spacious and feel inviting if you space plan well.
If you feel like the above tips were helpful, but you could use further suggestions and ideas to transform your home into a sanctuary, please reach out to us!
Kasia is a wealth of knowledge. Having designed and built a multitude of homes over the years, as well as being involved in the remodel and interior design of countless other projects across the globe, she will have sound advice and a creative vision that will take your home to the next level.
She is passionate about creating a home that is welcoming, warm, inviting, and calming. And, above all, she is very intentional in ensuring that each space she is involved with truly speaks to the owners who inhabit it. After all, we as people are all different. We have our own preferences and a unique set of elements that can be used to create our own personalized sanctuary. Kasia will discover exactly what those elements are for each and every one of her clients and then incorporate them into the design and end result of the project.
To learn more about us and what we do, visit our “About” page. Kasia Karska Design is a boutique design + build firm located in the Vail Valley, Colorado. We focus on the design and build of unique environments for infinite potential, tranquility, and inspiration.
“Your Life… Your Space… Your Sanctuary.”
All the beautiful photography by: Brent Bingham Photography