Posted in Article Submissions

Any good interior designer will tell you to start with a central point of your room, around which your decorative objects may flow. Once you have selected your focus, find pictures in magazines and decorating books for inspiration. Then follow these 10 tips to decorate the interior of your home successfully:

1. Choose a base object of decoration: select an object of great impact as a starting point. This piece can be a floor cushion with a beautiful fabric, a poster or a painting, a floral arrangement, a vase, a rug or anything that goes well with your style. This object will set the style, theme and tone you expect to create in space and help determine your overall combination of colors.

2. Extend the color: Colors are one of the most important elements in the decoration of a house and gives harmony, co-ordination and endless possibilities to a space

Generally, a space has three main colors in descending proportions: a main color, secondary color and an accent color. Repeat the accent color in all parts of your environment in different ways (repeat at least three times) with a few strategically placed objects.

For example, put a red decorative throw and pillows on the couch, a rug decorated with touches of red on the floor, then add some red candles to the fireplace or frame your paintings in red to draw some of the accent color up onto the walls.

3. Illumination: The lighting of a space is as important as the colors you choose.

Ceiling light fixtures are in most cases the only design element you will add to the biggest open space you are likely to ever come across in interior design, so think carefully how to utilize it. Wrought iron lighting can also completely transform a space as a piece of art by itself and also by giving other wall art and ornaments on shelves a new look choosing a nice lantern chandelier.

Table lamps, floor lamps and candles strategically placed in space can add warmth and interest where you need it most. Adding a new shade to a lamp also instantly changes the quality of light and the overall feel in the room.

Think about the effect you wish to achieve: crystal-accented light fixtures add sparkle, glamour and interesting plays of light and shadow. Murano and stained glass adds color and warmth. Brass, steel, wrought iron or copper can add anything from a classic to contemporary or modern to renaissance feel. Keep always open mind your choices about kids chandelier.

4. Finding a theme for your project is creative and enjoyable! A good theme will say something about yourself and your interests and will greatly simplify your decorating decisions when shopping.

Say your theme is Mediterranean decor, minimalistic decor, tropical decor or cabin decor, in each case the objects you choose will be basic enhancers in creating the look you want.

For example, you can easily create an “Old European” theme by adding some colorful glazed bowls, an oil painting (or print of one), simply adding a small chandelier or perhaps changing the wall color to tones of rich or soft pastels, or both.

The home is also a wonderful place to reflect the seasons with different holiday decorations. Have fun decorating with fall palates of oranges, browns reds and ocres, or let your living room be reborn with fresh cut flowers and fresh, bright colors for spring.

5. Refresh with floral decorations: floral decoration - from wreaths and silk flowers, to silk plants and fresh cut arrangements can bring a fresh perspective to your space and really make it come alive.

You can easily integrate your flowers and plants with any theme, whether it is adding a terracotta pot for Tuscan flair, tropical silk flowers or plants for your island theme or fresh cut lilies to welcome spring with both an eye-catching centre piece and a lovely fresh fragrance.

A single tulip in a simple ceramic vase on a mantle can have as much impact as an overflowing silk flower arrangement that adorns the dining table. The key is to add that little burst of color and vibrancy.

6. Decorate the walls: Pretend that your walls are a blank page, regardless of the color of paint. There are many items to decorate your walls, from paintings and posters to shelves, tapestries, sconces and boxes which make it difficult to know where to start. Remember to put your theme or style as the ordering principle.

Acrylic display shelves, highly fashionable posters, reinforce a modern style, while black and white pictures in wooden frames can create a sense of antiquity. To unify a group of pictures, frame them in similar frames.

Synchronize your wall art in relation to the size of the wall and furniture. The landscape paintings and posters with images of a scene open a small space and create “a window outside”, as do mirrors. Whereas modern art works well in wide open spaces and bring you “in”.

Posted in Article Submissions

Pest Control in Cheshire, Lancashire and Manchester has seen a relatively early this year which is very surprising given the somewhat cold winter of 2009/10.

Pest controllers were kept working with the usual city centre rats and mice calls throughout the winter of 2009/10, but the relatively cold early spring has already seen ant infestation coming in.

The wet summers of 2008 and 2009 were not to the liking of the hymenoptera (sawflies, wasps, ants & bees) but 2010 looks like being a busy year for flying ant callouts.

Frequently ants nest under the floors of houses and inside cavity walls causing a large number of foraging ants to enter kitchens and food cupboards.

However it is at the annual mating time when they can be most annoying as they produce winged queens and males which then mate on the wing.

The emergence of thousands of these flying ants inside houses can be horrific indeed.

A relatively new pest was quite numerous in the the North West area last season, the Varied Carpet Beetle (Anthrenus verbasci).

It was rare for pest controllers in Cheshire, Lancashire and Manchester to meet these pests until recent times but they seemed to arrive from nowhere in 2008 and already this March has seen reports of these insects in unprecedented numbers.

These beetles have a similar life cycle to moths their larvae, called woolly bears devour natural fibres and can do great damage to carpets and any fabrics. They are a difficult and tricky pest to remove.

Bed Bugs are continuing their come back in the the North West area, regularly arriving as hitch-hikers in the suitcases of home-coming holiday makers.

Regularly the first reaction of those unlucky ones who realise that they are infested with these horrific,blood-sucking insects is to get rid of the old beds and purchase.

This is a costly error as despite their name bed bugs do not just hide in beds and in an infested bedroom will be found everywhere within up to five metres of the bed, in cupboards, drawers etc, even in electrical and telephone sockets and the new beds will be quickly re-infested.

Many people mix up bed bugs with dust mites which are not visible to the naked eye.

They dine only on blood which they drink from their sleeping victims. People often associate bed bugs with insanitary conditions but nothing could be further from the truth, they do not require squalor, they eat you!

Until April 30th 2010 Harrier & Manchester Pest Control are offering a twenty-five percent reduction on their guaranteed ant treatment.

The revolutionary treatment which is guaranteed for three years, extendable indefinitely in additional three year chunks by a simple re-treatment every three years, can be carried out in most properties subject to free site survey

For the summer of 2010 Harrier Pest Control are providing a fixed price for destroying wasps nests in the Cheshire, Lancashire and Manchester area of just thirty two pounds.

Contact Harrier Pest control for more information on 0800 019 8382 or 0161 930 8814