We’re living in an age where, increasingly, our home spaces need to do double duty.

Not only are we demanding more and more in terms of functionality and versatility (hello home office squeezed into the lounge or dining room), but we also want our living spaces to offer something more intangible – a mood, a sense of escape and sanctuary from the stresses of the outside world. 

It’s a lot to ask of a home, yet by making smart colour choices and working to your home’s strengths, achieving both is entirely possible.

Exploring colour with carpet

Colour has the ability to uplift, calm and inspire, and can also be used to create interior zones, and improve a home’s spatial flow.

Your flooring decisions are a perfect way to harness the power of colour, and carpet – with its inherent comfort and feel-good factor – will make an exponential difference to the mood of a living space.

Whether it’s laid across an expansive open-plan area with abundant natural light, or in a cosy space that relies more on artificial light sources, the appearance of carpet instantly signals a desire to create tactile comfort. 

Use light coloured carpets, or even neutrals if you want to play to that sense of space; and similarly, a darker hue in a smaller space will help create a cocooning effect, particularly when combined with dark and moody wall paint colours. 

The Antilles Twist in Sandstone from Carpet Court is a great option for a lighter carpet; the Alpine Retreat range in Bulla is a great neutral option, and for a more dramatic, darker choice, look to Hideaway Lodge in Bluebird for an incredibly chic dark navy blue.

The colour of your carpet can also go a long way to underscore the architectural elements in your home.  A classic Hamptons-esque home will respond beautifully to a sea-blue carpet, such as Celeste from the Passionate range.

Similarly, a dramatic carpet such as Coal Black from the Avant Garde range will add further monochromatic gravitas to a mid-twentieth century Brutalist-style home. 

The recent nostalgic appreciation for 1980’s homes means we will be seeing a lot more muted pastels in celebration of that era, such as Peony and Muscari from The Luxe Palette range.

Toning with the timber look

Similarly, the hue choices you make when selecting a timber or timber-look product will have a dramatic effect on the overall mood of your space. Remember that, unlike carpet, rather than absorbing light a timber floor will reflect it back up into a room.

Therefore, if yours is a less-illuminated, more intimate space and you’d like to add the illusion of more light to it, look to the paler timbers, such as Arctic White or Blanc from the Nature’s Oak range.

To create more warmth and intimacy to a large open-plan area, select a timber with reddish tones such as Jarrah from the Settler’s Run range.

If you’re attracted to the mood that a very dark floor establishes, try a strong deep grey like Bushfire Black from the Carpet Court Laneway vinyl plank range; or for an engineered timber, look at Black Forest, from the Nature’s Oak range.

As with carpet, the colour and style of timber flooring can enhance the architectural features of your home. Wider floorboards suit contemporary architecture, and slimmer ones definitely pay homage to a mid-twentieth century style. 

For a grand, high-end design, look to a Chevron or Herringbone pattern in Mink Grey from the De Marque ranges. Visit Carpet Court to explore a quality range of flooring options.

Photography supplied by Carpet Court.