May I recommend a mini makeover?
Fixing up tiny things can have a huge impact on your home.
“I’m making over our bedroom,” I proclaimed to my husband back in September of 2022. I had a checklist of tasks, including buying a new bed, painting the whole room, ordering window treatments, and getting a piece of marble cut for our dresser top: My plan was to tackle it all in a month. I even imagined I’d document it all and write about it.
I probably don’t need to tell you: This was very wishful thinking.
We did upgrade to a king bed (and our sleep is much improved for that extra space), but the paint, the curtains, and most of the other things I dreamed of? They are still waiting to get done.
However, getting a new bed did propel me to make some modest upgrades. I rehung the painting to be centered on the bed and moved a large painting from our hallway to the wall opposite our bed. Just two nails made a major improvement. (Turns out: Art really does make the room.) After procuring wall anchors from the hardware store, I properly installed our second bedside sconce. One wild Saturday night, I took the brass knobs off our dresser and spent an hour hunched over the sink polishing them to a shine with an ancient bottle of Noxon. (I suspect they’d never been buffed since they left the Winchendon Furniture factory in the 1950s.) I recently re-polished them and it feels like the dresser is giving me a happy little wink every time I look over at it.
None of this added up to anything that would make for an impressive “before and after,” but that’s not the point. These are tiny but satisfying projects—not ones that inspire decision fatigue. Nor do they require hours of your precious time. Most often, they can be done entirely with what is on hand without buying a thing.
With the change of the seasons upon us, I’ve been pruning unloved and too-small clothes from our drawers. When we pulled out our summer quilt and sheets, I treated myself to a cute pair of pillowcases that bridges the sheet and quilt colors and gives our room a little dash of pattern. On my list for next week is washing our sofa’s slipcovers, one of those why-did-this-take-me-so-long tasks that I ought to do more often, and the new pillowcases have given me a hankering to get new covers for our toss pillows, which my husband just reminded me we bought in 2011.
These changes are flea-sized compared to the grand renovations you see on Instagram, TikTok, or in magazines, but they really are palpable. My home feels so much better. You don’t realize what a big impact a small project can have until you do it.
Small improvement is also a sustainable and cost-saving approach to home design. Feeling ‘meh’ about your house might make you think you need to buy something new, but often you can get the same rush from improving what you’ve already got. Making modest updates helps you get to know your home better, which can help you avoid costly or wasteful mistakes. It also smooths the way for you to tackle big decisions with a clear head. For example, with our bedroom truly in order, I feel a little less paralyzed about choosing window treatments.
I believe exercising your taste on a small scale can also help you discover your big-picture vision for your home. For example, experimenting with a colorful lampshade might confirm your hunch that you want more bright color. Swapping out the hardware in your kitchen might make you realize you don’t really have the cabinets that much afterall. Each mini project makes you more sure of your style.
So, if you’re feeling stuck with your home, I encourage you to tackle a micro makeover: Polish some knobs, spackle holes, scrape paint off your window panes, ditch a dingy lampshade, strip your paint-covered kitchen cabinet hinges, spray paint an ugly light fixture (or fan blades), recaulk the seams in your shower, repaint or replace grimy switchplate covers, Kondo the contents of your bureau.
What micro home improvement would you most like to do? Tell us in the comments. Find something tiny to improve, and I bet it’ll kickstart a whole string of miniature makeovers.
Here’s a peek at our bedroom three years ago. Plus, here are a few good design stories from the archive:
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A Few More Things
The best small space I saw last week was the home of interior designer Megan Gibbon on ArchitecturalDigest.com. I found it refreshing to see a rental apartment that someone had fixed up and personalized—and to hear that it took her years to finish a curtain embroidering project!
Following: I’ve been following the plug-in solar movement via Bill McKibben’s excellent newsletter The Crucial Years. So I was pleased to see this opinion piece about it in the mainstream New York Times (gift link). New York’s legislature passed a bill that would allow New Yorkers to use plug-in solar to lower their electricity bills, but we still need Gov. Kathy Hochul to sign it (fingers crossed!). I personally would love to install one on my future shed!
Reading: I was unaware that #densebeansalad was a TikTok trend, but the New York Times has enlightened me (and I’m here for it!). Violet Witchel also has a Substack newsletter that looks like it’s full of appealing recipes.
Admiring: My son has a new-found interest in making Pinterest boards of admired clothing. The fact that he pinned one of these amazing The Wolves jackets makes me think I’m doing something right as a parent. So beautiful. But alas too expensive for us—maybe a DIY?
One last thing: Doing this.
FYI: This is an update of an essay that I published in the early days of the Living Small newsletter. I’m taking a few days off to visit with some family, so I may be slow on the comment replies. See you next week!
I love the idea of the small step. Done: a basket for all the books waiting to be read. Aspirational: clean off my desk.
I love the idea of mini makeovers! It’s actually a core idea in my business philosophy but I’ve never used that language (need to start!). Even though I have some training as an interior decorator, my work in decluttering and my focus on sustainability prevent me from constantly telling clients to buy more. I actually don’t want jobs to redo an entire house of furniture, finishes, etc, despite how lucrative it could be because I think these types of mini makeovers would be sufficient for most people, regardless of their budgets. And it would be a lot less wasteful in many cases.
As a renter the last ten years, with the budget of a solo parent and former high school teacher, these are the kinds of changes I’ve been making in my own home anyway. I just recently updated an area rug for the living room and it changed the entire look of the room and was much more in line with my style. I changed it in preparation for adopting two Chihuahuas because the old rug had been stained by the previous dogs, and despite several steam cleanings, I didn’t trust new dogs couldn’t smell something. I also wanted natural materials instead of the synthetic ones of the old rug and a move towards a more feminine version of Art Deco (pale pink geometric!) rather than the blah beige contemporary I had.
I also frequently change throw pillow covers (Ikea and Etsy are great) and duvet covers instead of painting the walls when I want a different look. And my children used to complain about me rearranging the furniture and decor every few months when they still lived at home!