Decorating A Manufactured Home: Tips For Tough Spots

Congratulations on your new home! You’ve probably been waiting for a while for it to be manufactured and installed in place. (Of course, it didn’t take as long as a stick-built home.) And now that it feels like a dream come true, it’s time to make your house a home.

Manufactured homes come with certain features that can make decorating seem like the biggest challenge you’ll ever face. You must learn to overcome these trouble spots to make your home the space you have always wanted. Interior designers use different tricks that we’ll share with you here. Don’t despair; you can make your home look great, even in those tough areas. Decorating a manufactured home doesn’t need to be challenging. Just follow these tips!

The trouble spots when decorating a manufactured home

Ceiling heights

Not all manufactured homes are created equal, but they do share several features that give the houses a consistent look. You must acknowledge and work on these features to make your home unique. For instance, the ceiling heights in mobile homes are always much shorter than traditional homes. While adequate, tall furniture will overwhelm them. To make your room seem larger and taller than it is, you can use some of these decorating tips:

• Extend the paint color of your walls a few feet on the ceiling to create the optical illusion of a taller wall. You should use cool colors on the walls because they recede from the eyes, so it makes your rooms seem larger than they are.

• Go with furniture longer in length but shorter in height instead of using tall pieces. This trick will draw people’s attention away from the ceiling and around the perimeter of the room instead. You can also lower the wainscoting panels or the chair rail, which will make your walls appear a lot taller.

Narrow rooms

Not all manufactured homes come with the same dimensions, but most of them have walls that are longer instead of wider. Combined with narrow hallways, your house may look very cramped. However, with a few tricks here and there, you can make your rooms appear wider and create a balance in the rooms. Here are tips you can use to implement this:

• Paint the wall on one of the short ends of the room with a warm color. Use cool colors on the other walls. The contrast created by the warm color will bring the wall closer. This will help balance the room’s appearance.
• In all the narrow rooms or areas in your home, you can install tiles, hardwood or laminate diagonally. Diagonal lines are meant to draw eyes out of the corners and visually enlarge and widen the room.
• Try to match the size of the furniture with the wall that it is on. For instance, you can place long tables or couches on long walls and put armchairs or end tables on the shorter walls to make them appear longer. You can also arrange the furniture in a cluster to make use of your space.

Kitchens and bathrooms

Most manufactured homes have identical kitchen and bathroom layouts. For the most part, this is due to functionality. With limited space, these rooms can feel sterile and unwelcoming. There are numerous ways you can put your personal stamp on them that don’t require any renovations. This couple completely customized their manufactured home to match their style. To get your personalized look, consider easy fixes like paint, textiles, and cosmetic updates. Here are some tips on decorating a manufactured home kitchen and bathroom:

Kitchen

• Remove your upper cabinet doors, and paint the inside walls with a repeated pattern like herringbone or lattice. This will bring interest in your kitchen space and allow you to show off your dishes as well. Open cabinets and exposed shelving will make your kitchen seem bigger than it is.

• To give your kitchen the color, style, and shine of real stone without the weight or expense, you can paint your countertops with faux-stone paint, then seal it with a few layers of glossy polyurethane.  
• You can install a backsplash of subway tiles around your kitchen to make it look larger. Install it past the cabinets, and this will help delineate the shape and size of the kitchen. You can add some decorative tiles to it, but do not overwhelm the space.

Bathroom

• Remove your bathroom vanity and replace it with a wall-hung sink, which will make your bathroom appear larger than it is. You can hang a small cabinet over the toilet to store your toiletries, or you can put a roll-away cart beneath your sink.
• If there is a medicine cabinet, remove it and put a wooden cabinet in its place. Match it with your trim work to make it look customized. If your bathroom has a window, you can remove the sill and replace it with something decorative, like hardwood or marble tile. You can make it deep, and then fill it with plants or accessories.

What to do with too small or off-centered windows

If the windows in your manufactured home are not necessarily centered in the rooms or seem smaller than you want, you can quickly remedy this. Using floor-to-ceiling curtains will create a dramatic look and make the ceiling look taller. This look will disguise the windows and leave them functional.

What’s next?

Regardless of the size of your house, decorating a manufactured home doesn’t need to be complicated. However, try not to clutter or over-decorate your home if you want it to look more inviting. You want your home to look great, but there is a fine line between attractive décor and over-decorating. Limit the décor you pick for your home to just a few pieces that make the most impact. Changing the look of your home with some of these tips and tricks can make you feel right at home in your new space.