Home Office Color and Design Ideas to Make You Feel More Motivated & Productive

By Emma Worden | home office | June 29, 2021

One of the main reasons why people choose to work from home is bland and isolated cubicles. These spaces often have a clinical and monotonous feeling with their white walls and dark furniture. While going with a white background for your home office might be practical, feel free to be creative with color so you can achieve the best focus and comfort. Here are the best home office color and design ideas that will ensure your office feels motivating and productive.

Consider your preferences

No matter what design magazines and blogs say, the most important factor in choosing the best home office color and design depends mostly on your preferences. Different people gravitate towards different colors and décor—some prefer bright colors, some go for darker tones while some love natural and neutral hues. Your safest bet is to find the balance between what’s practical for your home office and what you like.

Zone your space with color

If your home office is a part of the living room or bedroom, your best solution is to zone the space by painting a section of the wall with the desk differently. You can be very creative here, but make sure your home office shade fits well with the rest of the space. Here’s an example: if you have a sloping ceiling in your bedroom, paint this section blue, choose a slightly darker tone as the base of the accent wall and finish with an attractive geometric pattern across it (use pale blues and grays).

Photo by Collov Home Design on Unsplash

Pastels for relaxation and focus

If your mind is already chaotic, you might benefit from some tranquility at your home office by painting in with pastel colors. If you look at last year’s Color of the Year, you’ll find Tranquil Dawn hues that can transform any workplace into a relaxing and soothing environment that boosts productivity and allows complete concentration.

Go bold with vibrant shades

If your job is a little monotonous, you need something bold to keep you awake and focused. A vibrant shade of green is a great choice for an accent wall. It evokes renewal and rejuvenation so you’ll always feel fresh. However, this tone, and all other bold pigments, is not suitable for DIY jobs because mistakes are very hard to cover. So make sure to consider residential painting services and experts that will do the job quickly and efficiently, and leave your walls looking pristine, without any darker spots or splotches. Complete the look with white and black furniture and lighting that will pop against it.

Warm it up with wood

If you only have one corner of the room to use, you can use wooden paneling to make your home office warm and comforting. The wood will make it feel solid and inspire stability and confidence. If you’re looking to boost inspiration, opt for wood with an interesting grain.

Photo by Spacejoy on Unsplash

Paint with furniture

If you can’t paint walls, bring in color and boost design with furniture and accessories. For instance, you can opt for a yellow palette or any color that maybe reflects your brand, which is great for small spaces. Plain white walls will make your yellow chair, filing cabinet, lamp and other accessories really stand out.

Go for patterns

Red and orange are great colors for evoking energy, strength and power, but they can be overwhelming in big amounts. Interesting wallpapers with these shades will be just enough to create a striking home office. If you’re looking for a small DIY project, you can paint your desk in orange, green and white stripes to create a harmonious color scheme.

Introduce plants for pops of green

It’s a fact that plants improve mood and wellbeing, so make sure to welcome them to your home office, especially if you live somewhere without too much nature to look at outside the window. If you want to go big with plants, leave the walls plain and let the greenery really stand out.

Add interest

Natural light is very important at a workplace, but too much sun can often be distracting, especially in the summer. With shutters, you can keep them open to let sunshine or air inside or keep them closed to provide shade. Paint your shutters a nice color to show them off and create a stylish block of colored space. Pink is a good choice because it’s welcoming and warm and does a great job in counteracting blue light.

We all deserve to have a home office that will inspire us to reach for the stars. No matter if you have a tiny space or a full room to dedicate to your home office, these ideas will be practical and push you to be productive and relaxed as you work every day.

Cover photo by Huseyn Kamaladdin from Pexels