It’s more important than ever before to be able to relax in the home. After a hard day at work or looking after the children, you want to be able to put your feet up, switch your brain off and just drift away.
However, the same applies to your child too and looking after your child’s mental health is just as important. Today, with the likes of social media, pressure on exams and many other things, anxiety in children is at an all time high, so it can be incredibly useful to create a calming space for them to enjoy too, whether it be in their bedroom or a shared space in the family home.
If you are lucky enough to have a spare room and want to turn it into a chill out room for all the family, then here are some top tips…
Keep it Gender Neutral
Any chill out space you want should be as neutral as possible when it comes to colour. However, that’s no bad thing as many of the more neutral colours such as beige and soft tones of blues and greens are scientifically proven to be the most calming.
Now, we’re not saying to turn your space into a residential care home, private hospital or private drug detox clinic, but if you look at those you’ll see they use very neutral, soft colours as they need to be relaxing to put a patient at ease.
Think of yourself as a patient in your home and what the necessary steps and colours are to evoke that sense of calm.
Scents and smells
All the senses should be put at ease when it comes to relaxation, so adding some extra scents to your chill out space can really elevate your experience in there. You want to completely separate it from the rest of the house, where you may have the smells of cooking, and sadly even the toilet humming around at points.
Candles are usually great for this, but given we’re creating a family friendly room, plug in scents or diffusers out of arm’s reach are a much better option. There are tons of scents you can fill your room with to feel calm, from rosemary to lavender, vanilla to sea breeze, the latter a favourite with all the family given everyone loves a trip to the seaside.
Segment areas
While clutter should be at an absolute minimum (clutter is known to cause stress rather than relieve it), segmenting the room for members of the family can be really useful. After all, a child is going to have a very different idea of comfort to a middle-aged woman or man.
For children, think about bean bags to sink into, while a sturdy but comfy armchair may be just what’s needed for adults. You can then start to develop the space around that by adding favourite books, comfort blankets and more to it.
Try your best to make the room flow into each section naturally, and if you achieve that you’ll have a pretty incredible space for everyone to kick back and chill out in.
