Nick Acaster is Managing Director of the home accessories brand Stair Rods Direct. Here, he shares his top tips for Decorating & keeping your home's hallway spick and span, inspired by Instagram's very own Mrs Hinch.
Your hallway is the room that will welcome you home from work every day. Plus, it's the first thing your friends and family will see when they stop by for a cup of tea. So, you'll want to keep it clean and tidy — but that can be easier said than done, as it's where everyone throws off their coats and shoes, and it's likely to be quite low on your list of priorities when there are other rooms of your home to contend with.
However, putting some time aside to keep your hallway looking its best can make a huge difference, so it's well worth taking a leaf out of Mrs Hinch's book and tending to it little and often. The Instagram star is well known for her love of cleaning, and she always knows how to make the most of a space. Here, I'm going to take you through four simple ways you can 'Hinch' your hallway.
Choose a simple colour palette
If you've spent any amount of time on Mrs Hinch's Instagram profile, you'll have noticed that her home is primarily white and grey. There are lots of benefits to working with such a small colour palette. Firstly, the simplicity of it means her home naturally looks quite uncluttered. Plus, it means she can change up her décor quite regularly without having to buy anything new. For example, if there's a basket in her living room that she thinks would work quite well in her hallway, she can just move it over without any trouble, because every room in her house is decorated in similar hues.
Hallways can quickly get messy thanks to lots of shoes and coats being left out so, to avoid exacerbating the problem, stick to just one or two colours while you're decorating.
Create a practical space for shoes and coats
You might already have a shoe rack and some hooks for your family's coats, but take a minute to think about whether these storage solutions actually suit your needs. For example, is there only space for six pairs of shoes, when you need to accommodate at least 10? And are there enough hooks for everyone's coats? Persevering with a storage system that just isn’t suitable will result in your space becoming cluttered over and over again.
Even if you do have enough space for your shoes, coats, and umbrellas, your hallway might still start to look messy. So, you might prefer to hide everything away — that’s what Mrs Hinch would do. In this case, baskets and a coat closet will work much better than open shoe racks and coat hooks.
Pay special attention to your stairs
If your staircase is in your hallway, you also need to make sure you pay special attention to this. It’s another element of your home that will see an especially high level of foot traffic, so it can start to look tired quite quickly if you don’t make a special effort to look after it.
It’s a good idea to hoover your stair carpet at least once a week and, if it’s starting to look dirty, using a specialist carpet 
shampoo will help to give it a new lease of life. You also might find that a lot of dirty finger and handprints collect on your staircase’s bannisters — especially if you have young children. Regularly wiping them down with a clean cloth and multi-purpose spray will help to keep them looking fresh.
While a lot of people see their staircases as a purely practical feature of their homes, why not take inspiration from Mrs Hinch and add some decorative elements, too? Some silver-toned stair rods will add an extra dash of style to your actual staircase, and the wall next to it could serve as the perfect place to add a gallery wall of family photos!
Add decorative details to make it your own
While Mrs Hinch’s home has a simple colour palette and is always incredibly tidy, she’s also given it some personality and helped it to look lived in by adding some fun, decorative details that she loves. From shelves you can arrange some of your favourite books, ornaments, or photos on, to planters you can use to add some greenery to your space, you have lots of options to choose from!
The most important thing is that your hallway reflects your personality and sense of style, so you feel at home as soon as you walk through the door each day.
Mrs Hinch has become a huge Instagram celebrity, thanks to her cleaning hacks, beautiful taste in décor, and her determination to make her house a home. Take these top tips for decorating on board, and your hallway will be looking its best in no time at all.
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