Present2Sell - Devon Today Nov 2007
When selling our home, the selection and arranging of artwork moves away from being an exercise in self expression and becomes a useful tool to create an inviting ambience and a coherent harmony, handling the view of what buyers see in the subtlest of ways.
Take down personal memorabilia and any pictures that have cultural or religious overtones. Keep or buy images that evoke a tranquil mood - balmy summer rather than windy winter.
To pull your interior together, echo your accent colour either in the picture itself or in the frame, and be sure to use your larger pictures at the end of a long view, using smaller ones where the viewer will be close to them.
Create a focal point for buyers - it gives them a sort of visual safety net while the rest of the room can be absorbed, and can also lead the eye away from unsightly views or awkward corners. Conversely, draw attention to the parts of the property that made you love it when you first saw it, by ensuring plenty of uncluttered visual space around these.
In these days of open plan, use artwork colour to differentiate between, say, sitting and dining rooms.
For collections, relate these to some other element in the room. For example, if you have a 3 seat sofa, hang 3 pictures or 1 large landscape format picture above.
These techniques will all help buyers feel at ease, and that's the key to a quick sale.
