Creating a Minimalist Home: The Beginner’s Guide

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Minimalist Home

The last few weeks have been a whirlwind in our lives. As soon as we decided not to move, the perfect house for our family hit the market, and we were lucky enough to buy it. And even though this house is larger than our current home, I fully intend to create another minimalist home for my family once we move in officially.

Long gone are the days when every square inch of my home had to have stuff in it.

I’ll never forget becoming a stay-at-home mom 11 years ago, having two kids back to back, and feeling completely overwhelmed by everything I had to clean and maintain just to get through each day.

Dishes piled up, toys littered the floor, and the two-stall garage was so packed we still had to park outside. And yet, I literally never sat down all day long because I was constantly changing diapers, teaching the ABCs, and making one meal after another.

Something had to change and fast. I just couldn’t take it anymore. The stress of feeling like I worked all day with nothing to show for it was slowly killing me, and when I’d talk to friends about it, they were having all of the same thoughts and feelings as I was.

None of us ever felt like we were getting anywhere. Every day was the same old repetitive schedule of picking up, cleaning, and organizing again and again.

And when I visited neighbor’s houses for playdates, many of their homes had even more square footage; but they were still more cluttered than my own. They were gorgeously decorated and looked straight out of a style magazine, but take a closer look, and there was literally stuff packed in everywhere.

It just didn’t make any sense to me.

Why were we all buying bigger and bigger homes just to stuff them full of more and more things that we didn’t even need?

Eventually, I discovered some articles on minimalism, and I found a new sense of purpose. So I started out small on projects around the house and little by little, my entire well-being changed for the better.

I started applying minimalist principles to other areas of my life like cooking, cleaning, working, and even landscaping, and every step closer to a minimalist lifestyle I got, was one step closer to true happiness.

Fast forward to today, after spending an entire week packing and moving little by little into our new home, and frankly, I’m not even that stressed out.

Having a minimalist home makes day-to-day life a lot easier, but it also makes a world of difference when it comes to huge life events like moving.

To be perfectly honest, sometimes I still feel like even we own way too much stuff for what we actually need.

So I’m going to use this move as an opportunity to focus on creating an even more minimalist home that will be a warm, happy, inviting, and cozy sanctuary for all who enter. And hopefully, I can inspire others to join me along the way.

Because after all, who doesn’t want to relax at home instead of spending hours a week cleaning, maintaining, and organizing stuff you barely ever touch?

What is a Minimalist Home

The first step is creating a minimalist home of your own is to really understand what a minimalist home actually is.

A minimalist home is a functional space that is also comfortable and inviting. Minimalist homes have everything you need to live without all of the extra stuff that clutters your space and wastes your time with unnecessary cleaning, organizing, and maintaining.

When many people hear the words minimalist home, they picture a drab, empty space that is cold and unwelcoming. But that is not what a minimalist home actually is.

You can have a minimalist home with everything you could possibly need and still be surrounded by beautiful things that you cherish. The only difference between a minimalist home and an overstuffed home is that you have fewer possessions and you only keep the things you truly love.

Brooke’s Top Pick For Planners

Decluttering Planner by UnexpectedlyDomestic

• 23-page decluttering planner
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• Includes decluttering challenges and game
• Printable tags to sort and organize

Brooke’s Top Pick For Capsule Wardrobe Kit

Capsule Wardrobe Starter Kit by OwnMuse

• 6-page starter kit capsule wardrobe planner
• Helps you plan a core wardrobe
• Minimalism your closets with pieces that can create multiple outfits
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Minimalist Home Tips

When you’re ready to stop cleaning and organizing items you don’t even want or need, these 25 minimalist home tips will help you get started creating a minimalist home of your own:

1. Focus on One Area At a Time

Don’t overwhelm yourself from the beginning. Choose one area of your home to work on like a bedroom, kitchen, or bath, and focus on only that area for the time being.

2. Discover Its Purpose

Each room in your home has a specific purpose. Ask yourself what purpose you would like this one room to have. Is it for storage, an office, or a home gym? Once you know what the purpose of this room is, it’s easier to move forward.

3. Make a Plan

Now that you’ve determined the purpose of this space, make a plan to help it fulfill its purpose. Rooms that have too many purposes feel cluttered and cramped. How can this room serve you?

4. Take Inventory

Furniture is an important part of creating your ideal space. Take inventory of all the large pieces of furniture currently in the room so that you know what you are working with and ask yourself if anything is missing.

5. Focus on Function

Keep in mind that the furniture in each room should be functional for that space. Look for opportunities to use furniture pieces for multiple purposes such as a coffee table that can also be used for storage or a dresser that’s also safe enough to use as a changing table in a nursery.

6. Make a Decision

Now that you’ve taken inventory and focused on the function of each large furniture piece, it’s time to make a decision. Decide whether to keep furniture pieces in this room, relocate them to other rooms, or sell furniture pieces that are no longer meeting your needs.

7. Think About Decor

Now that the furniture has been dealt with, it’s time to think about decor. Take a look at all of the decor pieces on the walls, counters. dressers, tables, or shelves, and ask yourself if they’re still your taste. Then either keep or remove these decor pieces based on your decision.

8. Look At Surface Objects

We all tend to set objects down on surfaces where they don’t necessarily belong. Take a look at each object on the surfaces of the room and ask yourself if each of these items is essential. If it is, can it be stored out of sight? If it’s not, consider removing it from your home.

9. Check Out Your Floor Space

The next step is to check out your floor space. Is there anything impeding traffic in or out of the room? Are there tripping hazards that should be removed? Ask yourself what you can do to make sure that you have open floor space with plenty of room to move about it.

10. Start Piles

As you’re removing furniture, decor pieces, surface objects, and items on the floor, start four separate piles for items to keep, donate, sell, and throw away. Be sure to create these piles in a different room so that the room you’re focusing on starts to get cleaned out.

11. Realize That Sunk Costs Don’t Matter

Sunk costs are expenses that have already been paid and cannot be recouped. As you declutter, realize that sunk costs don’t matter. Just because you spent money on something once, that doesn’t mean you have to keep it forever.

12. Don’t Obsess Over Gifts

Just like with sunk costs, many people have a hard time letting go of gifts that were given to them. While people in your life try to give you things they think you’ll enjoy, that doesn’t mean you’ll like or need everything gifted to you. If the item doesn’t serve a purpose, give yourself permission to let it go.

13. Remove Items Quickly

There’s no point in making piles of items just to let them sit there for days and weeks on end. When you’ve completed minimalizing a room, make sure all items are put away, donated, listed for sale, or thrown away quickly.

14. Start to Organize

Organizing should always take place after decluttering — not before. Now that you’ve cleaned out the entire room, it’s time to organize all of the remaining items with storage solutions that make sense for both this area of your home and the items you’re storing.

15. Consider Natural Light

Now that the room is clean and organized, the next step is to consider the natural light in your room. Are the window treatments themselves simple and uncluttered while allowing daylight to flow freely into the room? Or should you remove them and install unadorned window treatments that are both simple and functional?

16. Examine the Lighting Fixtures

Next, examine the lighting fixtures in the room. Are they simple and aesthetically pleasing while also providing a natural, warm light? If so, great. If not, you may want to consider replacing them with lighting fixtures that make the room feel more comfortable.

17. Take a Look at the Walls

Believe it or not, wall color has a huge impact on how we feel when we’re in a room so take a look at the wall color you currently have. Is it a soft color that brightens the room, a dark color that’s warm and inviting, or a bold color that’s too overwhelming for your taste? Minimalism is all about feeling peaceful so make sure your wall colors bring you peace.

18. Repeat the Process

Once every inch of your focus room has been squared away, you can slowly repeat the process in other rooms. Just be sure to take your time, be patient with yourself, and remember that you’re doing all of this now in order to simplify your life moving forward.

19. Let Things Go

As you move from room to room, you’re going to come across a lot of things you didn’t even realize you still have. Remember that all of these things are just consumer products. It’s perfectly okay to let things go, and you’ll feel more at peace once you do.

20. Throw Things Away

When you find broken or damaged items in your home, throw them away. No one wants to add to the landfill, but no one else wants your broken or damaged goods either so just throw them away.

21. Stop Buying Stuff

All the decluttering in the world won’t create a minimalist home if you continue to buy stuff you don’t need on a regular basis. Make a commitment to yourself and stop buying unnecessary stuff already. Both your bank balance and your home will look better once you do.

22. Buy High-Quality Items

Creating a minimalist home doesn’t mean you’ll never make a purchase again. When you do find something you love or you need to replace an item, be sure to buy a high-quality item that will last.

23. Continue to Declutter

Even after years of practice with a minimalist home, things will still tend to stack up over time. So continue to declutter throughout the year so that it doesn’t feel as overwhelming as it does when you’re starting from scratch.

24. Learn to Be Grateful

No matter how committed you become to minimalism, there will always be times when you see people around you with things that you wish you had. Learning to be grateful for what you already have and how not to focus so much on what others have is a life skill that takes practice, but it is well worth the effort.

25. Enjoy Your Freedom

Living in a minimalist home is the greatest gift of freedom you could ever give to yourself. Enjoy all of the newly found free time you’ve gained since becoming a minimalist.

How to Become a Minimalist At Home

You can become a minimalist at home by committing to a simpler lifestyle and letting go of the things that you don’t really need. By completing focused decluttering projects and not continuously buying more stuff, you will quickly discover just how easy it is to become a minimalist at home.

And the best part is that your life will become noticeably less stressful, less time-consuming, and less energy-zapping than it once was, leaving you more peace, time, and energy to focus on what really matters in your life.

Instead of searching for things you’ve misplaced, sorting through stacks of paperwork, and shoving blankets into overstuffed closets, you’ll now be able to spend that extra time anyway that makes you happy.

You owe it to yourself and to your family to create a minimalist home so that you can all get back to the things that truly matter.

Sources

• Etsy
• MDPI: In Search of the “Good Life”: The Appeal of the Tiny House Lifestyle in the USA
• Sloane & Sons: Minimalist Interior Design
• Springer Link: Towards a Theory of Minimalism and Wellbeing

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How can you create a more minimalist home? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.