Artfully decorating a coffee table elevates the style and feel of a living space. It adds layers and textures to a room on a small scale and really makes a room look finished and intentional.
It takes practice but with these basic tips you can create a beautiful and practical vignette on your coffee table.
- Gather all the small décor items that could possibly work to decorate your coffee table. These might be small bowls, vases, figurines, candles, books crystals and objects. Keep them handy while you consider which items to use.
- Create a base by choosing a tray (different material to coffee table) not only does this create a visual border for the items it also makes it really easy to remove them for whatever activity your family may wish to use the coffee table for (games, toys, eating). You want the tray to contrast against the coffee table. Ours is a marble top so we wouldn’t choose marble but instead wood or metal. You also want to choose a material that isn’t going to damage the surface.
- If you don't have a tray consider a beautiful coffee table book.
- Consider also varied heights – we like to group 3 heights, tall, short and medium. Odd numbers are pleasing to the eye, as well as objects hitting different visual planes.
- Select tall object (vase size depends on coffee table size) If using a vase for your tallest object, a small table requires a smaller vase, larger for large vase. There is a bit more freedom if you don’t use a tray – but if you are using a tray choose a vase with a narrow base. Put fresh branches or stems in larger vases to add some life to the vignette or tuck in a small potted plant if the mouth of the vase has room.
- Pick short object: little bowls, candles, boxes, crystals
After placing the tallest object on the tray, book or coffee table, move onto the shortest or lowest object. This can be stacked books, a marble bowl, dish, lidded box or short candle.
The reason to go from tallest to shortest object when styling a coffee table is because it allows you to balance the placement of those two objects before adding anything else. They typically make up the most ‘real estate’ on the tray or table and it really gives you direction to what you will select next. You can decide to layer or stack another object on the shortest object or not.
Add greenery (this can serve as mid-height object or if stacked on books, a tall object). If you didn’t use greenery for your tallest object then adding a small potted plant is a perfect mid-height object.
Add sculptural object (if layered on books this can serve for a mid-height or short object) think crystals, orbs, or other intriguing items. This adds a little extra artistic flair - this is something that is visually light, but there is texture on the surface (bumpy, smooth, rough, pointy) and a contrasting material (metallic, glass, stone, wood, bone, etc) If you layer one of these larger sculptural objects on top of stacked books it can serve as your midheight object. A smaller object, like beads, layered on top of books won’t add much height but provide necessary texture.
Other considerations: Use repeat colours that already exist in the room, repetition of colour is fundamental of interior design. Every colour needs a friend in the room.
Use same elements and principals as with a tray but can spread them out.
Choose items in a 3 grouping for a round table so it feels balanced.
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