15 Affordable Upgrades For Adding Character To Your Home On A Budget

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If you're scratching your head for ways to decorate your home on a budget, you're not alone. The seemingly exponential rise in the cost of living is putting an ever-greater pinch on the pockets of homeowners across the country. More than that, the cost of materials is also on the rise, meaning that home improvement projects that once felt achievable (albeit with a few months spent saving) now feel excruciatingly out of reach.

Don't worry, though. You may not be able to afford to install that skylight in your kitchen, and that plush new extension you've been dreaming about may have to wait for a few more years. But that's not to say you can't level up your home decor. It just means that you may need to think on a smaller scale. Vincent Van Gogh once said that "Great things are done by a series of small things brought together," and as you'll see in the guide below, there are lots of tiny touches you can make to your decor that, together, add up to far more than the sum of their parts.

In newer builds (and homes previously owned by less design-conscious home makers) mass-produced door knobs and drawer pulls reek of "builder-grade." In other words, they look like they were cheap, bought in bulk, and installed en-masse. They also feel far from exclusive to your home. Fortunately, there are various cabinet hardware trends to upgrade your kitchen on a budget.

One is to upgrade the knobs and drawer pulls with a different metal, perhaps vintage brass or wrought iron. Alternatively, you could swap out your cupboard door knobs for glass alternatives. And if you want to personalize your cabinets with a little texture, you could even use soft material pulls, like these self-tapping leather drawer pulls from Sinyiol.

Whatever you choose, this is a simple trick that exacts maximum impact on your kitchen. Your chosen knobs and pulls will serve as jewelry for your cupboards, lending your space a tactile sense of quality that feels at once unique, bespoke, and intentional. And while it is a small change, it can give the cabinetry around your home an entirely new look without the expense of time and money that comes with repainting or replacing it.

Another downside often associated with newer homes is that they feel "boxy," cheap, and sterile. They lack the architectural detail that characterizes older, period homes, and can feel like they've been thrown-up more out of necessity for housing than a desire to make a home. They don't have to feel that way forever, though. In fact, there is a very simple way to add interest to your living space and make it look more expensive, and that's with some DIY picture-frame molding.

With roots in ancient Greek architecture, picture-frame molding comes in many shapes, sizes, and designs. And while it feels utterly premium, it needn't cost you more than the price of some basic materials and a few hours of your time. You can buy plain lengths of wood trim to form the molding, or you can opt for something more decorative. And if you don't trust yourself to cut the lengths to size, you can always buy a budget-friendly kit, like this peel-and-stick molding kit from Keoholi.

Offering an effortless way to transform a plain room into a space with real architectural intent, ceiling medallions were originally designed to hide the soot on the ceiling generated by fuel-burning lamps and candles. They were also often highly decorative, featuring eye-catching designs that helped, in more ways than one, to "anchor" the fixture to the ceiling.

Today, you can buy ceiling medallions in an array of both minimalist and maximalist designs. And while traditional Victorian medallions were made from materials like iron and plaster, modern alternatives come in an array of lighter and easier materials, including wood and polyurethane, both of which are easy to paint and thus match to the color of your ceiling. Just be mindful of the size of your medallion. It's usually best to match the size to that of your light fixture. You can go a little bigger in larger spaces, but it's best not to overdo it, especially in smaller rooms where a large fixture on the ceiling could lead to a feeling of confinement.

If you've moved into a new-build, or your house's previous owners played it safe to ensure a sale by painting everything white, then this tip is an easy win. Sure, it's a departure from the advice of many interior designers — that the color of your doors ought to match the color of your walls. And we'll admit that it takes a certain amount of bravery. However, by matching the color of your doors to the purpose of your room, as opposed to the color of the walls, you can achieve a new level of character that's rare in the often-sterile world of contemporary design.

So, what do we mean? Well, as an example, warm tones of oat, sand, and even mushroom make for a cozier alternative to other cooler neutrals like grey and white in living spaces like the lounge and adults' bedroom. Charcoal and navy are two of the best colors to paint a home office, each lending a sense of professionalism to your space. And if you have kids, their playroom can benefit from a similarly playful approach to door color. Think soft blues and light greens, which are thought to help children calm down and focus. 

Do you struggle to leave the house without your polaroid camera tucked into your bag? Or do you frequently spend rainy weekends filling albums with prints taken from your smartphone's camera roll? If so, a gallery wall is a great way to tell the stories contained within those pictures. It's also a fantastic way to add character to a large and otherwise blank space.

To create a perfect gallery wall, start by collecting frames from your local thrift store. You could buy them in bulk online, but the thrift store is likely to be much cheaper. While you're there, look out for any prints or wall-worthy pieces of artwork to intersperse with your photographs. The variation in frame sizes, material textures, and image content will work wonders to break up the clinical vibe of large, plain walls. This project replaces dullness with a characterful feature that feels curated and makes your space feel lived in. Get creative with the layout, and consider adding floating shelves to your wall. This will help you to layer your gallery with three-dimensional additions, like thrifted sculptures or houseplants.

Like your handles and drawer pulls, there are some surprisingly easy and creative ways to spice up your light switch covers. This sounds like an awfully small detail to worry about, however, since each and every room in your house will have at least one switch plate, it's a change that can make a surprisingly big difference to the character of your home. This is especially true in newer homes, where builder-grade plastic covers betray the cookie-cutter approach to interior equipment.

As for what you should swap them for, it's up to you. Unlacquered brass, wood, or even false-stone switch plates are all good choices. The important thing is to avoid getting carried away and spending a fortune. These Dyekou Antique Brass Switch Plates, for example, come in packs of six for less than $20. Yet they help to add the kind of micro-detail to your home that signals high-end customization, providing a satisfying tactile experience every time you enter your rooms.

Large, unadorned windows are fantastic for allowing natural light to flood into your space. However, they often lack character, and while they're perfectly at home in the sleek, clean-lined interiors of ultramodern homes, they don't always vibe well in households that are shooting for a style more rustic. Fortunately, you don't need to replace your windows in order to fill their frames with character. You just need to add some muntin bars.

Muntin bars were once a practical necessity in windows — used to hold smaller panes of glass together and prevent them from falling out of the frame. Today, they're largely decorative. They're also easy to add yourself, in fact all you need is some adhesive-backed strips, like the ones included in this window grid kit from Coositel. Done right, this trick mimics the look of expensive and historic multi-pane windows. Each section of glass becomes it's own piece of living art, too, with the surrounding muntin bars serving to frame the world beyond the window.

The first thing to say here is that you don't have to have a full-blown library room in order to make use of a library ladder. In fact, installing a library ladder is an easy and stylish way to help reach the tallest shelves in your home, wherever they happen to be. You may need one in your living room to access the top of a tall bookshelf, or in the pantry with high cabinets. 

However, in order for this upgrade to be strictly "budget-friendly," it's best to stick to areas where the ladder serves a purely decorative purpose, preventing the need to invest in expensive equipment. Functional library ladders with sliding mechanisms and rails can get expensive, and depending on your ability to install it yourself (versus hiring a contractor), it could quickly begin to blow your budget. But with a decorative, thrifted ladder, for example, or something like this blanket ladder from Vasagle, you can add a serious sense of whimsy to your shelves and bookcases without the need to burn a hole in your bank balance.

There are several reasons to add a DIY wood frame to your bathroom mirror, especially in newer homes. Firstly, by matching the wood and finish to your wider bathroom decor, you can tie the whole room together, instead of having furnishings (soft and otherwise) that clash with your contractor-grade mirror. Secondly, it makes the entire bathroom feel like a designed extension of your living space.

You'll need to give some thought to the style of mirror that you'd like to end up with. For example, are you blending your bathroom in with a wider coastal design scheme? If so, then some light or white-washed wood, or even driftwood, will work well. Alternatively, are you looking for something more classical and ornate? If so, you can buy ready-finished trim from the hardware store. Either way, you'll be amazed at the difference a simple frame can make to your mirror. When you're finished, it'll look like a bespoke piece of luxury furniture, and as far from "builder grade" as possible.

Beadboard panels are a perennially popular choice among homeowners seeking to infuse their homes with a little coastal character. In fact, they're suited to a variety of interior styles, including not just coastal, but rustic cottage interiors and indeed anywhere striving to evoke warmth, texture, and a sense of cozy nostalgia. Oh, and they're also very practical.

You can use these panels to cover imperfections in your ceiling that you'd prefer not to hire a contractor to fix. You can also use them to cover popcorn ceilings, and honestly, who could blame you if you wanted to do that? It's entirely possible to install beadboard ceilings by yourself, too, and while you'll have to spend both time and some money on buying and installing the materials, it's a far more cost-effective means of adding character to your home than hiring a contractor to do it for you.

Another way to bring some old-home charm to your house is to retro-fit plinth blocks to the bases of your door frames. It's a super easy project to take on, and yet it adds an enormous sense of sophistication to your interiors. You can use this idea to update an old home or to add characterful period features to a newer build.

Either way, all you need is a small piece of cheap MDF, plus some tools to help route the detail work to match the surrounding baseboards and architraves. You may also be able to source pre-finished pieces of wood from your hardware store, or if you're shooting for a cleaner, more contemporary finish, you could do away with the detail work altogether and use a plain block of wood. Whatever you decide, once installed, your plinth boards should mimic the "custom-milled" craftsmanship that's usually reserved for older homes or more expensive architect-designed houses.

Whether you have different styles of carpet to join together or need ideas to help you transition stylishly from tile to wood flooring, your floor transitions play a surprisingly important role in the character of your home. Transition strips can be used in various ways around your home, too, and since they come in an array of styles and materials, they represent the chance to exact maximum impact on your interior with the minimal amount of change.

For example, you could replace standard silver or wood floor transitions with solid brass bars, which will lend your carpeted spaces a high-end, boutique-hotel-style finish. You needn't stick to traditional strips, either. You could use liquid resin or epoxy to "pour" a colored transition between your flooring. This is especially effective when connecting warm materials like wood to the cooler tones of stone or concrete. It's also super versatile; you can buy and mix epoxy in a wide range of colors, using it to create a bold "river" that's as striking to look at as it is effective at protecting the joint in your floor.

If you have shelves, bookcases, or large cube-storage units, then some DIY fabric shelf-backs can add both texture and visual depth to your storage. Instead of seeing the plain white wall behind them (which smacks of cheap, flat-pack storage), this idea helps to level up your budget-friendly furniture, lending it its own unique character while dovetailing it with your wider interior scheme. The best part, though, is that it's super easy to do.

Some suggest wrapping up sections of thin foam lining the backs of your shelves with those, but there's nothing stopping you from wrapping some sections of cardboard. Of course, if your shelf unit has a back already built in, then you don't need either — just apply the fabric directly to it. In any case, the key is in choosing the right fabric. Select one that either matches or accents your room's wider color scheme, and don't forget that the goal is to add character. In other words, don't be afraid to be bold. 

Whether you need to throw light on a piece of artwork, a bookcase, or a shelf full of models and plants, battery-powered lights can add depth and drama to your home's proudest displays. They come in various styles and materials, which makes it easy to match one to your wider decor. They can also be installed in various ways, for example by casting a spotlight on display shelves, or by gently illuminating your favorite pieces of artwork. Crucially, they can be installed by you, meaning you can forgo the cost of hiring a contractor.

The GUIMUIZ Wireless Picture Light is a good example. It's perfect for casting light over your favorite pieces of art, is easy to install, and comes with a remote and built-in timer. Alternatively, if you have recessed shelves that you'd like to illuminate, some simple battery powered LED strip lights, like this wireless 3-pack from BestLuz, can help to both highlight and accentuate the natural depth and architectural interest of your shelves.

Unless you can afford to hire an electrician to have them run all of your electrical wiring into the walls, then visible wires are an unavoidable reality in modern homes. But that doesn't mean you have to put up with the drab and dreary appearance of ugly, plastic white cables. Instead, consider replacing them with more decorative cabling or covering them up with fabric cord covers.

These fabric cable sleeves from Hkoaodeo, for example, are ideal for homeowners who don't trust themselves to rewire the lamps in their lounge. Alternatively, if you're competent with basic electrical tasks, then you could opt for something like this twisted Italian-style braided electrical cable from DC Voltage. Whichever route you choose to follow, you'll find the end result is much more characterful and infinitely easier on the eye than contractor-grade cables.