So… you’re wondering when you should start decorating for fall? With stores releasing fall decor in July, many of us raise our eyebrows and think, “how early is too early?” It turns out there may not be a straightforward answer, but there are useful historical dates and factors to pick the time that makes the most sense for you! We’ll also share how you can slowly start implementing fall decor to make the transition less abrupt.
When You Should Decorate Your Home For Fall
The fall equinox on September 22nd marks the beginning of fall, so it makes sense that you would choose to decorate your home for fall around that time. You can make a tradition of decorating for fall on the fall equinox, and it will also give you a little more time to get everything up before October arrives! When the days get shorter and the nights get longer, it helps to make your home moodier. If you choose to make a tradition around decorating on the fall equinox, that’s great! If you’re still not sure when to decorate for fall, we have a few more considerations for you.
Feel Out The Year’s Weather
The best mood indicator of when you should decorate for fall is based on how the weather is behaving. While not all parts of the world get four seasons, if you’re accustomed to cooler weather in September and October, feel out the weather fluctuations and wait until it feels right to make the transition from late summer into fall. When daytime temperatures start dropping below 80 degrees, you can comfortably start wearing long-sleeve shirts and pants. This is the perfect time to start getting cozy inside, too, making it a good time to put up decorations.
Hold Off On the Halloween Decor
If you’re wanting to decorate for fall as soon as possible, slowly integrate autumn style without the ghouls and goblins. By holding off on the Halloween decor, you can start to decorate slowly for fall without jumping into the Halloween holiday.
Pack Your Summer Decor Away and Slowly Unpack for Fall
Once you’re ready to say goodbye to summer, put any seasonal summer decor away. This could consist of brightly colored throw pillows, blankets, and rattan decor. Replace your summer colors with muted ones such as amber, sepia, pale greens, and lavender. We’ll expand on this more when we talk about how to decorate your home for fall!
How to Decorate Your Home For Fall
Similar to most holidays celebrated in the United States, Thanksgiving and Halloween are derived from a long history of traditions and rituals. Our decorating trends and preferences are greatly influenced by this history. One classic example is the pumpkin. Pumpkins originated from the Native Americans who introduced them to the Pilgrims. Pumpkins became an important food for the Pilgrims, as they could last for long periods in storage over the winter months. This is just one example of how history has emerged into the seasonal trends of today!
Keeping this in mind, we’ll take a look at styles, colors, and decorating trends that have evolved over time with historical roots.
Fall Styles
In fall decor, you’ll often see a combination of styles. Rustic farmhouse, apothecary, and victorian gothic styles are all commonly associated with fall and/or Halloween. The rustic farmhouse and apothecary styles could have originated from mimicking the look of small farms during harvest. Between 2600 BC and the 19th century, an apothecary was a person who prepared and sold medicines or the shop in which they sold their products, similar to a pharmacy. The apothecary style incorporates glass and amber bottles, wooden cabinetry, and botanical prints. Common features for both styles include using raw and natural materials, dark earth tone accents, and raw (unpainted) homemade furniture (usually out of wood). Victorian style is known for its ornate furnishings, rich and heavy fabrics, warm lighting, and multiple patterns and textures. Gothic victorian incorporates all of this in a dark and moody color palette of amber, royal blue, deep purples, and dark greens. Gathering inspiration from these fall styles will put you on the right track with your autumn home decor.
Fall Colors
The colors that you see in most fall decor are taken from nature’s own color palette. Take this image of an autumn forest, for example.
Deep purples, yellow, brown, rust red, and orange can be pulled from this scene. Other common colors you see in fall are dark blues, grey, and dark green. Nature is the best inspiration you can to find the colors you’d like to use in your fall decor.
Fall Decor
Now that you have an idea of what styles and colors are used in most fall and Halloween decor, you can apply them to decorations of your own!
Include natural elements in your home, like dried flowers, herbs, pinecones, or other foraged items. Branching out from pumpkins and instead displaying a whole array of fall fruits and vegetables can help your decorating efforts! Apples, pears, grapes, pumpkins, squash, pomegranate, and persimmons add a nice pop of color. Eggplant, kale, turnips, sweet potatoes, zucchini, small squash, and artichokes are vegetables that can also be used. Botanical prints can also feel festive. Get creative with bringing nature indoors.
For your final touches, add artwork with gothic fonts and soft light sources. Lanterns, candles, and candelabras can be added for ambient purposes.
Fall is a wonderful time to give your home a seasonal refresh. We hope you were able to find inspiration for when and how to decorate for fall this year.
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