How to Decorate a Room with No Windows?

The strange feeling you get in an elevator without a mirror is similar to what you might feel in a room without windows. The sense of confinement from an enclosed space can feel unnatural. The way to overcome this feeling and achieve a spacious room is through well-thought-out decoration.

When decorating a windowless room, there are many details to consider, from wall design and furniture placement to color selection. By applying these tips, you can make the fact that your room is windowless go unnoticed. So, how do you decorate a room with no windows? Here are suggestions for a room decoration that breaks down the boundaries:

1. How to Add Movement and Interest to Your Walls

A window is one of a room's natural focal points—a framed view. In windowless rooms, you can use some decoration tricks to replicate this familiar feature:

• Wall Molding (Panelling): This has become a very popular wall decoration in recent years. You can create rectangular or square areas by mounting wooden trim on the wall. You can illuminate these sections with picture spotlights and hang art inside them. Beyond just creating a window shape, you can also create different patterns with wall molding, such as asymmetrically placed geometric areas painted in a different color.

• Mirrors: Mirrors make a room feel more spacious by distributing light. Although there is no natural light from a window, you can spread light throughout the room with wall sconces placed opposite a mirror. The other important function of a mirror is to create a sense of depth. By hanging mirrors on opposite walls, you can instantly expand the limited space in your windowless room. You can create a warm look by choosing decorative window-style mirrors, especially those with shutters. You can also hang a rectangular or square mirror on the wall to give this window-like feeling. However, note that shaped decorative mirrors or those with patterns like a diamond design will not have the same effect and will only look like a decorative element.

• Large Artwork: A delightful way to compensate for the lack of a window is to hang large paintings. You can create aesthetic focal points on your wall by hanging abstract works. In addition to abstract pieces, paintings that give a sense of vastness, such as seascapes and skyscapes, also add an airy feel to your windowless room. On long, empty walls, you can hang paintings that feature images like doors, windows, light, or fire, making the room seem as if it opens into another space.

2. Why is Color Selection So Important?

One of the first steps in designing a windowless room is deciding on a color palette. The colors you use in the room should be uplifting and not create a suffocating atmosphere. For example, you can soften the room's atmosphere by using soft tones like lavender, Nile green, baby blue, or pink.

• You can make the space look larger by using light colors like cream and beige on large surfaces such as walls, flooring, and rugs. You can use soft tones for textiles and decorative items. Thus, the brightness of neutral colors combines with the calming effect of pastel tones.

• To add vitality to a windowless room, you can use energetic colors like yellow, orange, or red. However, to avoid creating the opposite effect of what you desire, use these vibrant colors in the details of your furnishings.

3. How Can You Imitate Natural Light?

The biggest deficit of a windowless room is sunlight. You can push this deficiency into the background by incorporating different lighting solutions in the room. Instead of lighting types that make the space look darker, like pendant lamps and uplighting wall sconces, choose lamps that diffuse light.

• For example, use surface-mounted spotlights instead of recessed ones that sit in the ceiling. For a ceiling lamp, choose models with minimal designs that are not surrounded by a lampshade—that is, models that emit light completely outwards.

• Also, use "daylight" bulbs that imitate sunlight instead of cool white bulbs.

4. How Should You Arrange the Furniture?

One of the problems with a windowless room is that the space looks smaller than it is. Since there is no window opening to the outside, the room can appear more cramped. To soften this effect, you can pay attention to not having furniture that takes up too much space. You can prefer more minimal models instead of bulky furniture.

• You can also save space by using folding furniture.

• Furniture placed against the wall makes the space look smaller. You can use a small rug in your room to gather the furniture around it and open up the space in front of the wall.

• High-legged furniture makes the space look larger. When choosing furniture, you can opt for items like a console table instead of a dresser, a wall-mounted TV unit as an alternative to a TV unit with a bookshelf, and high-legged armchairs instead of a sofa.