4 Ways to Freshen Up Your Home for Summer

While it might still be spring, a midsummer’s night is only a few weeks away. In preparation for welcoming the longest days of the year (plus chilled rosé and picnic season), we’ve gathered a few tips to update your home, ensuring you’ll be more than prepared for those summer soirées come June 21.

The goal? Bring the outside in. Soft palettes inspired by nature and peppered with earthenware ceramics, textured pieces like thick woven rugs, and accents of natural elements like wood, rattan, and malachite create a serene oasis from the heat and humidity. Not to mention, these pieces carry an air of effortless summer breeziness—the kind we all wish would linger past Labor Day.

Below are some tips from top interior designers on how to shift into the new season with ease:

Fire up the kilnOne of the easiest—and most stunning—ways to bring the outdoors inside is through the incorporation of ceramics, tile, and earthenware throughout the home. “Pigeon Toe Ceramics makes a litany of earthenware products, but I am partial to their ceramic-based lighting offerings,” says Los Angeles–based Homepolish designer Haley Weidenbaum.

“For the kitchen, Heath Ceramics makes absolutely gorgeous yet remarkably durable dinnerware and other cooking related items. For backsplashes or floors, Clé Tile makes stunning Moroccan village terra-cotta tiles rife with beautiful imperfections in many different hues. Any or all of these items instantly give the home a handmade, natural aesthetic.”

Break out the linenA fresh and chic trick to freshen up a space for summer is to put white linen slipcovers on everything, says Nashville-based interior designer Sarah Bartholomew. “It lends a casual elegance to the room, and you can wash the slipcovers once the season wraps,” she says. If a more contained change is what you’re after, “throw a batik hand-blocked print over your dining, kitchen, or patio table for a laid-back summery look.”

For those not ready to go all out, a few well-placed airy linens in the kitchen and bathrooms also possess a summery, ethereal air about them. Fog Linen and Schoolhouse Electric both offer 100 percent linen and cotton tea towels, dinner napkins, and place mats with subtle patterns and muted colors. “The addition of homespun linens made of natural fibers brings the simplest form of Mother Earth into your home in a functional way,” says Weidenbaum.

Green is goodIncorporating greenery is the simplest and easiest way to make your home feel like summer is officially upon us. If you don’t have a green thumb, fret not. “Picking a eucalyptus branch and placing it in a simple glass jar can transform a space in an instant,” Weidenbaum says. “This hassle-free plant can last you many more days than store-bought flowers, and its simplicity makes it the go-to centerpiece for your next summer dinner party.”

Repotting plants into seasonally appropriate vessels is also a way to freshen up without changing your plants entirely. “Aged or antique terra-cotta pots full of easy, seasonal blooms are the perfect way to bring your garden inside,” suggests Bartholomew.

Woven and wickerNothing says summer like woven textures, be it wicker rocking chairs on the porch or rattan chairs in a sunroom. “I hang my French market totes on hooks by the door and use them as catchalls all season long,” Bartholomew suggests. “Also, wicker hurricanes create the perfect summer ambience to feel like you’re dining alfresco.”

Los Angeles–based, California-cool designer Mark D. Sikes, author of Beautiful: All-American Decorating and Timeless Style, is also a fan of rattan and hurricanes. “Every summer, I religiously bring out my rattan-wrapped hurricanes and put them all over the house. You suddenly feel summer. I also layer in more potted flowers and plants in the house—nothing compares to a blooming garden inside,” he says. And Sikes would know: He happens to be the personal interior designer to Nancy Meyers, director of arguably the most gorgeous movie interiors of all time (hello, Something’s Gotta Give Hamptons dream house).

It seems to be that achieving the summer feel in your abode is all about embracing a sense of effortlessness, pairing pieces that might not logically go together with a bit of ease. “All year long I’m a huge fan of mixing indoor and outdoor together,” Sikes says. “Whether it’s a garden stool and a stone table inside, or a French chair and Neoclassical stone console in the mix outside, that blurred line always feels elegant and chic.”