Now that spring season is in full force, it’s time to refresh the front porch from cooler early spring vibes to late Spring feels, moving towards summertime. Join me as I share how to refresh a spring porch with all the freshness and newness of the season.
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The Front Porch Mystic
Front porches are important because they connect our homes to the outside world. They are a transitional space between our private lives in our homes and the great big world outside. That’s a big job.
Whether it’s a small stoop or a large wrap around porch, a well-kept front porch suggests that the home is welcoming and friendly. A happy front porch increases the curb appeal to our homes, smiling at the community around us. Let’s talk about easy and pretty ways to make the front porch welcoming, warm, and friendly this spring season as we look towards summer. With some simple ideas on how to refresh a spring porch a home’s appeal increases this time of year.
How To Refresh a Spring Porch
Clean & Declutter the Space
Like with any project, it’s best to start with a clean slate, eliminating outside noise and allowing focus and clarity for the task at hand. I compare this with starting with a blank canvas when embarking on a new art project. Our home is one of our greatest masterpieces, and I like to treat it as such.
Start by removing existing decor and give the porch a good cleaning. Sweeping away debris and wiping away any dirt on siding, front door, windows, furniture and decor pieces, etc. Voila! Now you can start decorating and styling and refreshing the Spring inspired porch.
Once you’re done cleaning, place all the regular year round pieces back in their respective places before you start adding the seasonal accents. This layers the space and creates the welcoming spring story you want to tell.
Set the Stage with Rugs & Mats
A front door mat serves a double purpose. It’s practical for its intended use of wiping away dirt from shoes as people enter through the front door into your clean home. But moreover, it can also serve a decorative purpose. The front door mat can be pretty as it serves its practical purpose.
Our front door mat is a monogrammed coir floor mat, which fits in a rubber base, which mirrors the monogrammed wall inside in our foyer, tying both spaces together. Once the coir mat wears away, you can simply replace the inner coir piece, while the rubber base remains. This offers a savings since invariably you will have to replace your front door mat.
A step further includes layering the practical door mat with a decorative rug underneath if space allows. The mat is layered here with an oversized jute windowpane doormat fromTerrain (unfortunately it’s no longer available to link here, but I included some pretty alternatives in the shopping section below for your convenience). The layered mat look has been trending for awhile, and I love the extra texture and coziness it provides.
Add Door Decor
Front door decor is a big smile on your home, which includes wreaths, baskets, swags, etc., welcoming guests inside. It’s always nice to jazz up front doors with what I call front door “jewelry”. I use a square preserved boxwood wreath for our Dutch door most of the year. The simplicity and clean lines of the wreath provide all the provincial vibes, which I love.
I jazzed up the boxwood wreath for this spring refresh by simply attaching a bird nest and some feathers with floral wire. Once the season passes I can easily remove the decorations without harming the integrity of the wreath. Repurposing decor pieces for different seasons is a great cost saving technique.
Earlier in the spring season I created a door basket decor to welcome the season, which is also a super charming accent. Although I love my square boxwood wreath, I do like to mix things up once in awhile to give it freshness and interest.
Plant Pretty Flowers
Of course Spring is all about the flowers. It wouldn’t be a spring porch without some fresh blooms. The planters flanking the front door are year round planters, which I recently gave a refresh for spring. The white geraniums are hardy, which remained from the previous plantings, and I simply added new pansies and a spilling variety of plant, keeping with the thriller, filler, spiller technique for a well rounded display.
My latest thrift find was this burlap metal container with a monogramed M in a laurel wreath. Ok, if you guys know me, then you know this screams MaryJo all day long. For $3 I had to scoop this up, and I filled it with this pretty lilac plant (which I’m deciding where to plant in the yard) . Once again the monogram planter coordinates with the front door mat and the gallery wall in the front foyer. Stay true to your style, and all the pieces will coordinate and work swimmingly together.
I also added new blooms to the goat cart, which is one of my favorite antique finds of all time. This was on my coveted list for a long time, and I almost splurged a few times, but eventually I found this piece at the fraction of the price and it’s in wonderful condition. It was meant to be, and it was a true lesson on patience. Anyway, it sits on our front porch for seasonal displays to welcome all who arrive at our home.
Include a Hero, Wow Effect Element
The much adored goat cart leads me to this. The goat cart immediately elevates (figuratively and literally) whatever we place inside it. It’s my porch hero element, which is so much fun to dress up for different seasons and holidays.
According to the size of your porch you might not necessarily have the space for a piece this size, but you can also hang an exceptional item, using vertical space or wall real estate. If you have a large space area, items like a wheel barrel or vintage chicken coop crate or even an oversized birdcage can create a wow factor for seasonal displays.
Your wow effect feature will add a layer of specialness on top of all the other elements. It creates the memorable piece, but everything else is necessary for the entire ensemble to shine.
Set a Mood with Proper Lighting
Just like in our indoor spaces, lighting can create a mood and set ambience. Besides the porch house lights, floor lanterns and a wall candelabra greet our guests when it starts to darken outside. Remote controls and timers facilitate the use of these type of lights.
The candelabra on the wall has candles which are on a timer so they come on every night for five hours, and then turn off automatically until the following evening. I love this type of set-up! The only maintenance is replacing the batteries when they are spent.
The candles in the lanterns are on a remote control. Although they are also on a timer and will go off automatically, you do have to turn them on with the remote control first. I much prefer the automatic turn on mechanism, but one could argue it wastes battery life using them nightly. I guess having a combination is a good compromise to the quandary. Either way the glow of these candles adds a layer of happy and welcome to the front porch.
Create Sitting Area if Space Allows
If you have a large enough space on your porch for a sitting area, then seasonal throws and pillows are great accent pieces. Of course it would be good time for any furniture maintenance, paint touch-up, etc. before the full blown outdoor season starts.
We don’t have sitting space on our porch per se, but we do have the sitting area we created with the front yard remodel, which is porch adjacent. I will share the sitting area space with an update in a subsequent post.
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Closing Thoughts
Have you started prepping your outdoor areas for the warmer months? Outdoor spaces increase our living areas during the warmer months and we should take full advantage whenever possible. The outdoors with sunny vitamin C and fresh air is good for our minds and bodies.
I hope this helps you in prepping and fluffing your front porch or any outdoor space for that matter. Our front porches are the first impressions to the world of our home. Front porch styling is key to how guests feel about our homes before they even step inside. Greet your guests with style. Until next time friends, Au revoir!
Shop the Spring Porch Look
- Square Preserved Boxwood Wreath
- Hanging Door Baskets
- Monogram Coir Mat with Rubber Base
- Checkered Jute Mat
- Scalloped Jute Rug
- Set White Metal Plant Stands
- Metal Plant Stand
- Large Wooden Farmhouse Lanterns
- Gray Metal Vintage Lanterns
- Wagon Planter Box
- Small Flower Carton
- Large Flower Cart Plant Stand
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