Turn your RV into a home with a few simple touches.
The traditional definition of “home” is “a house or place where a person or family lives.” But home is also where you make memories, raise a family, share meals with friends and spend the majority of your time.
Some of us are lucky enough to have an RV that we call home. But as most of us know, your new or used RV won’t feel quite like home the minute you drive off the lot with it. Most RVs tend to be generic, with little style or diversity. So that means it’s up to you to make it a home!
When renovating our RV, we added a few thoughtful items and employed a couple of decor tricks that helped infuse our personal style into our new-to-us RV.
Here are our favorite tips to make your RV feel like a home:
Personalizing the bathroom with colorful and quirky wallpaper.
1) Use Paint or Wallpaper to Transform Your Space
Before renovations, our RVs interior consisted of wood and wallpaper (as most RVs are!) Although there’s nothing wrong with this style, it wasn’t our personal taste, so we knew that we were going to paint the walls to make our RV feel more like us. We opted for an eggshell color on the walls and a slate gray for the cabinets. We also chose to wallpaper the bathroom with a funky parrot pattern to show off our quirky style! A simple coat of pain or roll of wallpaper and some elbow grease can completely transform your RV and showcase your unique style.
Pro Tip: Lighter paint colors on the walls and trim (specifically, a shade of white for an RV) make the space look and feel much bigger!
A rug adds warmth and comfort to the motorhome’s plank floor.
2) Add a Rug (or Two!)
An easy way to make your RV cozy and inviting is to add a few area rugs. We opted for vinyl plank floors in our RV, which we absolutely love, but there are many other options out there! We have a few small rugs around the RV for looks and for comfort! (No one likes cold floors in the morning!) Placing a few area rugs in your RV will help tie the space together and make it feel warm and inviting. Plus, with so many patterns and colors, it’s a great way to showcase your individual taste!
Pro Tip: Break out the tape measure! RV “rooms” have different dimensions than that of a traditional home; many times, standard rugs won’t fit. Make sure you’ve got proper measurements of the space you want to put a rug. Head over to your laptop and plug in the dimensions on Google. We’ve found that shopping online is a great way to find alternative sized rugs that you won’t find in store.
Plants add beauty and health benefits to any space.
3) Embrace Your Inner Plant Lady!
This is a personal favorite of mine! I don’t feel like I’m home unless I have a few house plants in my space. Not only are they good for the air quality, but they also add a touch of green to your area and have been shown to improve concentration, reduce stress levels and boost your mood. Counter space can be limited in an RV, so you may have to get creative!
Try hanging plants from the underside of cabinets, the ceiling or on the wall using a wall planter. If you’re lucky, you may be able to squeeze a small houseplant onto your dinette or kitchen counter. Being a plant lover myself, we went as far to build a custom shelf in our kitchen just for our plants!
Pro Tip: When traveling, put all your plants in the shower with a towel wrapped around the planter base for safe motion!
Using hooks and velcro to secure wall hangings.
4) Use the Wall Space Wisely!
Wallspace is usually limited in RVs, so you want to make sure that you really love what you hang on your walls. We had so many pieces from our old home that we wanted to bring onto our RV, but because of lack of space we had to be very picky – which was a good thing. We ended up with our favorite things on the walls of our RV, which make it feel more like OUR home. We chose a combination of artwork, textured items (wall baskets) and mirrors to create variety in our RV. There’s nothing that makes an RV feel more like home than seeing your favorite pictures, artwork or memories all around you!
Pro Tip: Command hooks and Velcro strips are effective in hanging things in your RV without damaging the walls. Plus, they hold the items securely in place when you’re on the road. We stick a few extra strips of Velcro behind any hung picture to help keep it from falling while we travel.
Practice clutter-free living to create a calm and peaceful space.
5) Keep it Clutter-Free
This probably isn’t the most exciting tip, but it’s a vital one in making your RV feel like home. A motorhome can get quickly cluttered and this will make it a less enjoyable space for you. But a clean space will make you feel calm and relaxed. Hate cleaning? Well, the upside is that tidying up is way faster in an RV!
We do a daily quick clean, as well as a good deep clean every month or so. We also keep a small vacuum on hand to do a quick sweep when we notice the floors getting dirty. Putting things away as soon as we are done with them (most of the time!) and making the bed every morning are a few other ways we keep our RV clutter-free and feeling like home!
Pro Tip: Make a habit of spending a few minutes every morning putting away dishes, clothes and other items that have found their way around the RV the day before.
Making your RV your own is one of the most rewarding parts of being an RV owner. There’s nothing better than knowing wherever you end up parking your RV for the night, week or month, you’ll have a place that feels like your own. Incorporating the tips above will be sure to make your RV feel like “Home Sweet RV” in no time!
All photos by Rambler and the Road.