This Boho Apartment Shows How to Add Loads of Color to a Standard Rental

Name: Amanda Poe and my husband
Location: Mission District — San Francisco, California
Type of home: Apartment
Size: 800 square feet
Years lived in: 6 years, renting (5 years with roommates!)

Tell us about your home and the people who live there: Currently Drew, my husband, and I live in this apartment alone. Drew is in school studying paleo-oceanography, and I (Amanda) am an attorney. We love hosting and having friends over and especially decorating for every holiday we can. We try to celebrate everything in life, so that means going big even for the minor holidays, think decorations for Valentine’s Day or filling the apartment with balloons on a birthday!

We spend a lot of time here and it’s not huge, so every room has to have multiple purposes. I love when I find a piece that fits the small space (and budget!) perfectly. Though, we don’t have a car in the city, so getting some of the pieces home has led to some funny and interesting moments. Several of the pieces in our home were just found on the street corners! San Franciscans love to bring their unwanted items to the curb where people will gladly take it!

Describe your home’s style in 5 words or less: Maximalist, Bohemian, Eclectic, Colorful, Cozy

What is your favorite room and why? Our favorite room is probably the front room, our living room. This room has my famous hot pink couch! It also has the best light of the whole apartment and so plants are happy. We spend a ton of time in this room chatting, eating snacks, painting artwork, watching “Friends” re-runs, and hosting our real life friends. Although, I will say everyone else’s favorite room is the kitchen because when we host there’s never a shortage of food!

What’s the last thing you bought (or found!) for your home? The most recent items we bought were from Target’s OpalHouse line. I love that they’re bringing bohemian vibes mainstream. I also am LOVING how realistic faux plants are looking recently. A lot of our apartment has very little natural light and it makes decorating so much easier to have access to beautiful and realistic faux flowers. I got some fantastic faux greens from Hobby Lobby!

Any advice for creating a home you love? Oh yes, my advice would be to gather your thoughts first before you create a room and decide what kind of vibe you’re going for. I think so many people pick the pieces sort of “as-needed” to fill a functional need and feel disappointed when they don’t make sense together or the room has no vibe. There are lots of styles I love that I don’t necessarily want to use in my space because it won’t bring me the feelings that I want at home.

For example, I love, love, love looking at these clean white spaces on Pinterest and Instagram. But, I know from experience that I am hard on my items and love to have people over, so filling my home with white surfaces is only going to lead to disappointment when stains, marks, and spills happen! I think your home should reflect your inner self and your best self!

This submission’s responses were edited for length and clarity.