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Imagine if your home blended naturally into the surrounding environment. Not only would you have more space, but you’d be able to live in a more natural way. You wouldn’t be cooped up indoors all day long. Instead, you’d be out in the open air, catching a few rays and listening to the sound of birds.
For this reason, indoor-outdoor spaces have become tremendously more popular. These days, hardly a single luxury home neglects them.
The form they take can be quite different. Some are, for all intents and purposes, outdoor living rooms, equipped with fireplaces, chairs, recliners, sofas and coffee tables. Others are dining rooms, usually under some sort of shade, while the most extravagant attempts to bring the kitchen outside as well.
If you’re on the fence about indoor-outdoor living, then this post may help to change your mind. We discuss some of the benefits that such arrangements bring and how they can help you live a better, more fulfilling life at home. Here’s what you need to know:
It Makes It Easier To Have a Staycation
Getting away on vacation is not only expensive, but it can be physically difficult as well, thanks to all the international restrictions in place. For that reason, many people are turning to their own backyard, often quite literally, to make the most of their time off from work.
There are many ways that you could give your outdoor spaces more of a vacation feel. One obvious idea is to add a pool. Here, you can mimic what it would be like to be sitting around a hotel pool, enjoying the sunshine and warm air.
Some people turn their outdoor spaces into spas. These are over under cover, just next to their sliding patio doors.
You could also invest in a sunroom. These allow you to experience the warmth of the sun but, at the same time, protect you against the cool breeze. They’re similar to greenhouses.
It Gives You More Options When Entertaining Guests
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Standing around with your guests in the kitchen or sitting with them in the living room is okay in the depths of winter. But when the summer arrives, people want to be outside, enjoying themselves in the fresh air.
While a patio will suffice, having a bespoke indoor-outdoor area can make the whole experience so much more enjoyable for your guests. First, you can physically accommodate more people. You might only be able to fit twenty guests into your home itself, but you might have space to entertain fifty outside.
You can also take advantage of outdoor kitchens. These allow you to prepare food and service drinks to guests outside, without having to run in every five minutes to check on your cooking.
Modern outdoor kitchens actually rival those you find on the inside of your home. These days, they’re much more than just BBQs built into a countertop with a few cabinets. Instead, they come with running water, sink with plumbing, dedicated gas lines, and even pizza ovens. What’s more, they’re all protected by suitable roofing and come with options that let you batten down the hatches when the weather turns bad.
It Increases The Value Of Your Home
As discussed in the introduction, indoor-outdoor living is in high demand. Everyone wants to experience it.
Because of this, homes that offer functional exterior spaces are worth more than equivalent properties that don’t. Buyers want opportunities to go outside and enjoy being in nature because they know that it’s good for their health and wellbeing.
Buyers are also looking for properties that offer space. Therefore, if your home doesn’t have much interior square footage, you can add to it in a practical sense by expanding into your garden. What’s more, creating outdoor space is a significantly less costly way to increase your home’s value than adding a conventional extension.
Remember, when it comes to buying a new home, buyers want you to wow them. It doesn’t actually matter how you do this, whether with giant interior rooms at your property, or by increasing the space available to you outside. Remember, something as simple as adding a patio or veranda could be the difference between a buyer choosing your property and the next-best alternative.
It Is Good For Your Health
The average person only spends around 15 minutes per day outside in the open air. Unfortunately, that’s bad for our individual and collective wellbeing. If we’re constantly in built environments, it separates us from nature which is so beneficial.
For instance, NIH studies show that being in nature may help improve your cognition and memory. You may be able to think more clearly and better recall what people have said to you.
Being outside may also reduce stress, something that researchers refer to as “biophilia.” Our natural love of the outdoors appears to have a powerful effect on how our secretory hormones in the brain work, reducing the level of cortisol in the body. It’s one of the reasons why most people feel better after a weekend of camping, even if they’ve been sleeping on the uncomfortable ground.
It Expands Your Living Space
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We’ve already alluded to this perk above, but it’s worth repeating. Building an indoor-outdoor area expands your living space. It gives your home more square footage and can make even a small chalet feel considerably larger.
The current trend is towards “multi-use” spaces. Homeowners, for instance, are trying to create “rooms” outdoors that can fulfill all the functions of spaces inside their homes.
With some clever architectural tricks, outdoor living areas can also blend effortlessly into the rest of the home. Creating a common theme between the indoor and outdoor space creates unity and ensures that everything makes visual sense.
Some property owners, for instance, keep the indoor and outdoor floor heights the same, eliminating any need to step down. Others use sliding glass panels for doors that make it feel like indoor and outdoor spaces are one and the same. When there are minimal visual boundaries, outdoors areas feel like a natural expansion of your home.
