How to Decorate With a Tropical Color Palette
Take a vacay without leaving home!
Who wouldn’t want to take a tropical vacation year round? Thanks to the tropical color palette, you can! Styling your home with these vibrant colors can make it feel like summer year round, and we have the best ideas to get you started. Here’s how to decorate with the tropical color palette to keep your home beachy every month of the year!
Tropical Color Palette Explained
The tropical color palette is all about bright, vibrant colors. Its palette mainly consists of pinks, yellows, oranges, blues, and greens that are warm and have a beachy vibe when paired together. Its top colors include:
Aqua: A light blue with a green undertone that has a summery vibe that’ll instantly make you vision crystal clear water.
Turquoise: Darker than aqua, turquoise is still a vibrant blue reminiscent of the ocean and beachy sky.
Coral: Coral is a blended shade of pink and orange that provides its deep hue closely related to salmon.
Fuschia: Deeper than coral, fuschia is reminiscent of the plumeria flower found in Hawaii that evokes a vacation, summery sense.
Tangerine: This shade is a deep, bright orange that gives all the beach vibes, especially when paired with coral to create a warm feeling.
Canary Yellow: A bright and bold yellow that will remind you of the bright summer sun and a warm tropical atmosphere.
Rain Forest Green: This deep green shade will make you vision palm trees and other beachy botanicals to provide the tropical atmosphere you’re after.
Creamy White: To balance out the dark colors and bring in some brightness, creamy white is mixed in the color palette to pair with the warmer shades.
How to Incorporate a Tropical Color Palette into Your Home
Bring the beach or tropical destination of your dreams to your home with these easy design steps.
1. Start With Your Walls
Wallpaper boosts the tropical vibe around your home by bringing whimsical prints to your walls. Having beachy florals and a tropical color palette in your wallpaper sets the tone for the aesthetic you’re trying to create in the whole room. If you aren’t crazy about wallpaper, paint your walls with a color from the tropical color palette outlined above to set the stage for the rest of your home decor.
Once you’ve tackled your walls, it’s time to select your furniture! Since you’ve set the stage with vibrantly-colored or patterned walls, it’s best to choose furniture in soft color, like cream or white, to keep the room visually balanced. If your walls are a solid color, you can opt for a tropical living room set that contains a floral pattern that blends well with your wall choice.
If you want to really amply the tropical vibe, be selective with your color pairings! While the tropical color palette consists of bold colors, they feel balanced when you choose furniture and decor in colors that blend. Pair your blues with your pinks, or your pinks with orange, yellow, or green. Notice how the picture above combines tropical greens and pinks with the console, mirror, and accent lamps to create a cohesive look within this aesthetic.
Creating a tropical color palette includes more than just colors – it also includes textures! Including various textures is important for balancing the visual weight of any space, and the perfect texture to include for the tropical look is anything wicker. Wicker is a natural element derived from plants that’s woven to create natural-looking furniture, which speaks directly to the tropical aesthetic. The light color of wicker and woven pattern meshes well with the bright choices in the tropical color palette to keep the room toned and bright.
Rugs are essential, not just for comfort and floor protection, but as another element of home decor. Placing a tropical-patterned area rug in your home offers another way to bring this theme’s colors and prints into your decor. Boost the tropical feel of the space and help to tie the room together with the right rug underfoot!
What better way to spruce up your tropical home decor than with plants specific to the aesthetic? Bamboo, banana leaf, and palm plants are easy to style for a tropical vibe. Not only are they found in most tropical settings, but they contain deep green shades that fit the color palette as well. Faux plants are easy to take care of since they require no maintenance other than dusting every now and then. Live plants can easily be substituted over faux plants, but don’t forget to water them! Place your plants (live or faux) in a corner or next to a sofa for a complete look!
Tip!
Learn more about styling your home with plants in our guide: Decorating With Plants for a Stunning Display
7. Style With Tropical Accents
Once the bigger pieces are down, it’s time to bring in the smaller objects. Place your tropical home decor on wall shelves to store them while further highlighting your aesthetic. Decorative objects like pineapples, flamingos, or sea creatures make the room feel closely connected to the beach or tropics!
Bring the beach breeze to your home with a ceiling fan. Ceiling fans help to keep the room cool and distribute air, while fans designed like the one in the photo above go the extra mile by also reflecting a tropical aesthetic through their design. Look for fans that have accented wings like the one in the picture above, which looks like palm leaves, to serve as extra decoration for this style.
Want to incorporate more tropical colors or elements? Opt for hanging tropical wall art around your home! Wall art that contains scenes of the beach, beach animals, or bright colors is an easy way to instantly make a connection between your home decor and aesthetic. Plus, hanging up wall art with a beach visual gives you something pleasant to look at while you plan your next vacation.
Keep the beachy vibe going by extending the tropical aesthetic to the outside of your home! Make yourself feel as if you’re sitting beachfront with an outdoor rug, patio furniture, and live plants that highlights the atmosphere around. Tropical colors or textures in your outdoor furniture and decor boosts the vibe while relaxing outside in nature to make it feel as if you really are somewhere tropical!
Now that you know more about the tropical color palette and home decor ideas, it’s time to bring paradise to your home!
