As Simple as Black & White
A Halloween porch is transformed with some paint and a little creativity.
With the
popularity of haunted houses, porches with flickering lights and bowls filled with severed fingers, it’s not often you come across a Halloween porch that’s more chic than scary. “I always have the cute little kids in mind that don’t like scary stuff,” says Julia Konya, lifestyle and design blogger of Cuckoo4Design.
VERSATILE FOUNDATION
Julia’s home in Allentown, Pennsylvania, is now known for its painted striped porch that makes her Halloween display stand out. “My house is filled with black-andwhite patterns, so I thought I’d carry it outside too,” she says. The design makes her porch pop and provides a fun, neutral foundation for whatever style she has in mind, no matter the season.
“I always start with something that I love,” says Julia.
“It doesn’t matter what it is. I started with the stripes on the porch, and it was easier to do than it looks,” she says. A full tutorial can be found on her blog, but if you’re not the DIY type, you can still get the look in other ways. “If you don’t want to paint your porch, you can buy a blackand-white outdoor rug,” says Julia.
GET CREATIVE
Decorating for Halloween can be inexpensive if you focus on what you already have.
“One year my dad kept a disgusting tooth, so I hung that,” says Julia. “We went to the Sedlec Ossuary in Prague, where everything is made of real bones, and we blew up our pictures for our background. If it’s interesting, they’ll like it.” Of course, she buys pumpkins and fake spiders to tie in with the Halloween theme, but you may be surprised at how much you already have to make your fall porch trick-or-treat ready.
“My house is filled with black-and-white patterns, so I
outside
thought I’d carry it too.”