If you're planning to purchase decorative homewares for your partner's home, you should take the advice here into consideration when doing this.

Make sure you buy homeware that suits their taste, rather than your own

You must ensure that the homeware items you buy are in keeping with your partner's tastes, rather than your own. You should do this, even if you spend a lot of time at their property and feel very 'at home' there.

The reason for this is as follows; if for example, your partner's home has a very sparse, masculine aesthetic, with a few simple pieces of solid wood and leather furniture, along with a handful of carefully-selected decorative items, and you decide to buy them a toile lampshade and a pink cake stand (both of which you think are beautiful), not only will your gift seem thoughtless but it may also give your partner the impression that you're trying to put your own stamp on their home, which does not belong to you.

This could be very problematic if the two of you have already discussed you moving into their home and have decided that neither of you is ready to take this step, as your partner might perceive the unsuitable decorative items as an attempt by you to overstep a boundary that both of you had previously agreed to put in place.

With this in mind, you must ensure that the decorative homewares you buy are going to fit in nicely with the aesthetic your partner has cultivated in their home. For a home with the aforementioned sparse, masculine aesthetic, you might want to opt for a plain, geometric black vase or a decorative stone chess set.

Use your experiences as a couple as inspiration when shopping for the homeware

If you cannot decide which homeware you should buy, try to use the best experiences you have shared with your partner as inspiration.

For example, if the two of you regularly go skiing and always have a wonderful time together on these trips, you could buy them a pair of decorative, antique skis made from wood that they could display on a wall. Likewise, if you are both film buffs and your favourite date-night activity is watching a classic film, then you could order a cushion which has been printed with a quote or an image from a film that they love and which you have watched together many times. Taking this approach will give the gift some meaning whilst still ensuring that it relates to their interests and preferred aesthetic.

For more information, contact a decorative homewares store.