11 Hallway Decor Ideas That Totally Strut Their Stuff
The hallway in a home too often goes overlooked or ignored. When resigned to its default colorless walls and empty nooks, this in-between space serves no function beyond connecting major rooms in a home. At ELLE DECOR, we consider this a waste of space and a gross offense.
Despite its scant square footage and tricky spatial makeup, a hallway can be the key element that completes a home’s overall design. It can connect each room scheme and make that room-to-room transition a joyful experience rather than something you hurry guests through to avoid lingering in ugly.
Whether you’re dealing with a narrow windowless corridor, a curved passageway, or space with some kind of architecturally interesting arch, there’s so much potential for a memorable walkway. A dash of paint, a well-proportioned console table, and just the right kind of framed artwork can transform an unmemorable hallway into a chic portal that steals the show. In fact, hallways can even offer added functionality in the form of a covert wet bar or barely-there work space.
Ready to rethink how your hallway works for you? Below, we’ve culled some of the best hallway decor ideas from our archives—all proof that a hallway is anything but function over form.
Moody Hallway Moment
Interior designer Mike Moser and architect Tyler Thomas are the dream team—and the hallway in their Hollywood Hillside bungalow is proof. The duo drenched the windowless space in Sherwin Williams's Best Bronze and brought in an angular table. But the true showstopper of this runway-like corridor is the Gio Ponti–style shield mirror that allows every inhabitant to get a glimpse of themselves with each movement to the bedroom.
Maximalist Hallway
Leave it to Eric Egan, the man behind the decor of some of the world’s most beautiful hotel rooms, to leave no stone unturned—or rather, no hallway undecorated. In his elegant Milan apartment, he painted the walls in Farrow & Ball’s Cord and installed vintage curtains and artwork galore. Bellissimo!
High Contrast Hallway
Alfredo Paredes, an ELLE DECOR A-List designer, believes that he was born to renovate this Gatsby-era mansion, and his treatment of its grand hallway is proof that he actually might have been. Here, one wanders to the bedroom via a high contrast scene of bright white walls filled with a vintage oak table, a textured runner, and a lineup of family photos that are as artful as they are personal.
Museum-Like Hallway
When your hallway is as alluring as your living room, you know you’ve tapped the right designer. Such is the case for a pair of Miami art collectors, who entrusted ELLE DECOR A-List Titan Kelly Behun with their Manhattan home. The André Butzer artwork is given a fitting home against a Holly Hunt wallcovering and gilded side table. We hardly want to move into a room with seating!
Artful Hallway
New York–based interior designer Sandra Weingort’s treatment of the hallway of this Long Island retreat is part art, part function. A wall-mounted shelf mimics the architectural beams above, making for an artful, if not entirely useful, in-between space.
Stately Hallway
Welcome to Château de Fleury, a manse located just an hour’s drive from Paris. Upon entering, a galavant down its lengthy hallway will give any guest a sense of grandeur befitting such an estate. Stag antlers and Baroque-style light fixtures create an effortless, yet stately, look that could be mimicked in anything from a mountain retreat to a Texan home.
Minimalist Hallway
Sometimes a subtle backdrop allows just the right details to really sing. Take the upstairs hallway of this Houston home, for instance, where designer Elizabeth Young brought in a Marilyn Minter photograph that doesn’t have to beg to be seen amid the chic Urban Electric Co. pendants and vintage Persian runner.
Sculptural Hallway
Take notes from your favorite museum and give your hallway a touch of culture. In the entry hall of this Paris apartment, a Jean Touret sculpture and Aude Herlédan painting are in conversation with the artful marble floors.
Functional Hallway
The ELLE DECOR A-List firm of Nicole Fuller knows how to transform a windowless space into something of a haven—that you would never guess serves two functions. The long entry hallway of this edgy Manhattan home is defined by a custom Siberian marble shelf that was given legs and touch-latch drawers for shoe storage. This is also where the client keeps slippers for guests to wear throughout the apartment. How do we get an invite?
Hallway Seating
If your hallway has a wider berth, create a cozy corner reading nook with a tasteful seating option. In this Park Avenue apartment, designer Georgia Tapert Howe brought in everything one needs to feel right at home in the most unlikeliest of spaces—the entry hallway. A chic squiggly wood seat is perched beside stacks of books and a vase overflowing with sweet-smelling florals. We just might never get beyond three steps in!
Swanky Hallway
Bold color blocking is the name of the game in this atmospheric hallway, belonging to Robert Rowe. A photograph by David Haxton hangs above a 1970s stool—all against the backdrop of textured wallpaper and a warm amber-brown paint treatment. One class act.
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