Once you cover your home with faux log siding from TruLog you’ll probably want to make some additional upgrades to the outside of your house. After all, most log cabins have nice decks, front porches, and wood furniture to match the exterior of the home. And we also talked about how you can make your entire property look more “cabin-y” by adding stamped concrete walkways, fire pits, log cabin mailboxes, and even covering your garage and outbuildings with the same cabin siding as you put on your home.
But what about the interior of your cabin? After all, it certainly seems like many log homes have similar themes when it comes to permanent fixtures. While we might discuss ways to decorate the interior of a house in future blogs, let’s take a look at some of the more permanent changes you can make to ensure your house feels as much like a log cabin on the inside as it does on the outside.
Wood Walls
Here at TruLog, we only sell the log siding for homes that goes on the outside of your house. But that doesn’t mean that the interior of your home couldn’t use an upgrade, too. It certainly doesn’t have to match the cabin siding you put on the outside of the home, but it could. Simply install wood interior walls over existing drywall and you’ll be that much closer to the feel of a log cabin. Some types are single boards, others go in more like laminate flooring. The good thing is that you can do it room by room, so you don’t have to have a huge outlay of money all at once.
Staircases
If you have an enclosed staircase, there’s not much you can do to make it look more like a cabin than to replace the handrail with one that looks more rugged. But most stairways have newels and banisters that can be replaced with more natural-looking wood, like those you might see in a log cabin.
Taxidermied Animals
While taxidermied animals might not be permanent enough to be considered “fixtures,” there’s a good chance that once you find the right place for it that it’s not going to move. When it comes to using the art of taxidermy as decoration, you have many choices. First of all, will you only use animals that you personally hunted? Are you more of a head-on-the-wall decorator, or are you more interested in having the entire animal stuffed? No matter, because either way they’ll look great at your new wooden walls!
Antler Chandeliers
Antler chandeliers aren’t for everyone, but there’s no denying that they make their way into many log homes. If you like the use of animals in decorating but are running into pushback from a significant other who’s not keen on the idea, why not suggest antler chandeliers? After all, the antlers are naturally shed by the deer every year, so nothing had to die in the creation of the chandelier!
Fireplaces
Have you ever seen a log cabin without a fireplace? Probably not. That’s why you need a fireplace in your home that has metal log siding!
Still, what if you don’t currently have a wood-burning fireplace? Is it worth it to bust a hole through your ceiling (or through your second floor and then your ceiling) in order to get that log cabin look? Probably not. But you could install a gas fireplace with much less effort. There are also electric “fireplaces” that project an image of a fireplace while also providing heat.
Stone
What’s one thing that most often accompanies a fireplace? The chimney. And while it’s unlikely you’ll put in a chimney (as we mentioned above), you might add a fake chimney made out of stone in order to accompany your gas or electric fireplace. Stonework, whether full stones or a stone facade, can also be added to existing features such as kitchen islands and interior walls.
Once you have TruLog’s metal siding panels on the outside of your home, the maintenance you have to perform on it will be so low that you’ll be able to save up for all of these upgrades. But first, find that perfected siding that looks like wood for you home right here.