Is your bedroom a peaceful and restful retreat, or are you glad you spend most of your time in there with your eyes closed?

Since we don't tend to entertain guests in our bedrooms (ahem!) it's easy to put off decorating them, and they can become dumping grounds for clothes and bedding. But really you should treat your bedroom with the same care you do your living room; after all you do spend one-third of your life in it!

Here are five suggestions to help move your bedroom from messy storage room to restful and interesting:

Hide Clutter - Your bedroom will never be magazine-worthy if it’s littered with piles of clothing, no matter how neatly folded they are. Like it or not your clothes spend more time in your bedroom than you do, so it’s vital to give them a home. As well as the obvious wardrobes (fitted or otherwise) there are any number of other items of furniture which can be used to store clothes, from beds with storage underneath to ottomans, blanket boxes, drawer units, even decorative boxes that can sit daintily on bedside tables to store jewellery or cufflinks. Just about everything in your bedroom should have a storage function to soak up the mountains of clothes we all have. To keep things streamlined, storage with drawers and lids is preferable to open shelving, neatly hiding clutter so you can deal with it later. Or not!

Avoid Blank Walls - Although it’s tempting to keep walls clutter-free, avoid big blank walls which will just make the room feel under-scale and empty. Fill a large wall with an extra-large piece of artwork; an affordable option is to have one of your own photographs enlarged at a commercial printers, maybe onto Correx board which is lightweight and easy to hang. Or maybe apply removable vinyl stickers which are now widely available in different styles, from cutesy animals to contemporary shapes.

Angle the Bed - Your bed doesn’t have to be aligned against one wall; ring the changes by putting the head of the bed into a corner instead. If you’re lucky enough to have a large indoor plant (real or otherwise) this can go in the corner behind the headboard, so you feel as though you’re going to sleep under a tree, spending the night in the great outdoors without the inconvenience... well, a bit like that anyway. I saw this in a room set a while back and have always wanted to implement it!

Four-Poster Feel - If you want a four-poster feel without the expense hang a mosquito net from the ceiling above the bed. These are available for under £10 and instantly add a touch of drama to the room, even if there are no mozzies around to worry about. Of course if it's warm enough to sleep with the windows open the net will keep other annoying bugs away from you too.

Uplighters - If there’s one room where lighting is important it’s the bedroom. You probably already have bedside lights but I would also recommend an uplighter with a dimmer switch you can reach from the bed; you might need to splice in some extra cable to make this doable. Uplighters give a much gentler light to any room and are ideal for the bedroom; maybe even put it on a timer so it comes on and spreads a gentle light through the room in the morning to help you wake up.

Interior Inspirations’ showroom in Farnborough is packed with gorgeous wallpapers, fabrics and furnishings, a source of true inspiration for all your rooms.