5 Classy Ways To Incorporate Harry Potter Into Your Home Decor

Do you solemnly swear you are up to no good? True fans of J.K. Rowling's epic seven-book series know that even though the final Harry Potter books and movies came out years ago, the magic of Harry's world never actually ends. If you are still dreaming of an alternate life where you received a letter at age 11 informing you that you had been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, there are ways to bring your Harry Potter fandom into your adult world without going to the lengths of brewing your own potions or keeping an owl as a pet, both of which are generally inadvisable.

One way to pay homage to the world of Privet Drive and the Ministry of Magic is to incorporate some styles from Harry Potter into your home decor scheme. Decorating a la Harry, Ron, and Hermione does not mean going over the top, though, with wall-length banners featuring the Gryffindor lion, or a bookshelf displaying your collection of flying broomsticks. You can work references to the series into your home decorations in much more subtle ways — ways that may make you and your guests feel like you're living at Hogwarts without the fear that Lord Voldemort and the Death Eaters might take over the world. PopSugar Living has some ideas for inspiration to start you on your Harry Potter home decor journey.

Without even stating the obvious — that the world of Harry Potter is born out of some of the greatest books ever written — books play an integral role in so many of the Hogwarts gang's adventures. From the Half-Blood Prince's tattered copy of "Advanced Potion-Making" that led to so much trouble in Book Six to Hermione's ever-ubiquitous references to "Hogwarts, A History" and Tom Riddle's diary that both possessed Ginny Weasley and ultimately turned out to be a Horcrux, books are pivotal to much of Harry's epic story. Any home paying homage to Harry Potter should include a home library or, at the very least, a comfy reading nook.

Fortunately, focusing on books in a home decor scheme is not difficult. Chatelaine provides a list of ideas for how to showcase your collection, including book towers and stacking crates as ingenious methods of display that may be a little more funky and fresh than the classic bookshelf. You can also incorporate art pieces into your bookshelves to break them up visually and make them appear a little bit more interesting — prints of moody castles and fantastical creatures could even continue to play up the Harry Potter vibe. And of course, any room oriented toward a love of reading needs lots of cozy couches and blankets to curl up with and get lost in a wonderful story. The hygge decorating trend, with its emphasis on warmth, may work well in this kind of space.

The story of Harry Potter, at its core, is about the struggle between love and fear, with Lord Voldemort, who is incapable of love and operates using fear as his source of control, pitted against Harry, a young teenage wizard with far less magical skill than Voldemort but in possession of the one power Voldemort lacks: love. Any space paying homage to Harry should also highlight what makes him special — his unfaltering sense of love and compassion for the people around him. You can honor your own powers of love by incorporating tributes to your community and the people who support you into your living area.

Some characters in Harry Potter take their dedication to friends and family to the next level — remember how Luna Lovegood decorated her bedroom with giant, life-sized, hand-drawn portraits of Harry, Hermione, Ron, Ginny, and Neville? Never fear, you don't need to go quite that far in adding a sense of community to your space. Clare Murthy Photography provides some tips for designing a gallery wall for photos of family and friends, including balancing an overall feeling of cohesiveness and consistency with mixed and matched colors and frames. If you keep lines of sight in mind and have a sense of how you want your gallery to look before you ever even pick up a hammer, your gallery wall will appear more intentional and professional, as opposed to resembling a high schooler's photo collage.

Any space that calls to mind Harry's love of his community would be incomplete without a few references to the Weasley family's house, also referred to as the Burrow. Home to Harry's best friend Ron and eventual life partner Ginny, the Burrow is a jam-packed space for an enormous, wacky family of nine redheads. It is full of odd objects that reference Mr. Weasley's eccentric fixation on Muggle memorabilia, as well as magical knickknacks that emphasize the family's sense of closeness and cohesion, such as Mrs. Weasley's clock that indicates where each member of the family is at all times. The overwhelming takeaway from the Burrow is a sense of friendly chaos, but don't worry, you can bring the Burrow vibe into your home's space without any of the ensuing mess.

PopSugar Living recommends invoking the Burrow by incorporating lots of red into your living space and going big with mismatched prints, potentially even crossing the border from bold into clashy. Because Mr. Weasley's love of Muggles has kept him in a perpetually low-paying job at the Ministry of Magic, money is tight at the Weasley house, meaning a lot of their belongings are hand-me-downs or secondhand. Thrift stores would be a great source for scoring some vintage pieces that could recall the Burrow's well-loved furniture. Finally, make sure you find a large dining table — Molly Weasley's cooking and hosting skills are legendary, so to make your house truly feel like the Burrow, you'll have to host some epic dinners.

Has anything ever struck you about the movie intros for the Harry Potter series? As the series progresses, the introductory scenes where the movie title is displayed for the first time become darker and darker, as covered by Bored Panda. And it's not just the title intros — as the Wall Street Journal reports, the lighting, colors, and details within the movie scenes themselves also become darker with each subsequent movie. This color shift makes sense, as the storylines also become darker and more disturbing as Voldemort returns to power and begins an all-out assault on the Wizarding World.

So how do you bring darkness into your home without turning your house into a creepy old gothic castle? According to PopSugar Living, it's all about balance. You can choose to use darker, deeper wood materials for your furniture options, and add layers of rich colors such as burgundies and golds with your accent pillows and throws to keep the overall darker vibe from becoming too overwhelming (burgundy and gold also invoke the colors of Gryffindor House!). If you have incorporated a portrait gallery wall of your family and friends as referenced above, you can work in darker picture frames, or even print your photos in black and white for a look that is both muted and classy. Painting one statement wall a darker color could be another good option for working darkness into your room without creating a gloomy atmosphere.

Probably one of the easiest ways to bring Hogwarts and the Gryffindor gang into your home is to add little pieces in each room that call the Wizarding World to mind. You can find out which Hogwarts house you belong to (there are thousands of internet quizzes, but the only J.K. Rowling-approved version is found on Wizarding World) and then decorate your home with that house's color in mind: red and gold for Gryffindor, blue and bronze for Ravenclaw, yellow and black for Hufflepuff, and green and silver for Slytherin.

Small, fanciful details throughout your home can invoke the world of Diagon Alley and the Quidditch World Cup in subtler ways. Some examples recommended by PopSugar Living include adding a small inscription to an ornate mirror reading, "Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi," which of course reads backward as "I show not your face but your heart's desire," the words above the famous Mirror of Erised. Or, you could pay homage to Hermione's passion for social justice with a pillow reading "Proud Member of S.P.E.W." Owl imagery on your kitchen tea towels and a china cabinet displaying goblets instead of traditional glassware could be a way to bring the Great Hall into your cooking and dining areas. The sky is really the limit when it comes to your magical, whimsical decor options — unless, of course, you can take to the skies flying a broomstick.