In a London terrace the hallway is usually long, narrow and short of daylight, and it takes more knocks than most rooms, from bikes, buggies and wet shoes.
Narrow hallway ideas
- Paint the walls and ceiling a pale, warm colour to make the most of the light there is.
- Hang a large mirror on the long wall, facing a door or window if you can.
- Lay floor tiles on the diagonal, or boards across the hall, to make it look wider. Boards laid lengthways make it look longer.
- Choose shallow storage, such as a slim shoe cabinet and wall hooks, over a deep console table.
- Where a door into the hall swings across it, a pocket door slides into the wall instead. Not every wall can take one, as our guide to pocket door openings explains.
What colour to paint a hallway, and which paint
Every room opens off the hall, so choose a colour that sits with the rooms either side. Warm off-whites, soft greens such as Soulful Sage, the Dulux colour for 2027, and earthy browns all do that. In a small hall you can use one colour on the walls, woodwork and ceiling, which Little Greene suggests for its 2027 shade, Marle.
A hall with no window will never look bright in a pale colour. Some people go the other way, with a deep colour that makes the hall feel deliberate and cosy, and put the effort into the lighting instead.
The lower half of a hallway wall gets scuffed whatever the colour. Use a paint sold as scrubbable or durable on the walls, and eggshell or satin on the skirting, doors and spindles. A darker shade below a dado rail with a paler one above hides marks at bike and bag height.
Hallway panelling ideas
Panelling to dado or two-thirds height protects the part of the wall that gets knocked and is quicker to repaint than plaster. It is usually painted MDF. In a Victorian or Edwardian house, a moulded dado rail with a hard-wearing paint below can suit the hall better than square box panels.
A radiator on the panelled wall has to come off and be refitted on the face of the panels, a short plumbing job that we arrange with the panelling. Our carpentry and joinery and skirting and architrave pages cover the woodwork.
Best flooring for a hallway
A hall floor takes grit and water from the street. Porcelain tiles are the hardest wearing of the usual choices, and a geometric pattern suits a Victorian or Edwardian house. If original encaustic tiles survive under carpet or hardboard, they can often be cleaned and repaired. Luxury vinyl tiles and engineered wood are warmer and quieter underfoot, and our guide to engineered wood or LVT compares the two.
A new floor raises the level at the front door and under every door off the hall, so some doors may need trimming. Our guides to doors before or after flooring and levelling over old floor tiles cover the details, and our floor fitting page covers the work.
Hallway, stairs and landing ideas
The stairs and landing are usually decorated with the hall as one tall space. The wall above the stairs needs a stair platform or a small tower to reach safely, and the spindles take longest because each one is painted by hand. For that reason a hallway, stairs and landing is usually priced by the day. A painter and decorator in London typically charges £250 to £400 a day, with paint, materials and usually VAT on top, and our painters and decorators page lists our other typical prices.
A runner on painted or stained treads, and spindles in a contrasting colour to the handrail, change the look without new joinery. If you do replace the balustrade, the Building Regulations require the gaps to be small enough that a 100 mm sphere cannot pass through.
Hallway storage ideas
The space under the stairs is the biggest store in most halls. Pull-out drawers or cupboards made to fit use all of it, including the low end that a single door wastes; see our under-stairs storage fitting page. Elsewhere, hooks at two heights, one for children, and a shallow shoe cabinet by the door keep the floor clear. A meter cupboard can be boxed in with a door, as long as the meter can still be read and the gas emergency control valve stays within reach.
Hallway lighting ideas
One pendant in a long hall leaves both ends dark. Wall lights along the hall, a stair light that switches from the top and the bottom, and low step lights make a dark hallway easy to use at night. Get the wiring done before the hall is decorated; we arrange a qualified electrician for it.
We decorate hallways, stairs and landings across London and can lay a new hall floor as part of the same job. Send photographs of the hall, stairs and landing for a price. We get back to everyone within one working day.