How to Safely Move and Arrange Your Favorite Farmhouse Décor

Farmhouse décor is awkward cargo. Most of it is three-dimensional, painted, dried, woven, or galvanized, and none of it stacks well in a box. The pieces that make a room feel gathered are the pieces that arrive with a bent leaf or a chipped corner if they are packed in a hurry.

The way through is to treat the décor as its own small move inside the larger one. Sort it by how it will hang rather than by what it is, pack each material against the thing that damages it, and decide the walls in the new house before the truck is loaded. The pieces then arrive ready to go back up instead of waiting in the garage for a free weekend.

Sort the décor by how it hangs, not by what it is

Four loads cover almost everything in a farmhouse house. Wall pieces are the signs, wreaths, shutters, and framed prints that need a hook. Surface pieces are the crocks, cake stands, trays, and canisters that sit on something. Textiles are the feed sack pillows, grain sack runners, cotton garlands, and throws. Seasonal pieces are the things that come out for a month and go back in a bin.

That sort answers the packing question before it starts. Seasonal pieces go into labeled bins that ride in the car, because they are the least urgent and the easiest to lose. Surface pieces go in the truck with the kitchen. Wall pieces travel together in one flat box or one padded crate so that nothing heavy is stacked on them.

Pack each material against what actually damages it

Painted and chippy wood

Old paint flakes at the edges, and a moving blanket rubbing against it for two hundred miles takes more off than the road did in twenty years. Wrap painted signs and shutters in paper first, then pad the corners with a folded towel, and keep the painted face from touching anything rigid. Skip plastic wrap on chippy pieces, because it lifts loose paint when it comes off.

Galvanized metal and iron

Metal does not break, but its finish marks. Wrap a galvanized tub or tray in paper rather than tape, and keep iron hooks and handles from pressing into softer pieces. Anything with a sharp edge gets its own corner padding, and small metal pieces travel in a canvas bag so they do not become loose projectiles in the truck.

Dried wreaths, stems, and grasses

A wreath that gets crushed will not recover, and a box of loose stems arrives as dust. Hang wreaths on a hook or a strap near the truck wall, or lay each one flat in a box by itself with the front facing up. Bundle dried stems with twine before the move rather than after, when half of them will already be broken.

Textiles and soft goods

Pillows, runners, and garlands compress well, which makes them useful padding for the boxes around them. Wash and dry everything first, because dust and mustiness set in a closed box, and pack textiles in breathable bags rather than sealed plastic. A cotton garland coiled loosely in a paper bag arrives ready to drape, while one crushed under a box arrives as a tangle.

Make a placement map for the new house

Arranging is easier when the decisions were made before the move. Walk the new rooms with a tape measure and note the length of each wall, the height of the windows, and where the light lands in the morning and the afternoon. Then sketch where the big pieces go and note the wall each one hangs on.

Photograph the old rooms before they are emptied. The arrangement that already works in your house is the best plan for the new one, and a photo settles arguments about where the shelf went and how high the sign hung. Mark the box or crate for each group with the room it belongs to, so the wall pieces for the living room land in the living room instead of the garage.

Hang the anchors first and let the room tell you the rest

Unpack in the order the eye reads a room: the largest piece on its wall, then the surface pieces, then the small things. A big sign or a row of shutters establishes the scale, and everything after it is easier to place. Hang the anchors at eye level or slightly above, measured from the floor rather than guessed, and leave one wall in each room largely bare so the room has somewhere to rest.

Light decides the rest. A piece that looked right in the old living room may sit in shadow in the new one, so stand in the doorway at the hour you use the room most and move the small pieces toward the light. Groups of three read better than pairs on a shelf, and a hanging oval chalkboard can change with the season without the wall coming down.

Hand the two-person pieces to a crew

Hutches, armoires, tall shelves, and anything that hangs above a doorway are the pieces that turn a décor move into a furniture move. Those are also the pieces most likely to be damaged by a household lifting them down a stairwell. Full professional moving services include the padding, the straps, and the second set of hands that a heavy hutch needs, and the crew can set it against the wall the placement map names instead of leaving it in the hall.

For anything that comes apart, ask about furniture moving services before the move rather than after. A shelf that is disassembled and labeled takes a fraction of the space of one that is carried whole, and the hardware stays with the piece instead of going into a drawer that ends up in another room.

A local crew that knows the pieces

Farmhouse furniture is what residential movers handle every week, and a crew that knows these pieces already knows which end of a hutch to lift and how much padding a painted sign needs. That experience matters more on a truck full of one-of-a-kind pieces than on a truck full of boxes.

Move and Hang Farmhouse Décor With Fly Guy Moving New Lenox

For the pieces that need two sets of hands, Fly Guy Moving New Lenox is at 1333 S Schoolhouse Rd, New Lenox, IL 60451-2746, and the phone number is (815) 429-1519. The Google Maps listing shows the location on South Schoolhouse Road.

The New Lenox location handles local and long distance moving, residential and commercial moves, packing, storage, labor-only help, piano and fitness equipment moves, and furniture assembly and disassembly.

The first evening in the new house

Put one anchor piece up before the boxes are unpacked, even if it is only a wreath on the front door. A room that already holds something you chose reads as yours on the first night, and the rest of the arranging can wait for daylight.