Sandra Mardenfeld

The hues of 2026 support bringing an inner peace and light into your space. The Pantone Color Institute started the practice of choosing a color of the year in 1999 as an educational program to jumpstart conversations about culture and color, with their first official selection becoming Cerulean Blue. More than 20 years later, an annual hue is still picked … with other companies now joining in with their choices.

Floor mats have decorated homes for thousands of years, with the first known one appearing 6,000 years ago in Mesopotamia, according to Ultimate Mats. Initially, their use differed from the doormats of today. People mostly had earthen floors, and the mats served as seating and sleeping pads rather than a way of preventing dirt from shoes littering the house. Many of these early mats consisted of straw or grass until the early 1800s, when byproducts from weaving looms were also used.

If you want to grow a vivid, joyful garden with pink, yellow, orange, and other bright-colored blooms then the gerbera daisy (Gerbera jamesonii) is for you. The flowers come from South Africa and offer a range of sizes and colors, according to Gardening Know How. The site advises to select more compact plants — gerbera daisies from 2 to 5 inches — for pots and beds since the flower stems are stronger.