Do you enjoy your outdoor living space but want to make sure it's also a great spot for entertaining friends and family when they head over? Achieving this is simple and only requires you to take some simple tips into consideration. Particularly, the following five are a good starting point.

1. Make it spacious

An entertaining area should be spacious. Spacious doesn't equate to having a massive outdoor space - it just means that you have to make sure whatever space you do have is utilised properly. Move things around to make your space less congested, give people a proper path to walk through, and open up the doors connecting the outside and inside. With a bit of rearranging, you can make most outdoor spaces really work.

2. Work with the light

Whether it's natural or artificial, you want your outdoor entertaining space to have plenty of lighting. Of course, during the day is going to be a simple affair, but make sure you've got some good lighting on hand at night. Ambience goes a long way, too. Overly bright lights will make it too jarring, however, so go for warmer lighting that illuminates the space well but remains soft and inviting.

3. Have some shade

Shade is always important. During the warmer months of the year, you're going to want to have somewhere you can sit without the sun directly hitting you. Patios with roofs will account for this, but if your outdoor space is mostly uncovered, at least have a few spots with shade - table umbrellas, trees, shade tents, etc. On those unforgiving, intensely sunny days, you'll be glad you have those shaded areas to retreat to.

4. Seating

Sure, standing may be good for your health, but it does get pretty tiresome. And if you're spending the day or night outside, chances are you're looking to relax more than you are striving to achieve some kind of "standing for the longest time" world record. Our point? Just make sure you've got a good amount of seating around the place. Keep it basic when it's just for you, but have some spare outdoor chairs/lounges for when you're having friends and family over.

5. Control the climate

Regardless of whether it's the warmer months or the cooler months, there are some things you can do to control the outdoor climate. Outdoor heaters are a common choice during winter, whereas fans (roof or standing) are common during summer. Depending on the humidity, fans can be somewhat ineffective, but little things such as placing a bowl of ice in front of the fan's trajectory can help add a little more chill to the air being pushed your way.

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