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BEING A TRUE ORIGINAL IS SOMETHING YOU BUILD ONE CHOICE AT A TIME, IN A HOME THAT’S UNMISTAKABLY, UNAPOLOGETICALLY YOURS.

MAKE IT
YOURS. Every square foot of it.

With the world changing constantly, home has never mattered more. For a while there, we were all handed the same idea about what a home should look like. Cathedral ceilings. An open-concept kitchen. Shiplap. So much shiplap. And honestly, there is nothing wrong with any of that. But the most interesting homes have never come from a Pinterest board. They come from the street you live on, the neighbors you have, the life you’re actually living.

Thankfully, this part of Maryland never quite went along with it. Walk down any block in Hampden, Federal Hill, Annapolis or Ellicott City and you’ll find row homes with the same bones, built the same way, and they couldn’t look more different from each other. A painted mural on one. Window boxes overflowing on the next. A front door painted a color that has no business working as well as it does. Your home isn’t a product to be upgraded. It’s a canvas to be lived in. And the most original thing you can do with it has nothing to do with trends and everything to do with you.

Room interior showing canvas prep concept

FIRST, prep the canvas

Here’s what the design blogs skip: A beautifully decorated room that’s drafty in January and swampy in August isn’t a beautifully decorated room. It’s an expensive one. Before you pour yourself into making a space yours, the bones have to work. BGE’s Home Performance with ENERGY STAR® Program connects you with a certified contractor who does a comprehensive assessment of your home, covering insulation, air sealing, heating and cooling, and helps you make the improvements that actually move the needle. Tighten up the bones and everything else gets easier. You can’t paint a great picture on a canvas full of holes.

Learn more at BGEsmartenergy.com/HomePerformance5

Comfort is an inspiration interior

COMFORT IS AN INSPIRATION. Set the tone.

There’s a reason you can’t focus when you’re too hot and can’t relax when you’re too cold. Comfort isn’t a luxury. It’s the foundation for everything else. When your home feels right, you actually want to be in it. You notice the details. You fix the things that have been bothering you for months. You start making it exactly what you want it to be, one upgrade at a time, all on your terms. Don’t know where to start? A smart thermostat is a good place to begin. It learns your schedule and keeps things exactly the way you like them: warm before you wake up, dialed back while you’re out, just right when you walk back through the door. BGE offers rebates of up to $100 on eligible models, so your home gets smarter, kickstarting your energy savings.

THE
CREATIVITY
ENGINE is the Kitchen.

Every home has a creative center, and in most Maryland homes, that’s the kitchen. You know it the second you walk through the door. The smell of Old Bay, Maryland’s emotional support spice, and a tray of crabcakes coming out of the oven. And when it’s 90 degrees outside, the last thing you need is a hot oven or conventional stove making it worse. An induction cooktop heats only the pot: precise, fast, no wasted energy heating the whole kitchen. A toaster oven handles roasted vegetables and weeknight pizza without a 20-minute preheat. An air fryer cooks food worth sitting down for in less time than your streaming queue can make a decision. Cooking efficiently isn’t cooking less. It’s cooking with more intention.

Creativity engine kitchen visual

Originality IS BASICALLY FREE.

Originality was never supposed to be a luxury. The most personal homes aren’t the most expensive ones. They’re the ones where someone made intentional choices, one room at a time, with whatever they had. An efficient home just gives you more to work with. Less wasted on heating a drafty hallway. Less lost to appliances running harder than they should. More left for the things that actually make a house feel like yours.

Not sure where to start? That’s exactly what the Quick Home Energy Check-up is for. A certified pro walks your home, helps you understand how it’s performing and points you toward your next best step.

Schedule yours at BGEsmartenergy.com/Quick5

Originality is basically free visual